Brooklyn the New Paris?

Photo: Jim Henderson

My sister used to live in Brooklyn, across the street from Sunset Park.  I remember visiting once and waking up to find all the cars on the park side of the street with slashed tires, fortunately I was on the house side of the street.  That was before she moved to the Upper East Side, just down and across the street from the Permanent Mission of St Kitts and Nevis.  I thought the Upper East Side was way cool.  Imagine my surprise to read that Brooklyn is the new Paris.

Now the wannabe city is Brooklyn...  Ballard is the Brooklyn of Seattle. Glasgow and Melbourne both claim Brooklyn cool. And Oakland, California, has been called the Brooklyn of San Francisco...  There's even a Brooklyn of Paris: the once-gritty suburb of Pantin. Its derelict, graffiti-covered warehouses have been taken over by galleries and artists, turning it into the hippest place in the City of Light. MSN

I haven't been to New York in four years, haven't been to Brooklyn for even longer.  Last time I was there we climbed up on the roof to spectacular views of the Harbor and World Trade Center.

Photo: GK Tramrunner229

 So... is Brooklyn "the new epicenter of cool" ?