The accuracy of portraying New York in the many versions
 

I watched an interview about the show "The Real Ghostbusters" about how the cast felt about the accuracy of how NYC, Manhattan in particular was portrayed. One member laughed about how there was a "14th avenue" in Manhattan, though it had some decent moments.

Now for the OT in particular, there were quite a few references that seemed out of place in the show. The United World Building instead of the United Nations. The Global Trade Towers instead of the World Trade Center (correct in Enter: The Fly, however). In one episode, I recall hearing "I-5" even! I've also heard stuff like "5th and Main", and there is no main street in Manhattan! On the episode Turtles, Turtles, Everywhere when April goes to the beach, you can see a little mountain, and they aren't found on the east coast until Maine!

Think of some other geographical references that got screwed up here.

I remember in season 10, Dregg called the League of Nations to surrender to him but it should have been called the United Nations. It was in the 90's.

Also, New York has never had a red sky, to my knowledge.

I remember in the 4Kids show, one of the first episodes, there being a mention of the corner of "Eastman and Laird." (That's not really a screw-up, I acknowledge.)

I don't think New York has ever been accurately portrayed. Even on the quintessential New York show, Seinfeld, the exterior of Jerry's apartment was actually a building in downtown Los Angeles.

The accuracy of how New York is portrayed has very little to no importance to me. It's more about the quality of the show: does it have a good vocal cast, good animation, (and probably most important) are the stories interesting.

It's also much cleaner than the real NYC ...

Plus the derelicts are far less menacing.

Sometimes I wonder how the show would be different if it took place in Los Angeles. I guess they probably wouldn't eat as much pizza.

Not related to New York but in the 2nd episode that Leatherhead pop up in had the turtle travel to the Okefenokee swamp in Florida.Last I check the Okefenokee swamp is in Georgia.Now if they went to the Everglades that would have been more accaurate.Just an observation.

In the episode "What's Michelangelo is Good For," April refers to the zoo as the "Center Park Zoo" as opposed to Central. Also, there is no island in the middle of the lake like in the actual Central Park, plus it doesn't really show any buildings around the whole park; with only trees as far as the eye can see. Plus, the zoo's layout definitely looks so much different compared to the one shown on "Enter The Shredder", which was identified by April in that episode as the Central Park Zoo! The writers were different in each episode, with David Wise having the correct answer.

An interesting fact/fiction twist comes in the episode "Pirate Radio", where the radio station "WOOF" in real life is in Dothan, Alabama.

I've also seen a layout shot where there are more skyscrapers in one episode visible where Jersey City, New Jersey stands than lower Manhattan as, when in reality the opposite is true .

Another thing to point out is that in an interview by Michael Reaves posted on here is that they were later "told not to refer to it by name; just to make it a generic city, don't use recognizable landmarks, etc", and to make it more global in terms of setting. Some of the layouts could be part of a Japanese city when you think about it since that's where lots of the layouts were drawn. I feel that only Seasons 1 and 2 are proper New York settings; Season 3 started to introduce those silly fake locations that started to make it more of "city X". I think being more generic allowed for more freedom in plots/settings, unlike 4kids, which is a more accurate portrayal. The live action series of course are pretty spot-on.

If I were involved in some TMNT series, I'd try to add little similarities in the layout and buildings of the city.

As someone who lives in the Green Mountain state of VT, I'm afraid I have to disagree.

But Vermont doesn't touch the coast! Maybe I should have said "along the east coast" instead. But it supports the "generic city" argument that I posted above which was squarely evident by Season 3. And there are certainly many more cartoons which are supposedly set in a real life city, but looks very different as portrayed compared to reality. At least the Simpsons did a good job with Springfield, as that's a common name among US cities/towns and represents middle America quite well.

You guys really thought the OT had to be accurate, with what a silly series it was?

We all knew they lived in New York, given the ton of landmarks and direct references. And everytime they leave NY it is mentioned, like when they went to Florida, or Europe, or to Washington, etc.

I remember in the Muckman ep of Season 5 when Don uses his portal, Raphael says, "Let's just hope we don't wind up in New Jersey."

When the hell did they go to Washington?

Season 3 we see Mt. Rushmore.

Rushmore is in South Dakota.