Tuesday’s Headlines: Heastie Says Can’t to Gantt Edition

SB Donation NYC header 2Our anti-car Christmas carols were the toast of New York yesterday, so click here if you missed them. Even Council Speaker Corey Johnson said he couldn’t wait to check them out.

National treasure Roger Clark of NY1 liked them. And Jon Orcutt of TransitCenter pronounced “Here Comes UPS” as “the best one.” We say, enjoy them all.

And now the news:

  • The greatest news that you won’t read in any New York City paper: Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie has removed ailing, no show, anti-New York, anti-safety Transportation Committee Chairman David Gantt from his post. (Rochester Democrat and Chronicle)
  • Here’s a zen koan for NYC: What if the city created Fair Fares but then didn’t tell anyone how to apply? (Gothamist)
  • Reminder: the issue with congestion and bad public transit is that the cost of driving is too low, therefore encouraging transportation choices that hurt the majority of residents. (Bloomberg)
  • Uber fans are already complaining about more-expensive rides, even before a congestion fee kicks in. (Bloomberg)
  • The short-staffed Daily News followed its first-day story of a man run over by a driver with a very similar second-day story that didn’t add much and failed to mention the driver’s summons record that includes a speed camera violation and 10 other infractions. (NYDN)
  • Andy Byford really stayed on message in this Bloomberg interview.
  • Sorry, but the pea soup that the MTA is pulling out of the L tunnel looks like a tempest in a Dumpster. (Gothamist)
  • We haven’t covered the silly “outrage” over the Christmas decorations at the Holland Tunnel because only drivers seem to be upset, but apparently their long nightmare is about to end. How, wouldn’t it be nice if the Times, which covered the decorations, would devote itself to covering important things like Citi Bike’s expansion and repair crisis? (Gothamist, NYDN, NY Post)
  • And, finally, our editor had the tweet of the day, as he went after Council Member Barry Grodenchik, who insists on opposing congestion pricing because, he claims, it’s “elitist.”

SB Donation NYC header 2It’s our December Donation Drive! Please give.

  • David Gantt removal is huge news especially for speed cameras..

  • Here is Brodsky again protecting Connecticut hedge fund managers from congestion fee…

  • ohnonononono

    Only drivers care about the decorations on the Holland Tunnel because they’re the ones staring at it as they sit in traffic…

    There is no bike or ped access and very few buses go through that tunnel. NJ Transit runs almost everything through the Lincoln. If you’re trying to get from the one end of the tunnel to the other, assuming no traffic, it’s about 10 minutes. A transit trip from one end to the other takes about 45 minutes total to walk down to the PATH and take the subway up.

  • AnoNYC

    For NJ Transit, another rolling stock innovation

    https://www.railwayage.com/passenger/commuterregional/for-njt-another-rolling-stock-innovation/

    “By 2026, provided the procurement is fully funded and all options are exercised, New Jersey Transit—empowered by an infusion of much-needed funding by Governor Phil Murphy following a starvation diet imposed by his predecessor, Chris Christie—will have replaced its entire fleet of aging single-level cars with nearly 650 new Multilevels, many of which will be powered electric vehicles, the first of their type in North America.“

  • HamTech87

    For those outside NYC, Gantt kept the 2012 NYS Complete Streets law bottled up in his committee for a long time. That law, while not a cure-all, at least forces traffic engineers to consider users other than drivers.