Friday’s Headlines: Joyful Juneteenth Edition

Lower Manhattan was a joyful place yesterday, thanks to the New York Knicks — but also thanks to the Mamdani administration’s decision to properly honor the team’s championship by making the area south of Canal Street car free for most of the workday.

That’s how you unleash joy. You only had to look at people’s social media posts, or come down to our office on Lower Broadway, to see what car-free streets can do for people’s moods.

Here are some of our favorites (including Kevin Duggan’s photo above), but really, you don’t need much more than Sophia Lebowitz’s viral video from right after the celebration, a snippet that proves people just get this stuff in their bones:

It’s worth noting that politicians usually make horrible speeches at these kinds of things, but we were inspired by one portion of Mayor Mamdani’s speech in which he recalled the last nine minutes of Game 4, when the Knicks were down by 20 points and oddmakers gave the Spurs a 99.6-percent probability of winning. The mayor focused on that 0.4 percent in a particularly eloquent passage that rings true to so many New Yorkers (but, of course, not Rupert’s revanchists). “There is one thing that the pundits don’t get about this team and this city: It is in that point-four percent that we go to work,” he said.

Watch the entire speech here:

In other Knick reported news:

• The championship run reminded New Yorkers how to just hang out with strangers again. (Gothamist)
• The Times focused on joy.
• Richard Drew of the AP is going to win some awards for this picture next year. (NY Post)
• Some graffiti OGs offered an epic nod to history. (The City Reporter)
• Commutes were a bit tricky. (Gothamist)
• Of course, attention has already turned to the day’s overtime feeding frenzy, but also how cops flaunted their privilege:

All in all, a great day for New York City. And today is another great day, as we celebrate the Juneteenth holiday with a day off for our team. We’ll see you Monday, but before that, here are some non-Knick news to get you through the day:

• Speaking of joy, Vital City wants it front and center in city planning.
• Mayor Mamdani pulled back from his predecessor’s drawn-out quest to install stop-arm cameras to snare bus-passing scofflaws. (NYDN)
• The transit workers union has suspended horse carriage operations pending improved safety protocols. (amNY)
• Friend of Streetsblog John Surico offers some solutions to the summer’s G train mess. (amNY)