Less Death, More Tourists: A Good Year For NYC

City & State’s morning newsletter, First Read, carried this little nugget:

The Bloomberg administration has been on a record-breaking streak this past few weeks. Last week, the mayor proudly welcomed the city’s 50 millionth tourist. On Tuesday, he trumpeted the dramatic increase in life expectancy for city residents, higher than it’s ever been. Yesterday, he stood with NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly to declare the third lowest number of homicides since record-keeping began 50 years ago. And today, Bloomberg is set to announce that traffic-related deaths are at an all-time low.

More tourists, longer lives, lower crime and less death… not a bad year for the City of New York.

Of course, there will be no shortage of naysayers out there who will say, “Yeah, but what about the economy?” Or maybe, “Herr Bloombucks is destroying this city by X-Y-Z.”

Perhaps. But the existence of bad news does not negate the good news. If 2011 is to end – and, of course, it will – better to fill its last few hours with some positive thoughts of the year past.

What are some other great accomplishments that have occurred in 2011?