Wednesday’s Headlines: Andrew, Bill and Jumaane Edition

Yesterday was the much-loved busy news day, with the mayor begrudgingly admitting he supports congestion pricing, the governor unveiling an entirely new level of bureaucracy to run the MTA that he’s run so poorly the last eight years, and Council Member Jumaane Williams finally earning his rising star status by winning the Public Advocate special election.

Here’s how it all looked:

Everyone covered the governor and mayor’s joint announcement. Streetsblog’s David Meyer said de Blasio got played by Cuomo. The Daily News played it straight. The Post focused on Cuomo’s engineering henchmen from Cornell and Columbia who now will oversee MTA projects, as well as writing about marijuana taxes funding the subway. The Tabloid of Record’s editorial board echoed Streetsblog. Meanwhile, the Times focused on de Blasio’s support for congestion pricing. The paper’s editorial board hailed the de Blasio-Cuomo pact. The Wall Street Journal and amNY focused on the detente. Politco’s Dana Rubinstein got the right tone as always.
Everyone covered the Jumaane Williams victory. (NYDN, NY Post, NY Times, WSJ, amNY, Gothamist)
Here’s one reason why taxes from the sale of pot shouldn’t go to fund the subway. (NYDN)
The old rail tunnels under the Hudson River are falling apart and will destroy New York’s economy if they fail. (NYDN)
Yes, there was more driving on the sidewalks — again spurred by an illegally parked truck. (Gothamist)
For the second day in a row, the mayor took heat for his illegal construction in Central Park designed to banish the horse carriage trade, this time from the Daily News editorial board.
And, finally, we love how seriously Gothamist is pursuing the barnacle-covered Citi Bike. Is there a serial Citi Bike killer on the loose?

bolwerk

Proceeds from pot taxes probably should be earmarked for reparations to victims of police violence. Well, if only life were fair.
¯_(?)_/¯

A tunnel failure leading to economic disaster seems a little hyperbolic. A lot more people’s commutes will suck, and they’ll mostly be added to the list of west-of-Hudson commuters whose commutes to the city are already atrocious – a fact that nobody seems to really care about, going by lines of glacial buses leading to PABT. Over time employers would simply have to replace New Jersey workers with New York workers. Otherwise New Jersey residents will move closer to work or find new jobs west of the Hudson.

The rail crisis is the lack of redundant rail infrastructure from New Jersey, but that has been a crisis arguably for generations.
Wilfried84

Think about the angst and hand wringing and cost of the L train shutdown. At 500,000, a tunnel failure would affect several times as many people. And it would happen without years of planning, as in the the case of the L train. And, no more trains to Philly or DC?
Robert Lancer

Streets Blog team are you pro horse carriages? I know your against the horseless kind. I personally don’t see why they are needed and as someone who commutes through the park I do not like the trail of feces they leave behind.
bolwerk

The angst about the L Train shutdown is also overblown, and involves an actual full bidirectional shutdown.

I’m not sure where the 500,000 number comes from (HubBound 2016 suggests ~200k entering and leaving*) via this route, but it would take a shutdown of both tunnels to cause even that worst-case scenario.

I’m not saying that’s not really terrible either, but a more realistic evaluation of its impact is it’s just one more bad transportation decision making people’s lives shittier. Or, in economic terms, probably slower economic growth. Fucking NYC newspapers and thinktanks sell angst and kvetching to engage readers. It’s like a drug. But then they don’t talk about things that could avoid making these things so disastrous, like proactively building new rail infrastructure.

https://www.nymtc.org/Portals/0/Pdf/Hub%20Bound/2016%20Hub%20Bound/DM_TDS_Hub_Bound_Travel_2016-FINAL.pdf
sbauman

First, the 2016 Hub Bound Report counted 247K people using the L between the Bedford and First Ave Stations not your reported ~200K. That’s a ~20% rounding error.

Second, the 2016 Hub Bound Report did not count L train riders whose trips were between Eighth and First Aves nor between Bedford Ave and Rockaway Parkway. That’s where the MTA came up with a 400K estimate.
sbauman

I have been to a Rails to Trails conference, where National Park officials were handing out “Bikes Don’t Leave Poop” buttons.

If NYC can ban one class of road users, they would have less trouble banning bikes. I’d rather equip my bike with full fenders than have it banned from roads. The fenders are a small price to pay.
bolwerk

Oh, I thought he was referring to the North River Tunnel at 500,000.