Co-Sponsored by Merchant’s House Museum

Join us for this special book talk with Roberta Brandes Gratz as she speaks about her acclaimed book The Battle for Gotham: New York in the Shadow of Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs.

In her provocative book, acclaimed urbanist Roberta Brandes Gratz challenges the conventional wisdom on how cities authentically regenerate. Through the clashing visions of postwar urban renewal (highway building czar Robert Moses on the one hand and urbanist author and activist Jane Jacobs on the other), Gratz examines the fall and remarkable comeback of New York City and demonstrates how this story parallels that of many American cities. Battle For Gotham argues that New York City reached its lowest point after decades of destructive Moses projects, and began an organic regeneration with Moses’ demise and the cessation of his sweeping, federally funded projects that wiped out so much of the city. New York’s turnaround, Gratz illustrates, began with the small, local citizen-led efforts reflecting the urban philosophy of Jacobs.

Roberta Brandes Gratz is an award-winning journalist and urbanist who has been observing and writing about cities – how they grow, fall apart, recover – for more than 40 years. NYC-born and raised, Roberta started her journalism career as a reporter for the New York Post under Dorothy Schiff. She left when Rupert Murdoch bought the paper and went on to write six books on urban change. Gratz’s writings have also appeared in the Nation, New York Magazine, The New York Times Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Review, Common Edge and various online publications. She has brought her in-depth research and expertise to appointments, consultancies, and speaking engagements around the world. From 2003 to 2011, she served on the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission, where, appointed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, she helped preserve New York City’s significant buildings and neighborhoods for seven years.