Results tagged “West Side Highway”

The woman who allegedly drove drunk and crashed a vehicle full of young girls on the West Side Highway—killing her daughter's 11-year-old friend—is reportedly so upset that she's on suicide watch. A sourced tells the Daily News, "The first thing she says to anyone who walks into her room is that she deserves to die. That she is going to kill herself. She's not doing well right now."

So sad: The daughter of the woman who allegedly drove drunk, crashing a car full of young girls on the West Side Highway and killing one, told WCBS 2 about the horrifying crash. The 1998 Mercury Sable, which was overloaded with driver Carmen Huertas and seven girls, overturned and then crashed into a tree; Huertas' 11-year-old daughter Brittany Gonzalez said, "All three girls in the back just flew out when the trunk popped open because it just popped open when we flipped once. My friend's seatbelt snapped. Leandra Rosado just flew out and she was the one in the woods."

More upsetting details about the horrible crash on the West Side Highway that left an 11-year-old girl dead and six other girls injured, not to mention the mother who was allegedly driving drunk at the time. Melody Sanchez, whose daughter 11-year-old daughter Kayla (pictured) is in critical condition after being thrown from the overloaded Mercury Sable, said that Carmen Huertas essentially taunted the girls about her terrible driving.

Early Sunday morning, a Bronx woman driving a 1998 Mercury Sable—carrying seven children, including her daughter, ages 11 to 14—crashed and overturned her car on the West Side Highway. An 11-year-old girl was killed and the Daily News reports, "Investigators said Carmen Huertas' blood-alcohol content was more than one and a half times the legal limit." Huertas, 31, was charged with vehicular manslaughter and drunk driving. The girl's father said, "I call this murder."

A man and a woman ended up dead this morning after their car flipped over on the West Side Highway, taking place just an hour after another fatal car accident took place overnight in Staten Island. Police say that the 1996 Ford Mustang was speeding down the West Side Drive when it attempted to make a left turn heading east onto 56th Street. The car flipped and claimed the lives of the driver, a 45-year-old man, and his 20-year-old female passenger. Police tell Newsday the vehicle clipped a parked cab and then hit a concrete divider, flipping over and landing on its roof. The victims were brought to St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital where both were pronounced dead. The speed limit on the West Side Highway is 35 mph and the traffic light at 56th street is one of the first ones drivers encounter after coming off the Henry Hudson Parkway South.

Reader Allan send us these photographs, which show that the Ghost Bike Memorial for Carl Nacht had been "knocked down and mangled, still attached to the sign post it was locked to. it looked like the sign post was cut down." A note had been left at the sign post, and Allan called the person, who believes Gray Line Duck vehicle knocked it down. Gray Line, however, told Allan they don't know anything about it.

The Parks Dept. decided to throw in the towel on litigation that's been going on for three years and conceded to reevaluate its requirement that no more than 50,000 people could gather on Central Park's Great Lawn at one time.

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: an abduction on Atlantic Ave. in Brooklyn, a double shooting at West 151st St. and Walton Ave. in the Bronx, and a pursuit/crash/bailout on 95th St. and the West Side Highway in Manhattan.
• The disbarred lawyer accused of murdering his wife and blaming it on a random carjacking admitted to cops that he'd sent flowers to his girlfriend that day and had various small affairs and used escorts outside of his marriage.
• The girlfriend who turned in her boyfriend with his huge cache of weapons this week used to work for "The King of All Pimps" Jason Itzler out of his brothel. She was upset with Suwei Chuang because she wanted to get married and he wasn't sure.

Eugenio Cidron, the man who killed bicyclist Eric Ng in 2006 after driving drunk down the West Side bike path instead of the West Side Highway following a holiday party at Chelsea Piers, was sentenced yesterday to three to 10 years in prison. Cidron had driven over a plastic pylon to enter the path from Chelsea Piers and had been driving south for a mile before hitting Ng, who was traveling north.

Metro has an interview with NYU professor and Department of Sanitation anthropologist-in-residence, Robin Nagle. The piece comes on the cusp of “Loaded Out: Making a Museum,” an exhibition Nagle helped curate which focuses on the DSNY's history and its vital role in shaping the city. The exhibit opens tomorrow and will run for a full month, but she mentions this is just the first step in creating a Sanitation Museum.Police and firefighters have museums. Why...

Yesterday morning's rain caused a recently installed sewer main to burst, flooding the basement and parking garage of a Battery Park City luxury apartment building. Water levels reached up to 20 feet. Not only were car owners greeted with news that their vehicles were either submerged or floating on top of sewer water, hundreds of tenants at 90 West Street were evacuated. Fire officials explained that, per WNBC, "rain flooded a re-routed sewer pipe,...

On December 1, 2006 around 9:30PM, 22-year-old Eric Ng was biking north on bike path by the West Side Highway. Around the same time, 27-year-old Eugene Cidron, leaving a party at Chelsea Piers in his BMW, mistook the bike path for the actual highway, drove south on the bike path and fatally struck Ng near West Street - at least a mile from Chelsea Piers. Ng was hit so hard that his bicycle and shoe...

The Sklar Brothers spent years living in New York, working their way through the alternative comedy scene, becoming in demand performers, and eventually getting their own MTV show, Apt 2F, and later a Comedy Central Special. Then, once they had moved to LA and gotten comfortable, they were sent back into New York to film their show Cheap Seats for ESPN Classics. It seems like the Sklars just can't stay away from the city because...

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a stabbing on 168th St. and Hillside Ave. in Queens, a sexual assault at Stanton and Attorney Sts. in Manhattan, and a missing child on Himrod St. in Brooklyn. Artist Eve Mosher is outlining in chalk the high water lines that floods will reach every four years by 2080 if global warming continues unabated. The project can be seen at her site highwaterline. Six-year-old Natalie Shea is now a...

The Post reports that a woman running on the West Side managed to escape from a man who tried to rape her this past Saturday morning. According to the police, Jason Washington grabbed the 24-year-old woman from behind around 7AM. He then "fondled her and dragged her to an empty doorway near 12th Avenue and 58th Street."

The Smart car has arrived in the States, and measuring at 8 feet and 8 inches long and 5 feet wide, the miniscule vehicle got some big attention in the Big Apple this week.

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: A boat in distress at the Roosevelt Island Bridge, a homicide on Howard in Brooklyn, and a stabbing on Jamaica Avenue and 161st Street in Queens
• Hillary Clinton out-fund-raises Rudy Giuliani and Barack Obama in New York, which makes sense since she's been building her donor list as a Senator from New York.
• The big mystery of NYC: Where the middle class live.
• A man was fatally hit by a car on 54th Street between the West Side Highway and 11th Avenue; he apparently darted into traffic "to relieve himself on the side of the street."
• Is a honey bear in shoe-bomber Richard Reid's cell a deadly weapon? Maybe.
• Sonya "The Black Widow" Thomas ate 173 Buffalo wings in 12 minutes, winning Buffalo's National Buffalo Wing Festival. Still, Nathan's Hot Dog eating champ Joey Chesnutt holds the record, eating 7.5 pounds of wings in 12 minutes (Thomas's 173 wings is about 5.17 pounds).
• In the wake of three people arraigned for their $5 million pot operation in Long Island, Newsday reports feds made 40% more indoor pot-farm busts between 2001 and 2006.
• If you find yourself near Chester, NJ, the Stony Hill Farm Market has a corn maze in the shape of the Manhattan skyline where you can also learn about Manhattan history!
• In addition to derision, there's much confusion about Julian Schnabel's pink palace, dubbed Palazzo Chupi.
• Nanny Diaries directors Robert Pulcini and Shari Springer-Berman explain the difficulties of filming an "apartment porn" movie to NYU: "[Robert] was like, 'I don’t know where you are, where are you guys,' we were like, 'We’re by the kitchen,' he was like, 'Which kitchen? There’s three kitchens.' It was crazy."

Critical Mass, which came to New York around 1993, hasn't always been a cause for concern amongst the city's police. After 2004's Republican National Convention coincided with that month's Critical Mass in Manhattan, things changed. The ride has taken a more political tone and there's often an air of protest circling it.

A Carnival cruise ship bumped a West Side pier at around 7:30AM this morning. The ship, the 895-foot Carnival Victory, suffered some damage to its bow and now Department of Buildings is investigating whether the dock at 12th Avenue and 56th Street is damaged as well.

We are sad to hear that Pier I Cafe at Riverside Park South (around 70th Street, underneath the West Side Highway) was closed by the Department of Health. A reader visited the cafe on Sunday, only to find "a note saying they're probably closed for the season because the city said the bathrooms they had weren't good enough." The cafe had an open kitchen and bar, and the bathrooms were built in a temporary building, kind of a step-up from porta-potties.

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a shooting at Stanton and Rivington Sts. in Manhattan, a homicide on Light St. in the Bronx, and a robbery at Sutter Ave. and Powell St. in Brooklyn.
• The 72nd St. exit ramp off the West Side Highway is officially closed.
• Times Square foot and vehicular traffic is held up as an example of why the city needs congestion pricing.
• Miss New Jersey, Amy Polumbo, received another package of possibly scandalous photos, along with a threatening letter.
• Brooklyn's very own dream factory: Steiner Studios. Business Week magazine looks at the film and television studio at the Navy Yard on Wallabout Bay.
• After the loss of an intimidating but diplomatic presence on 125th St. to a heart attack, a street community finds itself off balance.
• A 27-year-old man somehow fell six stories to his death yesterday afternoon on East 85th at the corner of 2nd Ave. in Manhattan.
• Bike sharing in NYC is undergoing a five day trial out of a SoHo storefront.

Given the suspected terrorist activity across the Atlantic in Britain and Scotland, New York City has been on the look out for suspicious activity. Yesterday, there were two incidents that brought increased police attention - as well as a partial evacuation of JFK and closing down part of Riverside Park. Now it turns out the strange package and abandoned vehicles were harmless.

With Britain at its top terror alert level after a flaming SUV crashed into Scotland's Glasgow Airport yesterday, New York City has stepped up security at area airports. Port Authority spokesman Steve Coleman (the PA oversees JFK, LaGuardia and Newark airpots) said, there were "increased security measures" in place.

In this week's New Yorker, Lauren Collins has a funny bit on the popularity of "Fuck Frank Gehry" T-shirts. Popular, that is, with Frank Gehry himself!

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a building collapse on West 193rd St. in Manhattan, a car in the water at Ocean Ave. and Lincoln Rd. in Brooklyn, and multiple manhole fires on 45th St. in Queens.
• The NYTimes takes a stroll down one-time Indian trail now known as Jamaica Ave. in Brooklyn.
• Neighbors on Mulberry St. are so fed up with the Feast of San Gennaro that Community Board 2 recommended against approving organizers' application to conduct their block party this year.
• Police arrested a man on suspicion of murder after his girlfriend was found thrown from a fourth-story window and impaled on the fence below in the Bronx.
• Only his dad can speak to him like that! Donald Trump's son is suing his condo association board for $50 million after telling him he was fired.
• A look at how much certain New Yorkers earn annually. At the rate they're amassing their fortunes, our next mayor will probably be Jerry Seinfeld or Dick Wolf if either wants the job.
• The eight-year-old girl who was tied up in the downtown hotel with her family during a push-in robbery managed to wriggle free, telephone for help, and free her parents.
• A car involved in a drunk-driving multiple vehicle accident, flew off the West Side Highway and landed in Riverside Park.
• Charles Rangel is excited about the prospect of a Clinton-Obama ticket in '08.

The NY Times has a glimmering review of Frank Gehry’s first New York structure to actually get built. Architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff calls the IAC building, the headquarters for Barry Diller's media empire, “elegant” and “a much-needed touch of lightness” to the city’s skyline. Gehry’s latest, writes Ouroussoff, reflects how developers are paying closer attention to design.

There's a fascinating NY Region op-ed in the NY Times. Written by Colin Beaven, Worms in the Apartment looks at how, for the first time in his life, Beaven has changed his life to reflect his belief:

For the year beginning last December, my wife, our 2-year-old daughter and I, while living in the middle of the city, are trying to survive without making any net impact on the environment. This means we’ll get as close as we can to creating no trash (so no takeout), emitting no carbon dioxide (so no driving or flying) and pouring no toxins in the water (so no laundry detergent), as well as mitigating impacts we can’t avoid (so planting trees). Not to mention: no elevators, subways, buying products in packaging, plastics, air-conditioning, TV or toilet paper.

First things first: According to WNBC, the NYPD says that NYC marketing firm Interference Inc. gave them a list of 41 locations where the Aqua Teen Hunger Force LED devices were hung (38 in Manhattan, including the Meatpacking District, Greenwich Village, LES, and 3 in Brooklyn). The NYPD only found two which were at 33rd Street and the West Side Highway, which can only mean that everyone who passed by these things and heard the news last night must have taken them! And does anyone know what the other locations were? Gothamist is curious to know where Interference thinks ATHF fans are. Let us know in the comments!

Hmm, we wonder if we'll start hearing local NJ governments lobby for expanded PATH train service in the off hours. Because a Hoboken city councilman was arrested for drunk driving on the West Side Highway over the weekend. The NY Times reports that City Councilman Chris Campos ran a red light on the West Side Highway near 43rd Street around 3AM Saturday morning. The police smelled alcohol on his breath and Campos subsequently failed a Breathalyzer test. He was released after spending the night (or morning) in jail.

Here is part two of our semi-chronological look back at the top stories this past year (here is part one):