Moses chose the Gold Coast route to showcase the estates he relished passing

Evidence

The road to Sunken Meadow? It could, perhaps, run from New York along the middle of the Island, where the only opposition would be that of farmers, but Moses knew at once that the road wasn’t going to go there. If scenery was an attribute of parkways, why, here was a chance to run a parkway through real scenery: the Gold Coast estates. At night, now, Moses began to pore over maps of the North Shore, his pencil sketching out alternate routes. He saw on the map the names across which his pencil was sketching: Phipps, Whitney, Garvan, Morgan, Mackay, Vanderbilt, Otto Kahn. But he saw in his mind a road bordered, beyond the grassy right-of-way, by the magnificent stands of trees the robber barons had imported from Europe and by hedges neatly trimmed by their legions of gardeners. — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 724

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the ‘aesthetics over function’ theme in Caro throughout — and to the doctrine (checkerboarding, parkway as pleasure) that will produce the later reserve-rights clash. Echoes his argument that ‘The Power Broker’ roads hewed to rich men’s land despite the political costs. — connects to: A deserted millionaire estate became Moses’s template for public recreation land — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 722; Moses’s personal love of Long Island’s South Shore motivated his later park building — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 696
• SHARE: For anyone into Long Island’s Gold Coast social history: the specific list of names his pencil crosses — Phipps, Whitney, Garvan, Morgan, Mackay, Vanderbilt, Otto Kahn.

Broader Connections

• Moses’s personal love of Long Island’s South Shore motivated his later park building #expands (0.80) — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 696
• A deserted millionaire estate became Moses’s template for public recreation land #exemplifies (0.75) — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 722