Friday’s Headlines: We Have a Winner(s) Edition

On Thursday night, our colleagues at Open Plans held their first "Public Space Awards" to honor, well, the award-winning public spaces and, more important, the people who make them happen.

And the winners are:

• Best Public Space Evolution Over Time: Meatpacking District (but you knew that)
• Most Inspirational Project in NYC: 34th Avenue Open Streets Coalition/Friends of 34th Avenue Linear Park (pictured above; aka the "gold standard" of New York City open streets — but you knew that).
• Best Small BID: Park Slope Fifth Avenue Business Improvement District.
• Curbside Safety Award: Hoboken Department of Transportation (reminder: zero road deaths in four years, but you knew that!)
• Curbside Climate Award: Gowanus Canal Conservancy
• Best School Street: Clean Air Green Corridor
• Activist Award: Lonnie Hardy, Jennings Open Street, Bronx.

It was a great night. We'd like to congratulate the winners and remind them all that we'd like to drink with them again sometime soon!

In other news:

• Mary Frost of the Brooklyn Eagle reasserted herself as the doyenne of community reporters with a great scoop about the mayor's secret meeting to make sure the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway remain a car sewer forever. Earlier in the day, we were onto a piece of the story, too, thanks to Deputy Mayor Meera Joshi's public remarks about the "electeds and people" apparently clamoring for a three-lane highway.
• Everyone was all over the Council's package of bills to help rein in lithium-ion batteries, but let's be honest, our coverage stood out. (Streetsblog, NYDN, amNY, Gothamist, Crain's, and The City, albeit with an abominable lede)
• Man, this Grand Central Madison rollout continues to be terrible. (Newsday, NY Post times two)
• We always love (um, maybe that's not the word) when the New York Times wades into waters in which we've been swimming for months (oh, make that years). Latest example? The Gray Lady's coverage of the disaster that is Central Park.
• Thankfully, Hell Gate dove into the NYPD's Strategic Response Group's no-show appearance before the City Council and found it, how you say, lacking.
• Raises are finally coming for Uber and Lyft drivers. (NYDN)
• The humble bus is the key. (Yahoo! News)
• And, finally, it's weird how Train Daddy shows up and no one calls us: