This court in Manhattan handles more than 100,000 arrests a year, and averages about 70 to 90 cases during the 5 pm-1 am night shift.

Operating since 1967, the court has been an inspiration for the tv series Night Court and various scenes from Law & Order.

Interestingly, the court has become something of a bizarre tourist attraction, and was even listed in a Lonely Planet guide as a destination.

Notwithstanding recent arraignments of celebrities like rapper Sean "Diddy" Combs and French politician Dominique Strauss-Kahn, there is a compelling interest in the American judicial system that underpins much of the tourism. And the obvious hope to see Bull Shannon lay down the law.

Source: AP

view full location details...

Built in the Art Deco style and completed in 1932, this massive structure is the third largest building (in terms of square footage/2.9 million ft²) in Manhattan- just behind 55 Water Street (3.5 million ft²) and the Met Center (3.14 million ft²). It was formally the Port Authority headquarters and Inland Terminal Number One.

Google purchased the building in 2010, and it's currently the de facto headquarters for their east coast operations. The square footage of this single building is larger than the entire sum of all the buildings in the 26-acre Googleplex campus in Mountain View, California.

view full location details...

Located at this location since 1965, the Explorers Club is a group of professionals dedicated to the advancement of field research.

Members of the group were the first explorers to the North Pole (Robert E. Peary & Matthew Henson in 1909), first to the South Pole (Roald Amundsen in 1911), first to the summit of Mt. Everest (Sir Edmund Hillary & Tenzing Norgay in 1953), and first to the surface of the Moon (Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin & Michael Collins in 1969).

Today, the off-world colony group known as Mars One hold regular meetings to plan for a proposed manned mission to Mars in 2025.

Source: New Yorker, April 25, 2014

view full location details...

This studio in Hell's Kitchen, owned and operated by RZA (the Razor), is named after the Wu's debut album, Enter the 36 Chambers.

It's also the unfortunate location of the passing of Ol' Dirty Bastard, on November 13, 2004, from a drug overdose.

Eskimos, submarine operators and everyone else who liked rap jams still mourn his passing.

view full location details...

Closed since the facade collapsed in 2007, Chumley's has been undergoing renovations for seven years. In early 2014, the classic tavern faced a new challenge- neighbors who are sick of unruly tourists flocking to the destination (NY Times article link here).

view full location details...