Friday’s Headlines: Bitcoin Battiness Edition

We don’t delve too much into monetary policy over here at Streetsblog (except when we undertake our annual fundraising drive every December — why wait? Click here to donate), but our ears really pricked up on Thursday when Mayor-elect Adams boldly went where no mayor has gone before, announcing on Twitter that he would take his first three paychecks in Bitcoin rather than in good ol’ perfectly serviceable American dollars.

Adams made the comment in response to a pledge by Miami Mayor Francis Suarez to take one paycheck in Bitcoin.

“In New York we always go big, so I’m going to take my first THREE paychecks in Bitcoin when I become mayor,” Adams retorted. “NYC is going to be the center of the cryptocurrency industry and other fast-growing, innovative industries! Just wait!”

Um, we would actually very much like to wait — eight years if possible — given what the New York Times recently revealed about how the very “mining” of Bitcoin specie is going to drive our species to extinction. Apparently we were not alone in being very concerned about Adams’s apparently desire to make New York City a crypto center.

And others pointed out another flaw:

The Post also covered this crypto craziness, albeit without our hot take. The paper’s business section also looked at the issue.

In other news:

• Several outlets joined Streetsblog in covering the killing of Qiang Tu by an unlicensed driver in Sunnyside, with the Daily News adding a lot of details about Tu’s recent conversion to regular bike commuting — and his conviction, however misguided, that he would be safe because Mayor de Blasio had built enough bike lanes. (The Astoria Post and amNY also covered, adding little, alas.)
• The Post did a roundup of all the unfinished business that Mayor de Blasio will leave on Mayor Adams’s desk — but for some reason entirely left out transportation, a huge topic comprising hundreds of deaths, tens of thousands of injuries, billions in property damage and trillions of person-hours of time in transit.
• Then, oddly, the Post gave credible coverage to the city’s annual “Dusk and Darkness” driver safety campaign. And amNY also covered. Neither paper covered the root cause of the death that the campaign seeks to reduce. The fact is, we need narrower roads, lower speed limits, car-reduction strategies and a serious effort to get the worst drivers off the roads. And you can do that during dusk, darkness, light, day, weekends and holidays.
• So now people are landing helicopters in the middle of Crown Heights? (NYDN)
• Did Gov. Hochul really discuss her Penn Station plan with “the community”? One community member in Midtown says no. (NY Post)
• Here’s the only way Rep. Yvette Clarke can get in the news these days. (Brooklyn Paper)
• Fortune magazine has noticed the speeding pandemic.
• Reminder: Sunday is the marathon, one of our city’s great days. (NY Times)
• And finally, one of New York’s biggest unions took Justice Alito to task for his comments (mentioned in yesterday’s headlines) about how working-class people need to carry guns in the city.