Amazing Color Photographs Capture Daily Life in New York City in 1973

By 1970, New York City gained notoriety for high rates of crime and other social disorders. A popular song by Cashman & West in the autumn of 1972, "American City Suite", chronicled, in allegorical fashion, the decline in the city's quality of life.

The city's subway system was regarded as unsafe due to crime and suffered frequent mechanical breakdowns. Prostitutes and pimps frequented Times Square, while Central Park became feared as the site of muggings and rapes. Homeless persons and drug dealers occupied boarded-up and abandoned buildings.

Here are 32 amazing color photographs that capture street scenes of New York City in 1973:

(via The U.S. National Archives)