Street Vendors on 125th Street

I wrote and sent the following unpublished letter-to-the-editor to the New York Amsterdam News. It was written on July 31, 1992.

Dear Editor: Although Karen Carillo's article (July 25) regards the street vendors on 125th Street favorably, seeing them as entrepreneurs following a time-honored tradition in Harlem, she overlooks the fact that the proliferation of these vendors has gotten completely out of hand. For shoppers and other pedestrians walking down 125th Street is equivalent to an obstacle course. instead of a pleasant urban mall-like environment, pictured in the artist's conception during the redesigning of the area, we now have a zoo. Nowhere else in Manhattan do you see this type of situation.

It seems as though the black press, the community, and civic leaders are afraid to say anything critical for fear of being labeled politically incorrect.

People need to earn a living and should be encouraged in their entrepreneurship, but the situation that exists now is intolerable. I'm certain that the merchants, who pay rent and taxes, would be the first to welcome an alternative to what is happening in front of their stores.

Perhaps the best solution to the problem is for the community and civic leaders to provide more indoor sites like mart 125* for the vendors rather than having them sell their wares on the street which creates a health and safety hazard for the public.

*Update: Mart 125, across the street from the Apollo Theatre, has been vacant for several years. Eighteen years after I wrote the above letter, street vendors line both sides of 125th Street (in some places) from St. Nicholas Avenue as far east as Lexington Avenue in all kinds of weather.