How Greene Street went from a red-light district to hosting some of the highest property values in the world.

An online project from the Development Research Institute at New York University complicates that picture of undeterred growth. Led by William Easterly, Co-Director of the DRI and an economics scholar, the Greene Street Project is an interactive tour of the historic development of this single block in SoHo.

Most development economists tend to focus on macro-level units such as cities, or even more commonly, nations. But Easterly believes that such broad assessments belie the more chaotic realities that shape economies at the hyper-local scale.

“There’s a ‘Great Man’ view of history: that great successes happen because some wonderful, wise leaders intended them to happen,” Easterly says. “But looking at development at the micro level allows us the ‘common man’ view: that there were unintended consequences from lots of surprises on this block, and individuals taking advantage of them.” ...

Neighborhoods experiencing economic distress now should take heed, too. Easterly adds: “Don’t freak out with any one upturn or downturn. It’s part of the chaos of a successful, prosperous city.”

That’s macro-scale talk, of course. At the micro-scale of a single human life spent worlds away from Greene Street’s riches, it’s fairly small comfort.