An MTA track worker scared off a man who was raping a 36-year-old woman on the tracks at the Bowery J subway station at Delancey Street on Wednesday. Police say the suspect targeted the woman who got off a train around 1 a.m.: The [victim] was on an escalator when 29-year-old Michael Torres grabbed her around the neck, covered her mouth and told her not to scream. He then dragged her to the end of the platform, threw her on the tracks and sexually assaulted her." more ›

As anticipated, last night the DOT revealed forthcoming changes planned for Delancey Street, one of the most dangerous thoroughfares in the city. In five years, 129 people have been hurt in traffic crashes at the intersections of Delancey and Essex and Delancey and Clinton, and three pedestrians have been killed on Delancey in the past year. In response to calls for safety improvements, the DOT presented the plan [pdf] to the local Community Board last night. more ›

The Department of Transportation will announce initiatives to improve safety along Delancey Street at a special meeting of Community Board 3 tonight. Four people familiar with the project told DNAinfo that the changes will include wider sidewalks, different signal timing, and improved traffic patterns. "We're going to see significant safety improvements on Delancey Street in months, not years," State Senator Daniel Squadron said. "This is a quick and dramatic proposal." more ›

A pregnant 16-year-old was shot outside her apartment on Stanton Street yesterday afternoon in an altercation with her boyfriend. Kimberly Valasquez, who is two months pregnant, was shot shortly after 2:00 p.m. in the second-floor hallway at 210 Stanton Street and was rushed to Bellevue soon after. "Her boyfriend shot her," a girl who identified herself as Valasquez's best friend told the Daily News. "She's out of surgery now—she and the baby are going to be okay." more ›

Another $16 million will be pumped into redeveloping Pier 42 and completing the East River Waterfront Park as the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation officially approved the work on Thursday. "This funding will be a step toward the world-class waterfront and open space we’ve long fought for, while continuing the revitalization of Lower Manhattan," State Senator Daniel Squadron said in a statement. The green space and "beach" will jut out between the Williamsburg and Manhattan bridges. While the rendering looks swell, it's missing the requisite old men fishing and chain smoking. more ›

Even to the jaded New York eye, it was difficult to enter ABC No Rio Friday night and not be bewildered. Over loops of brash R&B and his mother's anecdotes of his childhood, artist Michael Alan methodically applied just about every incarnation of paint, glue, paper, fabric and to the otherwise nude human instruments of his Living Installation. more ›

The grandmother of 12-year-old Dashane Santana, who was struck and killed by a car crossing Delancey Street last week, is in the midst of raising the $8,500 for Dashane's funeral while she grieves for her granddaughter. "Right now we need about $3,000 by Tuesday," Teresa Pedroza tells us. "It's coming in little by little." Pedroza has sold candy and gone door-to-door asking for donations, which yielded around $600. She hopes that two fundraisers she's organizing, one today and another tomorrow, will be enough. "All this is out of the blue. Her birthday is in February—we're supposed to be celebrating that. Now I'm planning a funeral." more ›

In the wake of the death of 12-year-old Dashane Santana, who was struck and killed crossing Delancey Street last Friday, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver is asking the Department of Transportation to assign crossing guards to the dangerous thoroughfare. "With traffic coming on and off the Williamsburg Bridge and a wide area for pedestrians to cross, there is an urgent need for a more aggressive approach to safety," Silver wrote in a letter to commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan obtained by DNAinfo. "We simply cannot wait for another tragedy to occur." more ›

There's nothing more annoying than paying for goods and services with legal tender. We prefer to use a rectangle of plastic that creates enough cognitive dissonance to enable us to forget the whole thing happened until the end of the month. Finally, a brave consumer has fired the first shot in the war against bigoted cash-only establishments in the Lower East Side. Reader @iambovine passes along this photo outside the bar Marshall Stack this afternoon. Good luck sleeping tonight, you casholes! more ›

Dashane Santana, the 12-year-old girl who was struck and killed by a minivan crossing Delancey Street yesterday had dreams of attending Juilliard and becoming an actress. "She was a loving little girl—that was my girl," Santana's mother, Shamika Benjamin told the Post. Benjamin seemed to confirm the accounts of two witnesses who said that Santana was held up in the middle of the street as the traffic light turned green. "She was crossing the street when she dropped her bookbag." Police have not charged the 58-year-old driver of the van, and are deeming the tragedy an accident. more ›

[UPDATE BELOW] A 13-year-old girl is dead after being run over at the base of the Williamsburg Bridge in Manhattan. The unidentified sixth grader was hit around 2:30 p.m., and the FDNY tells us she was in cardiac arrest when they arrived on scene at Clinton Street and Delancey. She was rushed to New York Downtown Hospital, where she was pronounced D.O.A. The NYPD press office did not have any information about the accident yet, but there were reports of heavy traffic backups on the bridge. more ›

The 34-year-old woman who lept off the Williamsburg bridge yesterday and landed on the windshield of an SUV was conscious and talking at Bellevue Hospital. According to the Daily News, Jenna Marie Filippi of Queens stopped her car on the east side of the bridge and jumped down 20-30 feet to Pitt Street below. "I thought it was a rag doll," crossing guard Aida Mercado, who was 20 feet away, tells DNAinfo. "I couldn't even talk. I was just pointing." more ›

New Yorkers hear the argument from Californian refugees all the time: "You can't get any decent tacos in New York City." These poor ex-Angelenos have never put a Brooklyn Taco to their lips. Before this fall, you could only snag one at the Hester Street Fair or the Artists and Fleas fair in Williamsburg, but now you don't have to wait for spring. We paid a visit to Brooklyn Taco's first permanent location in the Essex Street Market, and as sad as it was to see Jeffery's Meat Market leave, the neighborhood now has sublime tacos just steps from 5 subway lines, 7 days a week. more ›

Following the release of Mayor Bloomberg's hit list of 19 schools that "just don't do the job," it behooves the ones who survived to shape up or face the impending municipal axe. Or, cut back on reporting things that would get you there. Parents and former employees of the Lower East Side's Marta Valle High School are claiming Principal Mimi Fortunato is attempting to play down the number of violent altercations and lax attendance policy to avoid closure. "See how I get a drink?" one truant student told a Post reporter outside the school. "If there was discipline, I'd be in class." more ›

Bars like Ludlow Manor, a three-level macaron of fancified boozing on the southwest corner of Ludlow and Delancey, continue to crop up in the Lower East Side. Call it gentrification or the "Lower Eastpacking District," we just call it "expensive." But the Lo-Down reports that CB 3 voted 3-2 last night to reject Ludlow Manor's request for liquor permits on the second and third floors, after allegations that the venue had been operating illegally without them. “You are using a catering permit to conduct regular business. These are not private parties,” CB 3's SLA committee chair Alex Militano said. more ›

When the Dark Room first opened on Ludlow Street in the summer of 2004, it was a different era of the Lower East Side. Like, an era where you'd see Interpol's Carlos D hanging around at bars and everyone was meeting up with "Michael Caine" in the bathroom, and Pianos didn't totally suck. So, granted the Dark Room has probably significantly changed in terms of what kind of people it draws these days, rumors that it's closing is sort tugging at our former self's drunken heartstrings. According to Bowery Boogie, the place may shutter sooner rather than later: more ›

Three 15-year-old boys playing handball in Sara Roosevelt Park last night at around 7:40 p.m. were approached by a group of six men and one woman. According to the NYPD, the group brandished a pistol and demanded that the teenagers empty their pockets. When they refused, the boys were shot with pepper spray, and the assailants ran. more ›

Won't someone think of the rats?! After all, Frank "Rat Man" Calzarano is only one man—for over a decade he's risen at dawn to bring food to the poor needy rats on the Lower East Side, particularly in the vicinity of Stanton Street. But New York City's rat community has thousands, perhaps millions, of desperate rodents, and Calzarano can't feed them all himself, try as he might. And if one area woman has her way, Calzarano's rats will be left to starve in the gutter. more ›

White Slab Palace, the cavernous Scandinavian bar and restaurant on a busy Delancey Street intersection, appears to have slung its last Aquavit: after suffering a series of NYPD and SLA-related setbacks earlier this summer, the space has shuttered for good. more ›

On October 9, a low-flying police helicopter roused residents of the Lower East Side along Rivington Street, looking for a suspect in a sexual assault. According to the Lo-Down the incident occurred around 7 a.m. near Rivington and Attorney Streets. more ›

Pastrami-lovers, watch your pocketbooks—a thief has been snatching bags from unsuspecting diners at the Houston Street institution Kat'z Deli, and she's still on the loose. more ›

You read that right. BabyCakes, the vegan bakery in the Lower East Side, is so psyched over Queen Bee's impending bundle of joy that they're baking a literal bun in the oven. Yes, it gets bigger every week, and no, you sadly cannot eat it. more ›

Responding to reports of a woman wearing a white skirt AFTER Labor Day, the NYPD vice squad and the Department of Buildings swarmed the Midtown offices of Mother PR last night after word got out that they'd be hosting Friday Night Throwdown. The fights, which have been popular for years and have acquired plenty of press for being rowdy, fashionable scenes chock full of high cheekbones, had been on an eight-month hiatus from their usual Lower East Side warehouse locations. Doesn't the NYPD understand that they've ruined a perfectly good opportunity to see male models get punched in the face? more ›