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  1. gossipmonger
    Hassling HasselbackRosie O’Donnell’s chief writer at The View was busted for drawing mustaches on pictures of arch-nemesis Elisabeth Hasselback. Accused D.C. Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey wants to publicize more names from her client list, but ABC News says there are no other even remotely noteworthy names on it. David Blaine wants to jump off the Brooklyn Bridge. (Please!) Mary-Kate Olsen and Matthew Modine are set to join the cast of Weeds. The maps have been removed from Jodi’s Shortcuts, the semi-famous Hamptons traffic-avoidance routes. Callers trying to reach Sarah Silverman as part of an MTV Movie Awards promo have been accidentally dialing some company in Texas.
  2. early and often
    Harlem Pol: Bloomberg Should Sell Congestion Plan as Health Issue Mayor Bloomberg has said he wants the State Legislature to act on his congestion-pricing proposals this session — which means in the next month, as the session ends in mid-June — and an influential state senator thinks that it’s doable if the mayor stresses the public-health benefits of the plan. Senator Bill Perkins, a longtime Harlem pol, told us outside a panel discussion this morning that Bloomberg should stress how decreased traffic can lead to cleaner air and lower asthma rates, as a similar plan did in London. Kids’ health is indeed one of Bloomberg’s passions, but Perkins says that point hasn’t gotten through in Albany. So far, he said, “the message has a businessman’s flavor to it.” A shift in rhetoric, the state senator said, could well lead to the needed legislation. “It’s difficult, but it’s possible,” he said. —Alec Appelbaum
  3. intel
    Bloomberg Won’t Wait for Congestion Pricing Mayor Bloomberg wants his congestion-pricing plan, and he wants it now. That’s what he told a largely sympathetic, lunch-sated audience at the Regional Plan Association’s annual meeting today, when he said he’ll insist Albany approves funding for PlaNYC’s congestion-pricing and transit measures in the next six weeks. The necessary legislation will “have to be in this legislative session,” he said in one of several deviations from his prepared text — and the legislative session ends in the middle of next month. “The reason the legislature doesn’t do what we want is we haven’t gone to them and said, give us what we need, or else,” the mayor said in another improvised bit. Later in the speech, he turned more conciliatory, reiterating a promise to implement short-term transit improvements like extra traffic cops in 22 driver-heavy neighborhoods. “The leaders in Albany really want to get together and get this going,” he added. “It will be a phenomenal legacy for them.” Let’s see if they agree. —Alec Appelbaum
  4. intel
    As Bloomberg Appoints New Transportation Chief, It’s Full Speed Ahead on Congestion PricingMayor Bloomberg announced this afternoon that environmentalists’ preferred candidate, Janette Sadik-Khan, will be the new commissioner of the Transportation Department. Sadik-Kahn’s appointment had been rumored since last week, and her selection puts muscle behind the transit element of Bloomberg’s PlaNYC green goals, like instituting congestion pricing in Manhattan. Indeed, the city has submitted a “conditional application” for federal funds to help pay for the congestion-pricing experiment in advance of a Monday deadline, Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff said at the same press conference, though the state must also join the application and hasn’t yet done so. Bloomberg was working the angles. “The geography of New York lends itself to something like this,” he said. “It will make deliveries quicker for trucking companies, and it’s a godsend for them … This will clean up our air and improve our economy, and the fact that money is available for technology that has been refined in other cities is a lucky thing, so I’m terribly optimistic.” If only the road to Washington didn’t go through Albany, we’d be optimistic too. —Alec Appelbaum
  5. developing
    PlaNYC Fine Print: Waiting for AlbanyMayor Bloomberg might be getting the credit — or the blame, depending on where you sit — for his pushing the idea of battling Manhattan traffic by instituting a fee to drive in prime neighborhoods at peak hours, but the truth is it’s not his call. It’s the state’s. To start, no municipality can limit access to public roads without the state’s okay. And even with that okay, to pay for the necessary infrastructure — how the city will track cars and bill their drivers — Bloomberg wants to apply for funding from a $1.2 billion federal fund, and federal rules say the state would have to join that application. Finally, to make clear that the city isn’t merely seeking to burden outer-borough and suburban drivers, Bloomberg is promising major transit improvements to allow people to get into the city center without driving — and he plans to pay for those improvements with funds raised by the congestion fees, a city contribution, and an equal state contribution. Bloomberg has promised $200 million from this year’s city budget; the state so far has promised nothing. To help convince legislators, the city is proposing 22 projects to help neighborhoods with high numbers of car commuters get better mass-transit access to midtown. So the question becomes: Will an imminent project to let buses escape some traffic lights on Staten Island’s Victory Boulevard — one of those 22 plans — be enough to convince Albany to support the plan? We’ll see. —Alec Appelbaum
  6. the morning line
    Congestion Pricing, Coming Soon to a Midtown Near You! • The mayor will use Earth Day to unveil a barrage of housing, transit, and environmental proposals. In the spotlight today: a charge for drivers to enter midtown, a cabbies’ dream and car commuters’ nightmare. [NYT] • Governor Spitzer is requesting FEMA aid, including disaster unemployment relief, for twelve counties hit hard by the weekend’s nor’easter. New York City is in line for some federal funds as well. [WSTM] • Albany, meantime, is proposing the so-called Paw and Claw Tax (on pet food, natch), with the money going toward shelters. The tax would apply to “dogs, cats, gerbils, hamsters, rabbits and birds.” Your ferret is now a bargain. [NYS] • Tom Cruise, whom the Post now dubs “the diminutive Scientologist,” hit Chelsea (an easy joke there) to raise funds for his questionable sauna-and-vitamins program for 9/11 emergency workers. Reporters were banned. [NYP] • And it took two fumbling attempts for the NYPD scuba team to tow the departed Sludgie the Whale from Gowanus to his final resting place in Jersey City. Deadpanned one detective by way of equivocation, “This was my first whale.” [WNBC]
  7. developing
    Park Slope Parents Win Traffic Battle, Lose ComposurePark Slope residents continued to set the standard for urban self-regard last night at New York Methodist Hospital, killing a Department of Transportation proposal in overwrought style. The department had proposed making Sixth and Seventh Avenues one-way in order to reduce traffic accidents. Local outcry was so strong — they suspected a cabal to hurtle Nets fans through the streets — the proposal was pretty much dead before the meeting even started. Since the lecture room was packed with about 250 people, another 200 clogged an anteroom in hopes of telling off Deputy Commissioner Michael Primeggia and giving their children (many of whom were, of course, there) a civics lesson.
  8. intel
    Dan Doctoroff Issues Vague Call for Bold Sacrifice A city planning guru dropped hints Monday that Team Bloomberg might be considering “congestion pricing” to charge drivers for the privilege of adding to gridlock, and today Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff — the chief planning guru — did nothing to discourage the speculation. Speaking at the annual meeting of the New York Metropolitcan Transportation Council, a regional body that coordinates federal transportation funds, Doctoroff talked of needing “a shift in the way we use automobiles” and called “congestion — road, transit and pedestrian” the city’s main barrier to growth. He also noted that taxes and user fees funded the 1811 street grid, the dedication of Central Park, and the city’s water network. “Those who benefit should pay,” he said. Was he hinting at a new fee on driving or cars? Providing political cover for an MTA fare increase? Telling the suburban county chiefs in attendance to look out for a commuter tax? It remains to be seen. But he did promise to issue the mayor’s sustainability plan in early April, just before tax time. —Alec Appelbaum Earlier: Bloomberg’s Planners Hear Public on Traffic Woes, Would Rather Talk About Something Else
  9. ground-zero watch
    Once More Into the Service Road — and Into West Street, TooIn 2002, with the “primary cleanup” of ground zero barely over, the city quickly built and paved a service road connecting the World Trade Center site to West Street. Only gradually, and without much help from the media, it is becoming clear exactly how massive a screwup it was. Since Mayor Bloomberg reordered the search for human remains last October, medical examiners freed 445 “potential” body parts from beneath the road. Finally, after months and months of new grisly discoveries, the city is facing the obvious: A new, large-scale excavation is in order.
  10. developing
    Bloomberg’s Planners Hear Public on Traffic Woes, Would Rather Talk About Something Else Back in December, when civic groups proposed the idea of “congestion pricing” — charging cars to enter midtown during prime hours, as a way to control Manhattan’s ever-more-horrible traffic — Mayor Bloomberg quickly danced away from it. “The politics of a commuter tax in Albany are probably such that we would never get it passed,” he told the Times then. “And what I want to do is focus on those things that we can get passed to help our city.” He’s since launched PlaNYC, a canvass for opinions about how to help the city survive a million new residents and sharply higher sea levels by 2030, and it seems congestion pricing has wedged its way back into consideration.
  11. numbers game
    We Have Seen the Traffic, and It Is Us If you’re like us, you’ve probably tried to reconcile your daily observations of forever-snarled Manhattan traffic with the fact that neither you, nor anyone you know, owns a car. Then, if you’re like us, you’ve assumed that it’s all suburban commuters’ fault. If so, the Times has some shocking revelations for you today. The data: • Total number of daily car commuters in Manhattan: 263,000 • Number of those commuters who live within the five boroughs: 141,000 • Percentage of total commuters who live within the five boroughs: 53 • Number of those commuters who live in Queens: 51,300 • Percentage of total commuters who live in Queens: 19.5 • Number of those commuters who live in Manhattan: 23,900 • Percentage of total commuters who live in Manhattan: 9 • Percentage of total commuters who merely pass through Manhattan en route elsewhere: 20 • Percentage of government workers who drive to work: 35 • Amount those government workers pay for parking: $0 In Traffic’s Jam, Who’s Driving May Be Surprising [NYT]
  12. in other news
    Managing Traffic for Efficiency and Hilarity We noted several weeks ago the city’s ambitious new plan to dedicate whole lanes of traffic to ultrafast buses with their own curbside turnstiles. And how would these buses battle unauthorized motorists slipping in and out of the lanes? By snapping pictures of them and ratting them out to the city. Nice. But not nearly as effective as a high-tech — yet awesomely brutal — solution implemented in Great Britain. Marvel at cars getting mauled by weight-sensing, automated retractable bollards. Bollard Porn [StreetsBlog] Earlier: It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s a … Bus!
  13. in other news
    City Hall: Feeling A Bit Congested? The idea of congestion pricing — putting a bit of a squeeze on all drivers entering Manhattan below 60th Street on weekdays —- has been around for a while. In recent weeks, however, it’s suddenly begun to get traction, and, as the Sun reports today, it now seems that City Hall will apply for federal funds next year to study the idea. Who’s so excited about the issue? Well, first, the Partnership for New York City, a group of 200 big-business CEOs, is about to release a report that will claim a better-than-expected response to the idea. Second, a major consulting firm is phone-polling the hell out of the citizens about the issue. (For an added dash of mystery, the firm’s client is not being disclosed.) And third, the Manhattan Institute will host a panel on the issue this Thursday. Congestion pricing, as Aaron Naparstek reports in this week’s magazine, was invented up at Columbia at 1951. And the best argument for reducing Manhattan traffic is that it’s somehow taken 55 years for the concept to travel about 140 blocks down Broadway to City Hall. Fees to Ease Midtown Traffic Jams May Get a New Look From City Hall [NYS] Unlocking the Gridlock [NYM]
  14. intel
    Anything You Can Do, Denzel Can Do Better Last night, Jada Yuan, New York’s intrepid party reporter, witnessed a rarity: Red-carpet gridlock. At right, arrivals for the premiere of Denzel Washington’s Déjà Vu at the Ziegfeld. At left, arrivals for the International Emmy Awards at the Hilton. At center, West 54th Street, jammed with limos, camera crews, and the occasional Hummer. Only in New York, kids.
  15. neighborhood watch
    Stop!Boerum Hill: City replaces stop signs with traffic light at one intersection, and neighbors aren’t pleased. [Streets Blog] Boerum Hill: Who you gonna call? Well, don’t bother with the police, if you live on a block stuck between two precincts. [NYDN] East Village and Lower East Side: Work continues on East River Park, with 6th Street running track reopened and overall project set for final completion in 2008. [Grand Street News] Fort Greene: There’s a new church coming, but don’t tell the local prostitutes. [Brownstoner] Harlem: There’s some weird architecture — an old-school front porch, a very new-school modern thing — on East 128th Street townhouses. [Bagel in Harlem] Lower East Side: Proposed neighborhood-friendly LES rezoning may not be as neighborhood-friendly as it’s cracked up to be. [LoHo 10002] Lower East Side: Thanks to construction-detritus pulverized Styrofoam, you can play in the snow even when it’s 60-plus degrees out. [What About the Plastic Animals? via Curbed]
  16. the know-it-all
    How Much Time Will We Get to Cross the Street?The city announced last week that it’s testing new pedestrian signals that would count down how much time you have left to cross a street. How much time do we get? Is it the same everywhere in the city? And — this being New York — does anyone pay any attention to these things, anyway?
  17. the morning line
    Suicide, Fire, Not a Hero • Indie actress, director, and screenwriter Adrienne Shelly, just seen with Matt Dillon in Factotum, was found hanged in her Village apartment. There’s no suicide note, and cops are checking up on unidentified sneaker prints in the apartment, but suicide is cited as the likeliest scenario. [NYP] • A blaze broke out in a Bronx apartment in the wee hours of the morning, killing a 5-year-old girl and sending three other people to Jacobi Medical Center. The survivors can thank the girl’s 13-year-old brother, who woke everyone up. The cause of the fire is being investigated. [WNBC] • Major karmic points are apparently not enough for Robert G. Seckers, the mate of a tugboat that aided the Staten Island ferry during the infamous 2003 crash. Seckers wants more tangible compensation for his good deed ($2 million to be exact) under an ancient unwritten law called “pure marine salvage.” “I don’t need to be a hero,” said Seckers in an interview. It appears you just took care of that part, sir. [NYT] • Hitler Kid, post-collegiate edition: A 23-year-old Greenpoint city employee (probably a hipster who applied for the job ironically) penned an essay in the Haverford alumni mag calling the Polish “vermin” and the nabe “even uglier than the morons who work there.” The piece is clearly Borat-style satire (the author dreams of a Greenpoint of “lawyers and investment bankers”), but — shock — subtleties of dry sarcasm are not a Parks Department specialty. [NYDN] • Three, two, one, stop. The city is testing out streetlight timers at intersections, visibly counting down fifteen seconds until the light turns red. Now, finally, the pedestrians will have something other than the road to look at! [amNY]
  18. the morning line
    Forget It, Jake • Chinatown business owners are beefing with Hollywood crews that have flooded the neighborhood, with 25 film permits issued over the last twelve months. City Hall says it’s the neighborhood’s fault for being so damn photogenic. [amNY] • In one of the strangest street attacks in recent memory, a pedestrian was stabbed by a passing bicyclist last night on West End and 63rd. The assault appears completely random. Perhaps citywide bike lanes are a good idea after all. [NYDN] • Local news predicts an unrelieved Manhattan Bridge traffic nightmare for the next year while the lower level is closed for a spruce-up. Daily Intel’s AccuChopper 20,000 predicts the same nightmare for the twenty years following the Atlantic Yards groundbreaking. [WNBC] • Mets tie series, prompt the following tortured sports-pun headline of the day: NOW BATS MORE LIKE IT. [NYP, natch] • Finally, some club called Country Bluegrass Blues and Other Music for Uplifting Gormandizers went out of business — with a name like that, what could be the problem? — hopefully stemming the steady flow of elegiac human-interest features. [VV, NYT]
  19. in other news
    Pedicab JunctionIt’s pedicabs versus taxi cabs versus everyone else in the battle for Manhattan’s asphalt these days — or at least so the Post argued yesterday. (It’s apparently “‘Pedi’-monium!”) But the real turf war, according to pedicab drivers, is among those pedicabbies themselves — because a glut of drivers, many of them short-termers from places like Turkey, Russia, and Poland, means intense competition. It’s leading to passenger-swiping, gimmicky “transpotainment,” and criticisms of those foreign drivers. (Who we always thought were just taking the fares Americans didn’t want to take.)