Canal Street

Profile

Following the path of a canal dug in the early 1800s to drain southern Manhattan's contaminated Collect Pond into the Hudson River, this traffic-clogged road connects the Manhattan Bridge to the Holland Tunnel. Befitting the epicenter of Chinatown, a pagoda-shaped visitor’s information booth stands at the intersection of Canal and Mulberry streets. Farther west, however, the street has an overwhelming, open-air-bazaar atmosphere that defines its character. Gray-market vendors hawk knockoff designer purses and watches, and bucketfuls of salted sardines and pungent yellow durian contribute to the sensory overload. Foreign goods in calmer conditions can be had at Kam Man, a two-level marketplace with an easy-to-miss storefront, where everything from chopstick rests to medicinal fungi are labeled in both Chinese and English. And some tarnished jewelry shops still remain at Canal's less-chaotic eastern end, the trade's center until midtown's diamond district came to dominate in the twenties. — Caroline Kinneberg