West 28th Street has long been home the city's Flower Market, a concentration of wholesalers that supply retail flower shops across the city. But the market is under siege, battered by changes in the flower business and in the neighborhood. NY1's Michael Scotto has the story. 

There are few streets in New York that look and smell as good as West 28th Street. For more than a century, the block has been home to the city's Flower Market.

"The prices are really good because it's wholesale," one buyer says. "But you also get to see a lot of stuff that you don't see anywhere else." 

But the Flower Market is wilting.

One by one, the wholesalers have closed, and on W. 28th between 6th and 7th Avenues, a half dozen hotels have opened or are under construction.

For hotel owners like Morris Moinian, the area offers character and proximity to major tourist destinations.

"North Chelsea is one of the undeveloped areas of New York City," says Moinian, owner of the Hotel Hayden. 

But for Gary Page, all the real estate development has put added pressure on the flower shops - already struggling to survive. 

He has owned G. Page Wholesale Flowers, a shop in the Flower Market, since 1984. 

"The primary pressure is the construction of all these hotels in the area," he says.

The flower market has its origins in the late 1800s, when flower sellers wanted to be close to the stretch of department stores along Sixth Avenue known as Ladies' Mile. 

But in the 1980s, the market started shrinking dramatically as wholesalers left town, zoning changes allowed for residential buildings and the internet upended the flower business. 

Page says there were some 40 flower and plant shops here 30 years ago. Now, there are only 20. 

The industry has for decades talked about reinventing and relocating all the wholesalers that make up the flower market, but those efforts have gone nowhere. Page says he is not sure what will become of it. 

"I'm not 100% certain that the future of the flower market is on 28th Street," he says. 

A future that may no longer be as colorful and aromatic as it is today.