[mhays]

Seattle's Pike Place Market has similar issues. The crowds are obviously smaller but they're in hallways, narrow alleys, and even narrower sidewalks, and the logjam of people can take forever to walk through.

If you live in an area like that you can develop crowd-walking skills, allowing you to weave through far more quickly. But tourists generally haven't. And many locals haven't. On my visits, I think I'm the fastest pedestrian in Manhattan.