The League of American Bicyclists has awarded New York City a bronze medal for bicycle friendliness. League representatives met with Mayor Bloomberg and DOT commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, who sometimes cycles to work, at City Hall yesterday to present the award. Though bronze is the lowest rung on the friendliness ladder, New York City is the only community in the region to be designated a Bike Friendly Community (BFC). more ›

Charles F. Luce, who was Con Ed's chairman and chief executive between 1967 and 1982, died last week at the age of 90 in California. The Bronxville, NY resident died of prostate cancer. more ›

While 30 Rock writers are on the picket line, Alec Baldwin is worried about his neighborhood.. And listening to the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. This morning, during a segment where Brian was discussing the future of NYC's streetscape with Department of Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan and the Open Planning Project's Mark Gorton, the acclaimed actor and gossip target made his debut as a caller. After joking that he needed a job, here's a transcription... more ›

If you've ever struggled to figure out which direction you're facing when you step out of a subway station (and there are no landmarks or sun to guide you), you won't have those problems at four subway stations in Midtown anymore. That's because the Department of Transportation and the Grand Central Partnership are placing temporary directional compass decals outside them. more ›

Is it possible to get a jaywalking ticket on Park Ave. north of Grand Central Terminal? We've never heard of one or seen one issued, probably because there's no Walk/Don't Walk signals at any of the intersections on the avenue between 46th and 56th Streets. Tourists hover curbside, unsure whether they're allowed to cross or not. New Yorkers who work on Park Ave. tend to blithely cross at their own risk, treating a lack of crosswalk red light as a license to proceed. Generally people have to attempt to see what the perpendicular traffic lights on the corners are signaling to figure whether crossing is allowed or not. Walkers stuck on the median have to rely on their wits, timing, and foot speed. That stretch of midtown Manhattan may soon receive signals, however, resolving a dispute that stretches back more than a 100 years. more ›

As part of the deal to advance congestion pricing (and nab the $354 million the feds are offering), the city and state have announced their appointees to a panel to, ur, study congestion pricing and develop a recommendation. The Mayor, Governor, City Council, State Senate Majority Leader, and State Assembly Speaker each get to select three appointees, while the Senate minority leader and Assembly minority leader each select one. more ›

The Department of Transportation announced that Central Park's West Drive will be car free until 8AM starting on Monday, August 6. Per the DOT's press release, via Streetsblog:

Beginning Monday, August 6th, the West Drive of Central Park between Lenox Avenue and the 7th Avenue Exit will be closed to motor vehicles for an additional hour (7-8am) during the morning peak period. Currently, the West Drive is open to motor vehicles between the hours of 7-10am and operates as an HOV 2+ only roadway. With this change, the West Drive will be open to motor vehicles between the hours of 8-10am only and will continue to operate as an HOV 2+ roadway. This additional hour of closure of the West Drive to motor vehicles provides an additional hour of conflict-free recreational use during the early morning hours.

Let's paraphrase what we wrote yesterday: How is it again, with Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff and Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan riding their bikes, that NYC remains a bike-unfriendly city? Yesterday, two bicyclists died in separate incidents in Brooklyn and the Bronx. At 9AM, 18-year-old Luis Ramos was biking to his job at George's Spanish and American Restaurant when a woman opened her car door in his path on Flushing Avenue near Beaver Street. The Post describes that "Ramos slammed into the door, flew over his handlebars and fell into traffic, where a school bus ran over him." Ramos' brother Lucas had been biking about two blocks behind him and saw the police at the scene. He said, "I ran over to him to hug him. But the cops told me not to touch him." Ramos was pronounced dead at Woodhull Hospital and the police did not issue any summons. more ›

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a water rescue at Emmons Ave. and Knapp St. in Brooklyn, a serious assault on West 37th St. and 11th Ave. in Manhattan, and a bank robbery on Flatlands Ave. in Queens.
• The body of the Ecuadorian man who was killed in a bar fight earlier this week will be returned home at the expense of a businessman, also from Ecuador, who appreciated the man's abbreviated attempt to support his family from abroad.
• The woman thought to have been trying to throw herself from the Staten Island Ferry in a suicide attempt was actually just drunk.
• Showing up subway-riding Mayor Bloomberg, Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff commutes to work on his bike. How is it again, with bike-riding DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, that NYC remains a bike-unfriendly city?
• Woody Allen is trying his hand at opera, from the safe distance of LA. He'll be staging one act of Puccini's three-part "Il Trittico" for the Los Angeles Opera company.
• A jury found that the author who published under the name JT Leroy did defraud a film company and she's been ordered to pay damages.
• The Snapple Theater Center has renamed the space currently hosting a revival of "The Fantasticks" The Jerry Orbach Theater.
• Politics reach a new level of childishness as Giuliani says of Bloomberg: He's copying me.

Though the Partnership for New York City's Kathryn Wylde told the NY Times that she finds Assembly Leader Sheldon Silver "quite the opposite" of the "dark Darth Vader figure of Albany" that many people think him to be, we're betting that Mayor Bloomberg thinks Silver is quite Vaderish. A number of lawmakers confirmed to the Post that the many people hate Bloomberg's congestion pricing plan for the city, offering comments like "It sucks, it does nothing for anybody, kill it" and "It's likely dead for good." And Streetsblog found out from new Department of Transportation Commisioner Janette Sadik-Khan that the city doesn't quite have a Plan B if congestion pricing doesn't go through. She said:

Everyone is shooting for [approval of the plan on Thursday when the legislative session officially ends] but the promise of a special legislative session later this summer is still out there. So, Plan B is the special session. We are not giving up hope at all. We are fully committed. We need to get this legislation passed. It needs to pass now. It would be ridiculous to throw away hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funds. That's our plan and when the plan passes we're looking to institute a series of immediate short term improvements before the switch is flipped on congestion pricing, including increased express bus service, ferry service and a variety of other initiatives. So, our emphasis is on making sure this congestion pricing program passes. On the transportation side, we don't think there's anything more important for the future of New York than getting this plan through.

The new commissioner of the Department of Transportation won the hearts of not just bicyclists but other people who love Central Park the other day: Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan told Streetsblog that she was considering a car-free Central Park trial this summer. (It sounds like transverse traffic will remain.) more ›

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a slashing on East 156th St. and Union Ave. in the Bronx, a missing patient on East 135th St. and Lenox Ave. in Manhattan, and a person under a subway train at Lenox Ave. and Central Park North in Manhattan.
• Being a Jew-hating Nazi in Brooklyn must be neverending work. One miserable person in Park Slope keeps slogging away though.
• The New York Public Library is opening its first new branch since 1989 and it's in an old candy factory in NoLiTa. We expect Roald Dahl will be forever on reserve.
• State Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno is infatuated with the idea of Mayor Bloomberg assuming higher office. This week it's the Governor's office.
• The Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem is celebrating its 200th birthday with a pilgrimage to Ethiopia to commemorate the African seamen who obviated early colonial discrimination by opening their own church.
• This should make alternative-transportation advocates very happy: the city's new transportation commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan commutes to work on a bike (at least for a photo-op this morning). We hope she's not killed in traffic before bike-friendly measures can be enacted.
• There are eight million stories in the naked city. This one's about watching a cop movie classic with the police commissioner.
• Three Staten Island teens attacked a 125-pound cancer survivor as the 56-year-old was walking home from his bus stop Saturday evening. No robbery; just a senseless beating.
• Jerry Falwell, who posited that New Yorkers and America in general brought the 9/11 attacks on themselves by being a bunch of godless sodomite heathens, was called home to Jesus today.

• Name a new commissioner for the Department of Transportation (it's Janette Sadik-Khan - check out Streetsblog's suggestions for her)
• Cancel an appearance at a big GOP fund-raiser, which the Post's Fred Dicker thinks fuels further "speculation that he'll run for president"
• Continue to be mad at a Kansas TV station for not airing one of his anti-illegal gun ads