This is why I love archive footage. It's the closest thing we have to a time machine.

Let's all thank the cameraman for hauling a cinderblock around on his shoulder so we can see this.

amazing that whoever filmed this could have had no idea that their personal project would end up being viewed by 200,000 people worldwide

Pure nostalgia. From 1978 to 1980, I bused to Port Authority to get to art school and I can still register the smell pot and roasted chestnuts in my memory. Walking down 8th Avenue to 34th Street you were almost guaranteed to be met by a woman asking if you wanted a date and 42nd Street had small crowds in front of movie houses watching previews of kung fu and horror flicks on a television outside the box office. It was one of NYC's grungiest times but it did have its own charm in a way.

Nice blast from the past! In 1978, I was living there, buying Italian ice, shopping at Macy's, riding that subway line. Thanks!

Despite the fact that serial killers, thrill killers, hit men & street level violent criminals were off the charts during this period, - I still feel a strong sense of nostalgia & affection for this period in time. The fashions, music, artwork, architecture & design from this era continue to astound me & move my soul.

If, like me, you have just watched the 1890s NYC street scenes video and then a 1930s street scenes vid, this has a different feel now. The elderly in this video were the little kids in the 1890s/1900s vid. Then we saw them as adults, entering middle age in the 1930s going about their working lives, and now here they are as very old people still walking along as the city has whirled around them for over 80 years.

Such contrast to the way videos are filmed and watched today. I find tiktok and even movie scenes cut way too fast whereas stuff like this let’s the scene sink in more. Great content here. Thanks!

Appreciate that you leave the sound as it is! Its so annoying that so many other videos put some useless music on top!

I love videos like this. Not merely for nostalgia (born and raised in Brooklyn, still here) but I always hope to spot a relative, or even the family car. One shot in millions but it'd be fun.

in the 70's and 80's we had the perfect equilibrium between technology and humans...we had some but not to the level where technology takes over our life

You captured New York in the late 1970s. I lived in the City then and loved and appreciated everyday. The city had its own pulse and its own grittiness. I regretted the day I had to move out.

“Federal Express” , the cigarette ads, the old cabs, the original Kentucky Fried Chicken…man, nostalgia…

Wow, everyone walked upright.

This is better than Netflix, could watch this all year.

NYC 🗽 IN THE 70'S AND 80S WERE A BLAST !! MUSIC ,FASHION AND ART. ❤🧡💛💞

When I was 22, in February 1978, I dropped out of University, sold everything and went to Europe. Back then there was a deal that let you fly to London from New York for $99. So I got myself from Vancouver, Canada to NYC, with about 5 days in the city because I always wanted to see New York. Slept on the floor of an opera singer’s minuscule apartment, who was going to Juilliard and was a friend of a friend. Wandered around the city discreetly taking pictures, and this video is exactly how I remember it being. I bought standing room tickets for a couple of Broadway shows, took the Subway everywhere, which at that time every square inch outside and a lot of the inside was completely covered in graffiti. And it was really, really filthy. Just thought it was all part of what made New York, New York. Really looked forward to my return visit in a few months on my way home. It was a great trip in many ways, but the best part was getting to compare 5 world cities one after the other, New York, London, Paris, Rome and Amsterdam. Each completely different in every single way, design, housing, street life, noise, smell, transportation. I’ve been back to New York several times, the last being in 2005, and I’d love to go back to Europe and see what might have changed after 45 years!

You can almost smell the car exhaust.

Nowadays everyone feels so self aware of being on camera. Everything felt so candid back then

Wonderful sight, not one person attached to their screens

Is it me or is It such a beautiful sight not to see 1 cell phone.

People back then are probably wondering why he would want to film that.

At 6.34, on the magazine rack, the Esquire magazine is dated 18th July 1978. I just googled Esquire magazine 1978 and somehow the exact issue came up first :)

I was 17 in 1978, living in Ridgewood, Queens, NY! I remember the street signs being color-coded! Manhattan had black letters on a mustard-yellow background (0:14); Queens had blue letters on a whitish-gray background; Brooklyn had white letters on a black background; the Bronx had white letters on a dark blue background and Staten Island, was similar to Manhattan, but instead it was dark blue letters on a mustard-yellow background. Yes, I paid attention to details back then! hehe...

Excellent footage of my NYC during my teenage years! This was at the height of the madness, mayhem, attitude, flava, authenticity, and culture of the true NYC! These years are iconic in our history and will NEVER be duplicated again! So much culture and history came out of these years!

I love comparing prices from then to now. I love when stuff has pricetags in old videos

What a wonderful era that was. The city was broke, we just put up with a major blackout and the Son of Sam, but as New Yorkers we had each other's back through thick and thin.

My parents (from Switzerland) spent a year in NYC in 1978 a decade before I was born, it's nice to see what the city looked like then, for them

I like how you can see both the old and "new" taxicabs. It was always exciting to get an old one because they had the jump seats and you'd fight with your sister to be the one to sit on it.

Back when life was so much simpler!

Thanks for a piece of everyday life in disco era NYC

it's sad to think that probably about half of these people have passed. pretty much anyone in this video over 35 yrs old has moved on. life is short.

Fascinating how it somehow looks modern and historical at the same time.

When I was kid, in the late 70s, we drove into Manhattan on occasion, but it was a fun family routine to make sure all the doors were locked on the car the second we exited the Holland Tunnel. We used to get a kick out it. It didn't matter that we were about to get out of the car and walk around the city anyway, we still did it. The city was seen as dangerous in the 70s, but I think it's actaully more dangerous now because it's life-threatening danger. Back then, regular folk didn't get killed. The worst thing was getting mugged, and it was by seasoned muggers, not crazed people randomly slashing people or pushing unaware commuters into the subway train, like today.

This was a time when Studio 54 was going strong.

I miss the old cars......Made of steel......Real Cars!

Thanks so much for sharing this. Wow, normal people in the streets! I visited NYC for the 1st time 1986. NYC was different then and it wasn't only "better back in the day". It felt often dangerous, but normal people could live there. Streets were jumping. It was exciting and maybe even exotic?!?! It was really something (to see). I enjoyed more visits in the 90s and 2016. In 2016 at first sight everything looked so different compared to when I visited first. It was clean and proper, but at a second glance this 'clean up' had darker sides as well. NYC has become something of an open air mall of expensive brand stores. Sure a rotten Times Square was reason to complain but is the commercialized artificial disneyfied Times Square / City so much better? Some would say Yes. However I wanted to learn more and booked a personal guided tour. She told us that with a job like cashier, bookkeeper, stylist, clerk you simply cannot live in NYC or more precise Manhattan anymore. So everyone who's not a lawyer, doctor, banker, business consultant, CEO, etc.) commutes to Manhattan from oftentimes far away. On the other hand, many condos are empty because they are only 'investments' for those who can afford it. To some, it is only the 2nd or 3rd home and they spend there only a week or so per year. This just doesn't add to the 'character' of a city. And NYC had lots of it. This development is taking place in many cities around the world, but as always NYC tops it all off. I wouldn't say the 'old' NYC was 'better' I am just thinking the other extreme has its disadvantages also. Why can there only be extremes like seedy, gritty, rotten vs. super rich and expensive? A middle ground with everything in it and a place for everyone would be nice, wouldn't it? Anyways was good to have seen NYC in the 80s and even though this coverage was from the 70s I enjoyed watching and remembering.

the 70s and 90s was the best times to be alive. I grew up in the 90s and now everything sucks from music to movies to censorship.

I used to love buying the newspaper in the morning reading from page to page

I’m up and down these blocks everyday making my deliveries. Footage like this is priceless…I’d be born six years later…

So mellow. People moved so stresslessly back then. Might look a little less perfect here and there, but it just seems a lot nicer evenso. Makes me understand why there was much less stress back then.

I lived 47 years right across the river in Jersey City. I was 8 at this time and remember going to NyC first time and I saw Beatlemania on Broadway with my family. There was a guy laying unconscious on the sidewalk and everyone just walked around him. I was shocked as a little girl.

People actually talking and looking at each other not a mobile phone those were the days .

That one magazine at 6:33 was from July 18 1978. I wish I could just walk around for a day in that time. I was alive but too young to remember for the most part

Back when New York City had character and was alive.

That kid the mom with the I Love NYC shirt (around 4:17) is probably exactly my age in, let's say, 1978. So many delicious details in the video, there are too many to list. Nostalgia and surprising quaintness all at once.

Cartainly brings back some memories. Those were my formative years and were an experience not soon to be forgotten. We just went out and had such fun, with something for everyone: The Lone Star, The Bottom Line and Max's were just a few of the venues I frequented (just to name a few). It's all gone now.

This is a treasure, a word I chose carefully. Its the kind of thing Stanley Kubrick would view from his exile in England to capture the contemporary time that he might be trying to meticulously replicate in a film. He did that with "Eyes Wide Shut" in the late 1990s, but I think of a current director who strives for accuracy reviewing this film carefully with all the subtle details. Each frame of this video is a rich painting.

What I do notice is that you have a mix of people of different age groups unlike now where everyone looks like they are below 28 years old.

I bet no one guessed they will be in KZfaq 44 years later

The clock shown around 2:40 has more character than what they got today. It was a smaller version of the clock that was mounted within the EPOK between summer/fall 1965 and early 1976 when Bulova Accutron advertised there. Wonder how small this was - 1.5" column and row spacing? In any event, this clock lasted from 1969 (the year the construction of One Penn Plaza was prepared and begun, and the accompanying buildings on the edge of each end of the block first opened) until 2010 when Tourneau (originally M. Wexler & Sons) moved out and Swarovski moved in and replaced this with the characterless LED version we see today (and is now hardly working).

When dignity was still a thing.

Lived there from '78 to '83. Good memories.

I can't help but hear the Taxi Driver theme when watching this...

Great footage. Love the "old" nyc. Thank you for posting this!

The boombox radios that people would buy to hear music.

Obviously filmed in the summer, about a month or two after this I got my first Manhattan job as a messenger, so I was spending almost my whole workday on the streets of NY. I was a high school senior. This is all around Herald Square, and I was working out of the Pan Am Building, which is at Grand Central, so not too far away. 10 blocks north and a couple of blocks east. You can tell how long ago this is when the girl at the beginning buys an Italian ice and pays for it with coins. I don't think there is a single thing you can buy in NY any more for less than a dollar.

These time period movies of New York City are really great!!! This, as I lived through it all, working there every day, commuting to and from Manhattan to the Bronx.

The New York we remember and will forever look back on fondly. Cheap cabs. Great ethnic food, cheap rents.

I remember it like it was yesterday! 😊 I'm still working in NYC today.

New York City (1970s Version), We will Never Forget You, Old Decade 1970s. We Love You. #RIP 1970s. 😢

it feels like an entirely different universe

A time where taxi drivers felt secure and did not have to compete with ride shares like Uber

This was the first New York my young eyes saw as an infant citizen of Flushing, Queens. This first portion of my life took in so many sights and sounds that I'm now seeing again rt+ years later.

That was the REAL NYC! I m a New Yorker born and raised. 1970s: Great memories, great city! The music, the vibes, the people. Anybody could live in Manhattan back in the day. Today, it's unrecognizable. Manhattan is all for the wealthy, 42nd Street is all Disneyfied (I call it sissyville), and they ve build so many condos, that the city skyline is practically no longer familiar, but repulsively ugly as all hell! NOW, IT SUCKS$$$!!!

Thank you so much ! NYC fascinates me and I love and miss the 70s !

Oh to be back in the 1970s, better than today believe me...I am from the UK...

Videos like this remind me how fleeting life and time is. One day you’re walking down the street in New York, the next 45-years have passed. I would have loved to have lived then. Smartphone and internet free.

It was real. Internet killed reality.

I was born in 1979. This makes me feel so old and gone. Makes me kinda sad but happy too.

Wow. People seem so connected to their environment. Not glued to a device. Like they were living in the moment. When I see a family at a restaurant on their phones and their kid has an iPad it makes me feel a certain way.

Cars all had different styles. So nice. Today they’re all cookie cutter cars, just different colors

I wish I could visit.....ppl just seem so much more aware and in the moment....I remember that feeling pre social media....

@1:03 See how the police officer and the civilian greet each other and when the officer seems to look back at the camera guy he did not come up to him and demand I.D. and harass the guy. This is how it used to be.

Yellow cabs were all over NYC.

This video was filmed in July 1978. I looked up the esquire magazine on display and that’s when It was published

Nostalgia for what I wasn't around to see.

This is back when your dollar 💵 Stretched around the corner and back I miss these times in my life . I was 11 years old and what a life it was to be a kid in the 70’s ❤️✌️

This is one of the best of this genre that I have seen.

In Autumn of 1977, 19 year old, Madonna Louise Ciccone, left her home state of Michigan and moved to New York City in pursuit of a career in Dance. Two years later she developed an interest in music; learned how to play percussion, keyboard, and guitar, and in the following years would eventually become the greatest selling female musical recording artist in history. Watching this nostalgic footage makes me ponder what life must have been like for her in the early days; basically living hand to mouth at times. She was determined, talented, and had an undeniable drive and belief in herself, but sometimes it's not enough. So many artists from that time are now long gone, but somehow she survived. Nothing but mad respect for her.

Takes me back to my childhood growing up in the city. I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Wow I was born 1978 in Brooklyn, Ny . I will be 45 in September and to see what the city look like the year I was born and how much it has changed. Thank you for this footage .

no cellphone, no internet just real world

It's a time I feel I would have better belonged. Thanks for posting this ! You better believe I liked and subbed. Great footage of a great time IMHO! Much love from Chicago!

Used to work for the city of New York at that time. Liked it much better back then. Loved eating Kanish, real Italian pizza and Sabrett hot dogs vendors used to sell. Two slices of pizza and a coke only cost me $1.75.

I remember the pollution from the cars, taxis and buses....and smokers everywhere. The air during the summer was completely unbearable.

This country was so much freer, happier, healthier, simpler and better back then than today. There wasn't anywhere nearly as much economic and political polarization between the haves and have nots and people in general weren't the arrogant, pretentious, superficial and materialistic snobs they are today. Granted, there have always been jerks in this world, but never as many comprising the overwhelming majority of the population as is the case today in America.

Love this trip back in time. I was born and raised in NYC and would have been about the same age as that girl buying the ices - 13. I'm 58 now how time passes. Oh, I miss those days

Brilliant time capsule. Thanks for posting 🍎

There is so much diversity in this video, so much beautiful little things that have made New York so special. When I was a kid I used to travel to South Korea with my parents in business purposes. I remember Seul back then was such a thriving, prospering place as New York on this footage. Now we live in whole different world... Everything is artificial, synthetic, copy of a copy...

What I wouldn't give to see some of those old punk bands in their prime during this era.

I like that no one is glued to a phone or rushing to get places....people actually talking to each other

New York was a great place to live or visit until around the late 90s. Then it began a steep decline. Now it looks like an obscenely expensive sanitized dump.

way better than 2022, that is for sure.

This is a treat! absolutely love this!

This is the nyc that greeted me when I arrived. I remember many of those scenes quite vividly.

Thank you so much for the memories.

That policeman at 00:51 is epic, he exudes authority :)

In the 70's most of the business people were in the 50 age bracket then 80's came along and the 29 year old Yuppies were everywhere .

I remember steak and brew! I went to NYC many times as a teenager and thru my 40's. A hop, skip, and a jump on the train from CT. Live in Oklahoma now. Many great memories of the best city I know.