The plan for a pedestrian mall on 34th Street has been scrapped (much to the delight of the Post's Steve Cuzzo), but now the city is proposing a new plan that's sure to have the anti-bike lane/pedestrian plaza/anything-that-isn't-more-cars crowd reeling. New plans for 34th Street would pare the street down to just two lanes for cars, one going east and one going west, and bus-only lanes on either side. Dan Biederman, president of the 34th Street Partnership, told the Times that he was happy about the plan, because, "It is not a good thing for Midtown retail to have a screaming four-lane roadway." We'll wait for the inevitable screed on some "new" lack of Midtown parking or whatever, but for now the Post has a new enemy: pop-up cafés. more ›

It's been a tough few years for cantankerous NY Post columnist Steve "He Who Yells At Cloud" Cuozzo. So many changes in this town! Particularly near his office, where the DOT turned several blocks of Broadway into pedestrian plazas that Cuozzo did NOT sign off on. Infernal bike lanes have popped up everywhere, cigarette smoking is criminalized, and now the DOT is still threatening big changes to 34th Street. In a new rant entitled "Debacle on 34th St.; DOT's plans to ruin grand blvd," Cuozzo draws a line in the sand: more ›

Earlier this year, the Department of Transportation unveiled a comprehensive plan to reconcile the words "rapidity" and "transit system," the most revolutionary piece of which was a 34th Street bus-only lane. Now, the Post is reporting that the lane has gotten the federal helping hand the DOT was hoping for, in the form of $18.4 million. more ›

In the past week, the DOT has revealed details about two bold new plans to create pedestrian plazas in high-traffic parts of Manhattan. As part of a proposed 34th Street Transitway, a pedestrian plaza would be created on the block between Fifth Avenue and the Avenue of the Americas. Further downtown, the DOT wants to turn a block of Broadway north of Union Square into another pedestrian plaza, which would extend along East 17th Street to the eastern corner of the park, at Park Avenue South. But the two proposed changes have come at a price: the fragile inner serenity of NY Post columnist Steve Cuozzo. more ›

Now that the Department of Transportation has revealed its latest congestion-fighting strategy—creating another pedestrian mall in Herald Square and giving buses half of 34th Street—the reactions are coming from pedestrians and drivers. Naturally, they have very different opinions! One driver complained to NY1, "Bad enough they closed Broadway. We can't even turn up and down Broadway. It will make it even more worse than what it already is," but a pedestrian said to the Daily News, "I wish they would do it tomorrow." more ›

As promised, the DOT is moving quickly on a plan to radically transform 34th Street to prioritize buses and pedestrians over passenger cars. The proposal [pdf], which was completed at the end of February, would essentially cut 34th Street in half, with the section west of Sixth Avenue running one way toward the Hudson River, and the section east of Fifth Avenue running one way toward the East River. Buses would travel in both directions in their own special lanes, and in the middle there will be another pedestrian plaza on the block between Fifth and Sixth, the part of town informally known as Clusterfuck City. more ›

NYC Transit's bus service on 34th Street would become an estimated 35% faster as a result of big new changes in the works for the corridor between the Javits Center and the East 34th Street ferry landing. When the project's complete, buses will have their own, two-way dedicated road to zip along on. And as part of the overhaul, the DOT is also planning—you guessed it!—a "significant new pedestrian plaza in the middle of Manhattan and other pedestrian mobility, safety, and comfort enhancements along the corridor." 34th Street is going to be radically re-imagined under these new plans: more ›

Just weeks after a horrifying murder on the D train in which straphangers were locked in a subway car with the suspect until police arrived, a Gothamist tipster describes a scary — though thankfully less violent — incident on the Q train this morning in which commuters were locked in a car with an aggressive passenger in the 34th Street station. more ›

Reader and Flickr user Hello Turkey Toe took this photograph and writes, "Taken in the 34th Street - Herald Square Station, where the subway system has apparently collapsed in on itself, creating a sort of singularity..." We are also reminded of Cosmo Kramer's freakout, "Hey, I'm on First and First. How can the same street intersect with itself? I must be at the nexus of the universe." more ›

Wow! Streetsblog attended the Department of Transportation's and New York City Transit's "co-presentation" of the city's Bus Rapid Transit program and discovered "A Transit Miracle on 34th Street."

DOT will repave and restripe for five lanes between Third and Ninth Avenues by the end of this year, with painted bus lanes on the north and south sides and three auto lanes in the center. Service hours will also be extended. Phase 2 calls for a 34th Street Transitway, closing the street to cars between Fifth and Sixth and installing pedestrian plazas. On either side of that block, there would be two lanes for cars heading in one direction -- toward the rivers -- while on the other half of the street, buses would have two extra-wide lanes separated from traffic. In other words, buses would constitute the only through traffic on 34th Street. According to Sadik-Khan, 34th Street BRT will eventually tie in to new East River ferry service (details to be announced next week).