Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chairman and CEO Janno Lieber's surname means "dear" in German, but he lacked sweetness with one reporter at the agency's board meeting yesterday.
After amNY reporter Kevin Duggan asked the transit big whether the MTA could open drop-in centers for the homeless, with toilets and showers, like Philadelphia's subways have done, Lieber tartly said, "Kevin, Kevin, with all due respect, I don't know how long you've lived in New York, but New York City and New York State have been running drop-in centers."
Lieber later gave CBS2's Marcia Kramer an exclusive showcasing the MTA's cop-heavy approach to the homeless, riding the subway with her during the evening rush hour so that they could gush at the patrols on the platforms. They had a goon squad sighting: "At the City Hall stop, there were strategic response group cops with a long guns and a cop with a patrol dog," Kramer reported, even as Lieber insisted that the cop overload hadn't been arranged for Kramer's benefit.
The Daily News led with Lieber's take that rising crime and the growing presence of the homeless had driven down subway ridership. Bloomberg went with platform doors. Speaking of platform doors, read all about 'em:
In other news:
- Like Streetsblog, NBCNews and amNY wrote up Transportation Alterantives's year-end fatalities report.
- "The War on Cars" podcast prophesies that Uber's 15 minutes are up. (Via Patreon)
- Curbed followed a story Streetsblog ran months ago on the electric e-bike chargers that explode, hurting delivery workers. It also ran a critique of Gov. Hochul's Penn Station plan that pilloried it as a return to the bad old days of "urban renewal."
- Here's some motorist-on-motorist mayhem: A two-car crash in The Bronx ended with one driver fatally shooting the other. (amNY, ABC7)
- A certain former federal transportation official thinks that expanding the G line would be more efficient that building the Interborough Express. (Brooklyn Eagle)
- Hey, DOT, Queens wants its beep back! (The beeps, for their part, had a good laugh over the DOT's incompetence, QNS reported:
- Speaking of beeps, Brooklyn's motorists seem to think it's the job of their borough president to find them parking. Anthony Reynoso had a good rejoinder:
- Streetsblog contributor Aaron Short rounds up the state of play of the BQE revamp for the Commercial Observer.
- Finally, the Sanitation Department not only picks up garbage, it serves up beefcake and cheesecake. (WABC)
