New York robbed of its hustle and bustle

Masks on the streets

In Manhattan, which reported 6,060 confirmed cases on Monday, there are few Uber or Lyft ride-hailing vehicles available, and fewer taxis.

On the streets, nearly everyone, including a reduced number of joggers, is wearing a face mask. Those with or without masks shooed this reporter away as he approached for interviews.

Daffodils are blooming in Manhattan's Central Park, but the vendors selling ice cream, hot dogs and pretzels have vanished, along with tourists, horse-drawn carriages and pedicabs.

"People are scared to come outside," Justin Rahim, a Central Park tour guide, told Fox News. He said several of his pedicab drivers－who rely on tourists for a living－had quit to drive for Uber's food delivery service, adding: "It's crazy. How am I going to survive this?"

On the west side of the park, across the street from Strawberry Fields－dedicated to the memory of John Lennon－there are few lights on at night in the landmark Dakota apartment building where the former Beatle lived, was shot and killed.

"They (residents) have fled to the Hamptons or elsewhere," said a doorman, who declined to give his name.

One man, who also spoke anonymously, said he had been due to move into the building shortly. He paid $8 million for an apartment at the rear, but is now going elsewhere.

"Our apartment isn't ready, so I'm taking my family and heading for a rental house in the Catskills," he said, referring to an area nearly 220 kilometers north of The Dakota.

In Central Park's East Meadow, a field hospital opened on Tuesday.

A team of 72 doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers from Samaritan's Purse, an evangelical Christian disaster relief organization, erected the facility, where they will work and which is equipped with 10 ventilators.

It will treat patients from Mount Sinai Health System hospitals in Brooklyn and Queens who are not infected with the virus.