I found this book to be a fascinating read full of diverse information and anecdotes to maintain one’s interest.
It speaks with passion and the decline and regeneration of parts of the waterfront in Jersey City. Artists is a collection of people who were drawn to this area and a majority of whom made their studios and homes around 111 1st Street in a historic building that was once a vibrant tobacco company warehouse.
Some discussion is given to the term gentrification and the people and locations that make urban renewal happen. Some argument is made that the Artists were the advance party, more than a catalyst but the colourful ingredient and fertile conditions that in cheaper neighbourhoods and lower rents, painters, sculptors, musicians, writers, photographers and film makers gravitate and coalesce in a vibrant community. In the process they attract services and start up trends.
I loved the history of the area, the former industrial presence and the result of the passage of time. I hated the truths shared about politics, good intentions and broken promises. There is something romantic about those who transformed a building but the realism of it being demolished was a pain I shared. My dislocation with property development was never brought into a clearer focus.
I hate the thought that money is generated over time holding on to land and I wish local authorise representing people were more transparent.
However the change needed to transform whole areas of urban decay and downtown squalor is not a simple course of action. It will differ from place to place and the previous transport links and the proximity of New York to New Jersey played its part.
The romantic part of me delighted in the vision the Artists brought the beauty they saw in abandoned warehouses and forgotten structures and the chance they took to find space to do their thing.
This book has something for everyone, a literary treatise with full details in chapter endnotes on quotes shared and comprehensive bibliography.
It gave me a new perspective and wider appreciation of community and I recommend it without hesitation as a book you may pass over but to do so would be to miss out and reduce your horizons.

Left Bank of the Hudson is a thoroughly interesting text that is a sophisticated gentrification narrative comprised heavily of economic and cultural backgrounds which provides the foundation. As a former New Yorker I found the discussion of the diverse lives and interests of the artists and the history of businesses that all played a part to attract these artists to the former warehouse districts fascinating. Goodwin also includes a lengthy discussion on cultural preservation that was very revealing to past history as well as future possibilities.