Alan ,

I am in the process of changing my addresses on my website , CoSy.com from 42 Peck Slip where I have lived 21 years to my new address in the mountains of Colorado . I'm leaving largely because you and your fellow council people have criminalized , at the behest of authoritarian mayors , my right to relax and to efficiently get to around this city to cultural events and even shopping . The cowboys I'll meet out in Colorado may not be as stimulating as the many exceptional friends in many fields I will be leaving here , but at least we will still enjoy the Freedom to relax with a cigar and friends and a beer .

Alan , I know you are aware of my vision for the continuing hole in our your district , the Conic All Connect , about which my favorite comment has been

Your WTC solution is the most inspiring one I have seen and is the only one which makes the needed statement that we are "greater than before and greater than the world ever knew". I expect, however, that the final design will be awarded based on political criteria.

Well , it's no longer my community . The understanding of Liberty in this city and state has become as hollow as the Statue in our your harbor .

I'm 60 years old and in good shape except for a left leg shattered in a climbing accident 33 years ago . Not only have you eliminated the possibility of my enjoyment of any commercial night life in this city , but you have criminalized the very 21st century practical , affordable , individual urban folding scooters which made it possible for me to get up to the art galleries of Chelsea and then to after-parties in the East Village , or even just to the great cheese store by Astor Place or the sausage shops on 2nd Avenue , without hobbling around with a cane the next day .

A decade ago , I could not have escaped your nanny tyranny . But with the internet I can even continue as webmaster for my talented and angry fellow Manhattan Libertarians .

One of my friends among the elite of the global computer programming community , when he learned of my leaving , emailed :

whoa! bob armstrong leaving new york?   (think: canary in the coal mine)

Perhaps the first of us to get out are those like me for whom the discomfort of not being able to relax with a drink and a smoke as our fathers did or as George Burns did to the age of 100 is secondary to our gut level disgust and fear seeing some bullying pisher who was a junior when we were freshman now have the force of police behind his assertion of control over details of our peaceful voluntary choices .

According to current articles on Finance.Yahoo.com , New York City is #1 most expensive place to live , and #2 , second only to Boston , in terms of housing bubble risk . Well , the historic and inspiring view of New York's 19th century greatness I've enjoyed for a couple of decades is now added to the housing stock . It sure as hell is not worth fighting to stay here ; I'm moving where I won't have an iron fence between me and every patch of green .

You and your fellow members of the political class may have millions of sheep willing to be your sidewalk serfs , but you don't have me .

I'm out of here .

Bob Armstrong