(MONEY Magazine) – In August, I treated myself to a night on the town: mouth-watering Italian fare at Brooklyn's Coney Island followed by a Brooklyn Cyclones game at Keyspan Park, the picturesque stadium built for the minor league Mets team. As we cruised on the East River, the sun set behind Manhattan on our right, illuminating a newly resurgent Queens and Brooklyn to our left. Ten years ago, such a trip would have revealed a depressing display of dilapidated warehouses and empty lots.

Today, Manhattan teems with commerce and culture. The other boroughs have enjoyed an unprecedented renaissance of safety, convenience and just plain livability. It is a great city, reborn. And the tragic events of Sept. 11 only proved what I'd said all along--that New York City is the strongest, bravest, best city in the world.

Coney Island is but one example of a revitalized neighborhood. With its famous Cyclone roller coaster, energetic boardwalk and the gorgeous new ballpark, Coney Island symbolizes all of what's going right in New York City. Brooklyn homeowners flock to the borough, lured by the promise of affordable beachfront housing. And that story is repeated all over the city.

I was born in the East Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn on Hawthorne Street, went to Manhattan College in the Bronx and law school at New York University in Manhattan, lived in Woodside, Queens when I was an assistant U.S. Attorney. And I plan to retire someday on Staten Island, where I currently golf as often as I can. So I'm familiar with enough places to know that this is a city so filled with promise, with good people and great opportunity, that I truly cannot picture living anywhere else.

There is a spirit here that makes New York City the capital of the world. The most cursory summary includes Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, reliable and inexpensive public transportation (including charming ferries and a tram), many of the world's great museums, the Yankees, Mets, Rangers and Knicks, the first-class universities, peerless theaters, lush parks, unbeatable restaurants and the greatest, most generous citizens in the world.

On the boat to Coney Island that evening in August, we curled around the Gowanus Bay and I spotted a familiar sight--a lady who for 115 years has reminded visitors and New Yorkers alike what this city means to the country and the world. The Statue of Liberty has long welcomed newcomers to the city of New York, and that beacon of freedom will always hold the promise of a better life.