Though St. Mark's Place is still lined with smoke shops and leather fetish stores, these now rub shoulders with trendy boutiques, bars and restaurants, drawing those looking for a good time or a cute dress. Avenues B and C, which until the late 1990s were known mainly for their drug corners, are now chock full of new apartment developments and entertainment venues. This gentrification brought a dramatic 71 percent drop in major crimes in the area over the 17 years since 1993, led by a 91 percent plunge in car thefts, an 81 percent drop in robberies, and 77 percent declines for murders and burglaries.

There's still room for improvement, however, as the East Village and Alphabet City rank just 58th out of 69 neighborhoods for per capita crime in DNAinfo.com's Crime & Safety Report, even though the overall crime rate there fell by 9 percent in 2010. The area's crime rate of 182 incidents per 10,000 residents also places it as only the 12th safest out of 17 neighborhoods in Manhattan.

While the neighborhoods never lacked a solid bar scene, the influx of new lounges and clubs has brought with it new troubles. DWI arrests were up 600 percent since 2001, to 140. On Aug. 22, 2010, Devin Thompson, 37, was shot and killed during a fight outside the Sin Sin/Leopard Lounge, on Fifth Street. Residents complained that it had become a magnet for drugs, prostitution and drunken midnight brawls. It was eventually shut down.

Property crime still plagues the 9th Precinct, which covers the area and has one of the worst rates in the city for this category, ranking a lowly 61st. Grand larceny remains a problem even though its rate fell 6 percent in 2010, to 760.