Ken Ficara - The Scars Of Robert Moses

Standing on a subway platform high above Brooklyn You can look out to the west and see the sea But an ugly eight-lane highway blocks the water view This was Robert Moses' great idea

His highway cut this neighborhood in two He destroyed so many homes to put it through Business dries up, the bank forecloses Time has not healed the scars of Robert Moses

He never was elected but Moses ruled New York Governors and mayors obeyed He built highways and bridges, tunnels and roads And he crushed anyone who got in his way

Landmarks, homes and businesses were lost Was all this crowded concrete worth the cost? Traffic clogs his roads and everyone bemoans it Trapped in their cars on the scars of Robert Moses

The Verrazano Bridge opened the same month I was born It brought changes Staten Islanders still mourn Moses built the bridge with no sidewalks and no subways The cars came, the pollution and the haze

They blasted through the hills to build a highway Bulldozed the woods where I once played Put up lots of strip malls, and ticky-tacky houses Covered the Island with the scars of Robert Moses

There's a park on Staten Island where Moses planned a road But people said, "You won't bulldoze this land." Heroes like Jane Jacobs saved Times Square and Greenwich Village They'd be highways now, but someone took a stand

Those neighborhoods they saved are now thriving The districts Moses paved, barely surviving Let's not fall for this development psychosis Now we have a chance to heal the scars of Robert Moses

Dedicated to Jane Jacobs, who saw that the emperor had no clothes.