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Times Square, Manhattan, NY 10036, United States
GPS: 40.758828885052, -73.984225901657
Visit the crossroads of the world Times Square. Located in the borough of Manhattan in New York, Times Square constitutes one of the most animated districts in the world with Shibuya in Tokyo, the Champs-Élysées in Paris or Piccadilly Circus in London. Formerly called Longacre Square in the 1870s, Times Square takes its current name from the famous newspaper The New York Times, which moved its headquarters there in 1904 in a skyscraper over 110 meters high to get closer to the first metro line underground of the city, newly built. It was the mayor of the city at the time, George Brinton McClellan Jr. who decides to rename this New York district at the beginning of the 20th century.
With the event of the Great Depression (economic crisis of the 1930s following the stock market crash of 1929) and the conflict of the Second World War, crossroads of the world Times Square changed radically. Its entertainment sites moved towards questionable places of debauchery where delinquency, prostitution, corruption and crime thrived. It was not until the 1990s that the district began its moult and became frequentable again under the mandate of Mayor Rudolph Giuliani who advocated zero tolerance. At the end of the 20th century, Times Square established itself as an essential tourist destination and one of the most emblematic places in the world. It is filled with luxury hotels, skyscrapers, giant billboards, scintillating lights and major entertainment venues. In 2009, the square was transformed into a pedestrian zone to streamline car traffic on the famous Broadway avenue. With more than 350,000 daily visitors on average, this “Crossroads of the World Times Square” as it is sometimes nicknamed, concentrates the busiest avenues on the planet. Much awaited, the New Year’s ceremony attracts around 1 million people to Times Square each year, in a festive atmosphere. This tradition dates back to the year 1907 when a fireworks display and a large bright time ball put in breath the inhabitants and tourists who came to gather on the famous square on December 31. Due to its dynamic, extravagant and disproportionate character, Times Square thus symbolizes the gigantism of American urban megalopolises.
Crossroads of the world Times Square is also known to house the theatre district of New York City (Broadway Theatre District). The latter is equipped with numerous places of artistic performances, performance halls, cinemas and a large number of theatres installed between 40th Street and 57th Street, Eighth Avenue and the historic section of Broadway. The opportunity to experience Times Square Broadway occupies the rank of cultural and cinematographic epicentre of the “city that never sleeps”. Multiple events, attractions, shops and restaurants punctuate this recreational and mythical place in New York, day and night.