It's time for a rare public service announcement that doubles as a chance to get some exercise and protect American democracy.
This election season, someone is going to have to stand up to protect the free and fair elections that we've enjoyed (at least locally) for years. Our friends at Common Cause NY are recruiting volunteers to help voters across the city as part of the group's non-partisan Election Protection program.
After some training, volunteers will fan out across the city for three-hour shifts monitoring polling places in vulnerable neighborhoods, helping voters and reporting any issues, both on Election Day and during early voting weekends (Oct. 25-26 and Nov. 1-2).
People on bikes will get to rove around among assigned polling places. It'll be fun (and important!). Sign up here.
In other news from another busy day at our Lower Manhattan offices (is there another kind?):
- Hell Gate and Streetsblog covered a shocking new report about soaring vehicle miles traveled issued on Wednesday by our friends at Open Plans.
- And lots of outlets covered Andy Byford's appearance at an industry breakfast on Wednesday, but none had Streetsblog's angle that the former Train Daddy now has his own daddy in the White House. (NY1, PIX11)
- A Jamaica man is dead, 10 days after being struck by a hit-and-run driver. (QNS)
- "Strip" search: Here's some flat-out BS from the car-loving New York Times.
- It bears repeating: Safe streets mean separate safe space for cyclists. (Road.cc)
- One day after heavily armed and masked federal agents swarmed across Lower Manhattan, Attorney General Letitia James and other pols vowed to crack down on rogue agents. (NYDN, amNY)
- The aforementioned raid led to the arrests of nine men, which the Post cheered, even though its news story offered very unconvincing details that any of these men are violent criminals or even in the country illegally. Indeed, amNY took the vendors' side, and Gothamist offered a legal primer. The City said we should prepare for more.
- And City Hall reiterated that it was not informed of the raid in advance, which is troubling. (amNY)
- Assembly Member Deborah Glick, who has been representing the West Side since I got into journalism in 1990, is retiring, Gothamist reported. We mostly remember her as being good on street safety, but weak on congestion pricing. (Here's our full coverage.)
- Winners...: Likely mayor Zohran Mamdani says he'll retain NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch if elected (NYDN, NY Post, NY Times, Gothamist). We've certainly had some nice things to say about many facets of Tisch's leadership of the Department of Sanitation and the NYPD — but if Mamdani is going to achieve the livable streets vision he's promised, he will have to rein in Tisch's criminalization of cycling and ramp up her stagnant effort against reckless drivers and towable recidivist scofflaws.
- ...And losers: After last night's mayoral debate, Andrew Cuomo rushed to a Knicks game to sit with future ex-Mayor Eric Adams. (NY Post, NY Times)
- Speaking of that debate, our Engagement Editor Emily Lipstein gave you what you need to know in one YouTube short (though broader debate coverage came from the Daily News, the Times, . It tells you something about the complicated nature of illegal motorbikes that each candidate had a completely reasonable position:
