When it comes to the most iconic skyline in the world, New York City might be at the top of the list. From skyscrapers like the Empire State Building to beautiful Central Park, New York’s cityscape is filled with architectural masterpieces that define the city. However, for every successful project that makes up the current architectural landscape of the Big Apple there’s also several projects that never got past the planning stages.
Never Built New York by Greg Goldin and Sam Lubell is a look at the unbuilt projects in New York City that might have shaped the skyline as we know it today in the past 200 years. It’s a book filled with stories, sketches, renderings, and photographs of models that could have drastically transformed the city, from developer William Zeckendorf’s Rooftop Airport, perched on steel columns 200 feet above street level, spanning from 24th to 71st Street between Ninth Avenue and the Hudson River, to John Johansen’s Leapfrog City proposal to create an entirely new neighborhood atop the tenements of East Harlem. With nearly 200 proposals, this book will really make you wonder what could have been.