BRING ON THE BIKE LANES!!

BRILLIANT piece in the Daily News!!!

Take the 7 to NEW JERSEY??

Mayor Bloomberg has unveiled an amazing new proposal to run the 7 train from the far west side of Manhattan, under the Hudson and into Seacaucus, New Jersey -- where it will connect with New Jersey transit.  The move will double the capacity of the currently overstuffed trains that link the two states, and bring New Jersey directly to Times Square and the entirety of the NYC subway system.  The glorious new idea comes on the heels of NJ gov. Christie scrapping the heavily subsidised and already begun tunnel plan from his state, and the risk it seems is that he will get credit for "big bro" NYC picking up the slack and fixing his greedy tragedy.  From the NYTimes:

"Last month, Mr. Christie, a Republican, put an end to the long-planned Hudson rail tunnel project after the estimated cost climbed to at least $11 billion, from an initial $8.7 billion. The project would have created two new tracks for New Jersey Transit from Secaucus to a new station deep under 34th Street, near Pennsylvania Station. The federal Transportation Department had pledged $3 billion, as had the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. New Jersey was responsible for the rest."

So Christie thumbed his nose at 3 billion from the Federal Gov't, and might gladly accept a similar proposal . . . as long as NYC picks up the tab?  What thinly-veiled slickery.  And if you know Christie, you hardly want to see him thinly-veiled.

A great short film about livable streets in NYC.

Culture of Innovation at the heart of Bloomberg's PlaNYC

As Earth Day approaches, new numbers have been released for Bloomberg's forward-thinking PlaNYC.  The program was launched three years ago on Earth Day, and it's multiple initiatives are bearing some impressive fruit. 

• 100,000 affordable housing units created or preserved
• 319,054 trees planted and 113 schoolyards-to-playground sites opened
• 200 miles of bicycle lanes installed and a bike-access law enacted
• 86 energy-efficiency projects completed as part of plan to reduce City government energy use 30% by 2017
• 25 percent of the yellow taxi fleet converted to hybrid vehicles
• 9 percent decrease in citywide carbon emissions due to cleaner power generation and less sulfur hexafluoride release

At the heart of the plan is tireless planning, extensive data collection, and establishing a "culture of innovation" within city government that previously was not encouraged.

"But Mayor Bloomberg took care not to over-manage the process from the top down. Instead, he hired the most talented staff he could find and encouraged a culture of innovation, empowering city staff to experiment with new ideas—and giving them permission to be bold and take risks. This is a major distinction to the business-as-usual approach so common in jurisdictions around the country."

Other cities are following suit using the PlaNYC model HERE.

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MTA faces massive cuts - where's Bloomberg?

From the NY Daily news HERE, the same sweeping cuts the MTA threatened before the wimpy bailout earlier this year are back on the schedule including the elimination of the W and Z lines, and the late-night shuttering of stations in lower Manhattan and Brooklyn along the N and R lines.

" Facing a massive budget crisis, the cash-squeezed MTA is moving to implement sweeping service cuts – again – including shutting down dozens of bus routes. Two subway lines also would be wiped off the map and four stations would be shuttered overnight under the plan expected to go before a Metropolitan Transportation Authority committee on Monday. If it sounds familiar, it is. The lineup is the same roster of reductions threatened earlier this year when the MTA was lobbying for a state bailout. The cuts never happened.

But in recent weeks the MTA has been rocked by bad news. The state – struggling with its own budget mess – slashed transit funding by $143 million. And cash from state payroll taxes is coming in about $200 million short of what the state had planned for mass transit. Even with 2010 service cuts, the MTA will have to find other ways to plug the sudden budget gap, sources said.

“We’re not going to rely on anyone else to do anything for us. We’re going to rely on ourselves,” MTA board member Mitchell Pally said."

Bloomberg, who ran on promises of salvaging and fortifying the MTA, has been silent on the topic. Hello Mike? Is this thing on?

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