FRONT PAGE: "Lose the Traffic. Keep That Times Square Grit." By Nicolai Ouroussoff, New York Times, 26 May 2009.

I travel a lot to many great global cities. Obviously, NYC is a premier venue in that sense.

But what it lacks that other great cities have is that signature open venue that defines its greatness.

And no, Central Park is not it. Central Park is the antithesis of that--by design. It's for New Yorkers.

The obvious place that defines NYC in an iconic sense is Times Square. For some reason, it's taken up to now for the city government to realize that it could do more to accentuate that signature venue by closing traffic there, but to me, it's an obvious move, because it's truly scary to navigate there because of the traffic and that really detracts from the experience, which is otherwise very cool.

Yes, Times Square has been cleaned up from its "Midnight Cowboy" roots and thank God. This move should improve it all the more.