Why New York City Can’t Fix Its Ugly Scaffolding Problem

 

Scaffolding covers the sidewalks near buildings at the intersection of West End Avenue and West 88th Street in Manhattan.

NEW YORK—Anne “LaVerne” Gaither teared up when workers dismantled the hunter-green plywood and metal scaffolding that for 21 years obscured the entrance of her Harlem apartment building.

The 220-foot-long structure, known here as a sidewalk shed, was New York City’s oldest existing shed until it came down in December. It was originally built in 2002 to protect pedestrians during required repairs to the neo-Georgian facade of 409 Edgecombe Ave., a century-old landmark once home to luminaries such as W.E.B. DuBois and Thurgood Marshall.