Ben Fried

Politicker is reporting that Upper Manhattan Council Member Ydanis Rodriguez has the inside track on securing the transportation committee chairmanship, which multiple sources have corroborated with Streetsblog. While the final decision won't be announced until next week, sources say that council leadership will finalize the choice sooner than that, perhaps as early as today. The immediate question, then, is whether Rodriguez is the right person for the job at a time when the mayor is committed to comprehensively addressing traffic violence and reallocating street space to transit.

Mayor de Blasio is at PS 152 in Queens this afternoon with Police Commissioner Bill Bratton and Transportation Commissioner Polly Trottenberg to discuss the administration's initiatives to sharply reduce traffic deaths and injuries. We'll have a full report later today, but here's what reporter Stephen Miller has broadcast on Twitter so far...

This afternoon, Mayor de Blasio is expected to be joined by Police Commissioner Bill Bratton and DOT Commissioner Polly Trottenberg at a press conference about traffic safety. The event is at PS 152, near the site where 8-year-old Noshat Nahian was killed by an unlicensed tractor-trailer driver last month.

Streetsblog is looking for a talented journalist to shape and oversee coverage throughout our growing family of news sites.

Melissa Mark-Viverito will serve as the next New York City Council speaker following a vote today by her peers in the council. She now holds the second most powerful position in New York City politics, after the mayor himself, and will set the agenda for the City Council for the next four years. The vote was un-contested after her chief rival for the speakership, Dan Garodnick, officially conceded.

We have some late-breaking news courtesy of the New York Cycle Club's Twitter feed. The Prospect Park West bike lane has been plowed.

How is the first snowstorm of the de Blasio era treating you?

Happy New Year, and welcome to the third and final installment of the 2013 NYC Streetsies, also known as the Streetsblog Hall of Fame induction ceremony.

Bill de Blasio has appointed US DOT Under Secretary for Policy Polly Trottenberg to lead the New York City Department of Transportation. Trottenberg is a veteran federal policy maker, whose resume includes stints working for New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan on the 1998 federal transportation bill and for Senator Chuck Schumer.

Before we get to the Streetsies, an important announcement: Neighborhood street safety advocates and victims' families will be gathering at tomorrow's inauguration to mark the beginning of Bill de Blasio's Vision Zero initiative to eliminate traffic deaths. If you'd like to volunteer or participate, organizers are asking people to arrive at City Hall at 10:45 a.m. tomorrow. More information is available on Facebook.