The Last Peep Shows

Times Square may be a G-rated tourist temple, but an avenue away, the "live girls" aren't going anywhere.

Photo by Pearl Gabel

As you walk up Eighth Avenue near Times Square, the first thing you notice is that you’re in the virtuous shadow of the area’s namesake institution, the steely-grey New York Times building, which looms on your right. You breathe in the scent of Schnipper’s burgers and fries, complemented by the familiar odor of a double-decker tour bus’s diesel fumes. And despite your utter hatred of Midtown crowds, you continue north toward 42nd.

Upon hitting a critical mass of tourists on the corner, you’re forced to dart west across the street, because you’re on a mission. Now you’re the clichéd salmon swimming upstream, as you’ll certainly be pummeled by the legions of commuters heading straight for the Port Authority Bus Terminal to make their 6:07 back to Weehawken or Rahway or Fort Lee or some other place you thank your lucky stars you’ve never set foot in. Yet, you know this is false snobbishness, because you’re from Long Island, a roughly parallel universe of only slightly …