Results tagged “barryfeinstein”

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a bank robbery on Livingston St. in Brooklyn, another bank robbery on 2nd Ave. in Manhattan, and a third bank robbery on 71-41 Main St. in Queens.
• Even diamonds can get family members riled up and stabbing this way and that.
• Something Into Plowshares: behold the transformed Park Slope Armory.
• Toys in Babeland coming to family-friendly Park Slope. The Pink Pussycat Boutique, which operates across the street from a public school soldiers on.
• A NJ woman was arrested after the death of an ex-police officer who died while undergoing plastic surgery by an unlicensed surgeon.
• The touch, the feel, of cotton handed out to passersby in NYC.
• The body of a man discovered dead with his mouth covered in duct tape in a Best Western Hotel has been deemed suspicious by the cops.
• Barry Feinstein, a long-time member of the MTA board of directors, is stepping down after a fruitful run.

First rule of Fulton Street Transit Center: Nothing will go as planned. Back in 2004, the MTA unveiled designs for the new Fulton Street Transit Center, which would have included a towering steel-and-glass dome (the "oculus") AND connections between many different trains lines, providing easier transfers for subway riders.

Love it! The MTA's board says free newspapers are what caused subway flooding in 2004. Which contradicts an April report from the MTA's inspector general, who found that the agency was at fault for severe flooding that shut down much subway service on a September day (September 8, 2004 - when Hurricane Frances came to town and wreaked transit havoc). The April report noted the MTA's "historic neglect" of valves, difficulties Transit Authority first responders had in arriving to the scene, lack of TA command centers, and trash and muck clogging drains. MTA board member Barry Feinstein, however, said, "These hand-distributed free newspapers have been and continue to be a major cause of clogging the drains."

Dig out that reading list, load your iPod up, and get ready to lose that teeny sense of "personal space" while commuting - the MTA wants $20 million in service cuts as part of a way to deal with its huge, looming budget deficits. And we're talking deficits of $905 million in 2008, $1.13 billion in 2009, $1.48 billion in 2010. The NY Times reports how the cut could manifest themselves in our everyday lives:

The cuts would add one to five minutes to wait times on many subway lines and local bus routes during off-peak periods. For subways, it would mean that on weekdays, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., all trains would run every 10 minutes, according to authority budget documents. Evening and late-night waiting times would be from 10 to 20 minutes.

Okay, so, take those numbers, which we feel are pretty optimistic on some lines, and multiply that by 2 or 3, and you'll get the real waiting time. And as much as reading is fundamental, no one wants to be able to read that much on the subway platform. The cuts amount to about $5 million for the subways and $15 million for buses, which can only mean you'll never find that bus you want, and when you do, it'll be crazy crowded.

If you're going to protest going to jail after leading an illegal transit strike for three days, then you might as well with the Reverend Al Sharpton, teachers union head Randi Weingarten, and about a thousand other supporters. And according to plan, many members of various unions are starting to view Roger Toussaint as a martyr, versus the main guy who inconvenienced the city (well, it's him and MTA Chairman Peter Kalikow). Toussaint headed off for his ten day jail stand in a big way: Rally outside the Brooklyn courthouse where he was sentenced and a rousing march over the Brooklyn Bridge. Some of what Toussaint told his supporters (and the news crews):

"Jail has no terror for me compared to the shame I would have felt if we would have simply swallowed the authority's miserable prestrike offer!"

Continue reading "Toussaint Goes to Jail After Brooklyn Bridge March"

The new line's cost will be about $16.8 billion dollars, with $3.8 billion of it for the first segment, between 96th and 63rd Streets. The Times notes that the first segment of the line would benefit the most riders immediately - 202,000 - while the whole line would expect to carry just over half a million riders a day. The Post reports on what the new station will be like - "sleek, brightly lit stations equipped with climate-control ventilation and built with no columns along the platform." MTA Capital Construction president Mysore Nagaraja said, "These will be 21st century stations. There will be no columns, which will provide for better circulation of riders [on and off trains]." Besides Gothamist wondering if there would be anything besides a 21st century station in 2005, Gothamist has to agree that a columnless subway platform would be easier. Think the London Underground, DC Metro, or Hong Kong MTR.