Brooklyn

With Select Bus Service speeding trips and boosting ridership on Fordham Road and First and Second Avenue, the next route slated for an upgrade is Brooklyn's Nostrand Avenue. The B44 bus runs over nine miles from the Williamsburg Bridge to Sheepshead Bay. It attracts 41,000 riders a day, making it the seventh busiest route in the city, despite running at an average speed or seven or eight miles per hour and having the least reliable service in the borough. Last night, the Department of Transportation and MTA held an open house to present an updated design for the corridor [PDF], one of the final revisions before construction begins next year.

Brooklyn's only proposed pop-up café won the approval of Community Board 2 last night in an 18-10-1 vote, allowing the city to replace on-street parking with public seating. This pop-up is sponsored by the Ecopolis Café on Smith Street, which will pay the cost of building the temporary public space.

The Park Slope Patch (an AOL publication, for what it's worth) did a few word-on-the-street interviews on Prospect Park West, asking passersby what they think about the bike lane. Not everyone they talked to thinks the lane is needed -- it's about 50-50, giving critics a disproportionate say relative to their numbers. But note that even the guy who calls the lane "stupid" thinks the NBBL-conjured safety criticism is hogwash.

Wondering why the city is subsidizing 18,000 square feet of parking for a project that's supposed to make fresh food more accessible to low-income New Yorkers? Political favors seem to have something to do with it.

Thanks to New York City's Economic Development Corporation, the residents of Midwood are about to enjoy a wider selection of produce and kosher foods. Under the FRESH program, Moisha's Discount Supermarket is slated to receive just under $2 million in tax breaks to double its size and provide more grocery options to the underserved community [PDF]. Along with 15,000 square feet of supermarket, however, the neighborhood will be receiving 18,000 square feet of parking.

Cross-posted from Brooklyn Spoke

An 83-year-old Israeli rabbi was struck and killed by a driver in Brooklyn yesterday.

The Brooklyn Paper reported today that police precincts across the borough, following orders from the top of the department, will soon embark on an enforcement campaign targeting cyclist infractions. A Streetsblog source who's spoken to the 78th Precinct verified that a coordinated effort to step up cycling enforcement is in the works.

The fight for scarce street space is always fierce in New York City, and as DOT's efforts to install bike and bus lanes across the city have revealed, the most contested zone of all is probably the curbside. On commercial streets, drivers can't get enough of the underpriced on-street parking while businesses want curbside access to load and unload deliveries. The result is rampant double-parking, cruising, and ultimately congestion -- slowing down buses and creating more dangerous conditions for pedestrians and cyclists. In some cases, local displeasure about curbside dysfunction manifests itself as opposition to seemingly unrelated livable streets improvements, like the Fifth Avenue bike lane in Park Slope.