NYC Grid project consists of then-and-now New York City photos

Photographer Paul Sahner has created an image project which consists of exploring New York City street by street and documenting the changes that the locations have suffered over the years.

New York City is one of the best tourist attractions in the world. Millions of people visit NYC each year, craving to get a good view of iconic sites, such as the Empire State Building, Madison Square Garden, and the Statue of Liberty.

On the left: this is how Broadway used to look in 1916. On the right: how Broadway looks right now. Credits: Paul Sahner.

Photographer creates “NYC Grid” project to document New York City’s evolution

Paul Sahner is different. He has moved to New York City a few years ago and has decided to create a photography project entitled “NYC Grid”.

The photographer is aiming to document the city block by block, in order to show the whole world how the surroundings have changed over the years.

Sahner takes a lot of photos and then looks for vintage shots of the same places at the Library of Congress and other sources.

The House of Morgan aka 23 Wall Street is almost unchanged compared to 1917. Credits: Paul Sahner.

Then-and-now New York City photos reveal the changes suffered by the city over the years

Anybody can pay a visit to the project’s website. It contains then-and-now New York City photos showing multiple streets, blocks, and parks of NYC. The list includes the Madison Square Park, Flatiron Building, Broadway, and the City Hall among others.

Visitors will be surprised to see that some streets have not changed at all. They look almost exactly the same as they did at the beginning of the 20th century and here we are at the beginning of the 21th century.

Needless to say, some streets are completely different from decades ago, thus emphasizing the importance of documenting how time is affecting our planet.

The New York Central Building has been sitting alone in Park Avenue for quite a while. However, things have changed from 1942, as the building is now surrounded by skyscrapers.

NYC’s biggest change are the buildings, as the city is a lot more “crowded” than a century ago

The photographer says that his original goals were to explore the city and to discover more about it. However, as the economical climate has become very unstable, a lot of sites may come and go, therefore now it is all about documenting New York City.

One of the biggest changes between now and then is that NYC is more crowded with buildings in 2010s, while the 1900s looked more crowded with people and vintage cars. However, it depends on the street your are looking at, as people’s whereabouts have shifted as well.

All things considered, these stitch-up photos of New York are more than welcomed and they will allow people in the future to see how the city has evolved over the centuries.