The author seems to only focus on the indigenous people insofar as they provide "suspense" to the "performance". I've heard the story of New Amsterdam and other colonizations a million times, but never with a focus on indigenous people. The article is laden with microaggressions, from calling them "savages" to treating them as a prop for the initial European colonizers. Even after the Grid has been put in place and Manhattan is "mostly rural", the indigenous people have faded into the background, along with the invalidity of Peter Minuit's transaction. 

Ironically, the Grid's "empty spaces" and "utilitarian[ism]" created a city to oppose Paris and London's "systems of articulation and differentiation"—one of the first instances of America overshadowing Europe. However, I'm not sure where these "empty spaces" are—Manhattan is extremely crowded and no maps were shown to demonstrate their location(s). Also as a result of the Grid, the fixedness of the city blocks prevent any horizontal development.