Today’s Headlines

  • NY Mag: “Andrew Cuomo Very Excited About His New MTA Chief, Whatshisface”
  • DOT Touts Projected $36 Million Economic Boost, 170 New Jobs From Citi Bike (Crain’s)
  • West Village Bike-Share Rack Trimmed by Four Docks (WNYC); News: “City Is Starting to Backpedal”
  • JSK: “I Would Like to See Penn Station Fixed” and “a Fully Funded MTA Capital Program” (Crain’s)
  • GOP Forum: Lhota Pins Toll Hikes on Budget Raids (News 1, 2); All Candidates Pro-Bike Lane (Post)
  • Driver Hits Elderly Woman in 4th Avenue Crosswalk in Bay Ridge; Victim Likely to Die (Bklyn Daily)
  • MTR: With Trans-Hudson Rail Improvements Years Away, P.A. Needs Bus Capacity Increases Soon
  • Tonight: MTA Hearing on Bus Service Changes Between Woodside, Jackson Heights and LGA (DNA)
  • AMNY: MTA Should Put Unexpected $40 Million Into Subway Service Restoration and Expansion
  • Gothamist Takes Up Cause of Manhattanites Who Don’t See No Parking Notices, Have to Pay Tickets
  • Uber Launches NYC’s First E-Hail Taxi App (NYT)
  • Adventures in Street Courtesy From Improv Everywhere (Gothamist) and NYC DOT (NYT)

More headlines at Streetsblog Capitol Hill

  • Anonymous

    In the Daily News unbelievably illogical article on BikeShare, a resident was happy that the Citibike station was moved — because he was concerned about “fire access” to the building.

    If we follow that line of thinking to its natural conclusion, we should remove ALL on-street parking in NYC to make sure fire trucks have easy access to ALL buildings.

  • Jeff

    I’m split on the taxi e-hail thing. I’m all for using technology to improve how people interact with transportation systems, but as vulnerable street user, I’m terrified at the notion of drivers frantically playing with their smartphones to find a fare. Yes, I get that there are protections in place to ensure the app can’t be interacted with while the vehicle is in motion, but even the idea of them context switching constantly between the phone and driving when they are stopped or moving is quite scary. I’m getting an image of them using the e-hail app at a red light, noticing a green light out of the corner of their eyes, and mashing the accelerator before even putting the phone down and switching back to “driver mode”.

    Not to mention the equity issue of two classes of cab users: Those with smartphones, and those without.

  • Yeah, I really don’t get the point of e-hail. Just sounds like an excuse to use technology for solving a problem without solving it. Hailing a cab is hard when they’re not around, or when they just refuse to take you somewhere (raise your hand if you don’t live in Manhattan). I don’t see how e-hail will change that, but maybe I’m being obtuse? Also, yes, I don’t think cabbies should be even more distracted drivers than they already are.

  • I think it just shows how comfortable people get with things that already exist. Nobody is complaining about access to buildings now because cars parked on the street just seems normal.

    JSK, DOT and Hizzoner seem to properly understand that once you’ve gone and made a change to some part of the street, people quickly come to accept it as normal. It doesn’t even take that long. I remember reading about some local busybodies losing their minds about the green bike lane on Henry St. in Brooklyn Heights years ago. In my nearly four years of living on Henry St, the color of the bike lane has never come up in conversation with my neighbors.

  • ADN

    Remember how much New Yorkers (and the tabloids) were freaking out about the ban of cigarette smoking in restaurants and bars? We don’t hear about that very much anymore, do we?

  • Remember how upset everybody gets whenever Facebook changes its layout? And remember how everybody forgets about it after a few days? And then remember how everybody gets angry again the next time Facebook changes something?

    This is like that, but for streets.

  • Bolwerk

    All candidates pro-bike lane? What we need is a manifestation of the vox populi to come forth and rip these lanes up. Once the task is complete, and with the backing of SUV-driving union labor it should take no time, he can grasp his fasces and summarily judge and execute the pro-bike lane hipsters and their socialist enablers.

    Weiner 20-uh, um, when’s the election?

  • I agree. Remember the launch of E-Zpass? The local news had man-on-the-street pieces wherein one dude after the next made the same pun, saying “whoa whoa whoa, it’s not so EASY.” Pun level = not ok. I am willing to wager that 100 percent of these same people now have E-ZPass. And if you tried to improve it somehow they’d trot out their faux populist objections.

  • guestnyc