Driving downtown - Troy, NY. USA
Troy is a city in the U.S. state of New York and the seat of Rensselaer County. The city is located on the western edge of Rensselaer County and on the eastern bank of the Hudson River. Troy has close ties to the nearby cities of Albany and Schenectady, forming a region popularly called the Capital District. The city is one of the three major centers for the Albany Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), which has a population of 1,170,483. At the 2010 census, the population of Troy was 50,129.
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The Central Troy Historic District is an irregularly shaped, 96-acre area of downtown Troy, New York, United States. It has been described as "one of the most perfectly preserved 19th-century downtowns in the [country]"with nearly 700 properties in a variety of architectural styles from the early 19th to mid-20th centuries. These include most of Russell Sage College, one of two privately owned urban parks in New York, and two National Historic Landmarks. Visitors ranging from the Duke de la Rochefoucauld to Philip Johnson have praised aspects of it. Martin Scorsese used parts of downtown Troy as a stand-in for 19th-century Manhattan in The Age of Innocence.
In 1986, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP), superseding five smaller historic districts that had been listed on the Register in the early 1970s.(Two years later, in 1988, the extension of the previous River Street Historic District north of Federal Street was added separately to the NRHP as the Northern River Street Historic District.) There are many buildings designed by the regionally significant architect Marcus F. Cummings. The downtown street plan was borrowed from Philadelphia, and one neighborhood, Washington Square, was influenced by London's squares of its era.
The district reflects Troy's evolution from its origins as a Hudson River port into an early industrial center built around textile manufacture and steelmaking. During this period it was rebuilt twice in the wake of two devastating fires, resulting in its mix of architecture styles. After the decline of its industries in the mid-20th century, downtown Troy was threatened by urban renewal efforts that galvanized local preservationists, leading to the early NRHP listings and eventually the creation of the district.
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