Sunday, November 3, 2024

NYC Department Of TransAlt greenway follies

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Queens Chronicle

The city’s Department of Transportation is temporarily postponing a virtual Zoom workshop scheduled for Tuesday, Oct. 29, on the proposed 16-mile Queens Waterfront Greenway after a meeting in Douglaston last Thursday, Oct. 24, turned into a huge shouting match between supporters of the trail and homeowners concerned about its potential impact.

The DOT posted the announcement on X Monday evening at around 6 p.m.

“Tomorrow’s Queens Waterfront Greenway virtual workshop has been postponed,” the post said. “A code of conduct will be developed to ensure decorum and respect for all participants.”

Last Thursday’s meeting took place at the Alley Pond Environmental Center. After a slide presentation by the DOT, the crowd of well over 100 people was split up into breakout groups. Just about an hour after the meeting started, what had been strained conversations erupted into a large verbal free-for-all that raged for several minutes.

In a small handful of instances, city employees and other meeting attendees had to physically separate some people.

The city’s plan is to run a trail of bike lanes and other amenities between Fort Totten and Gantry Plaza State Park on the East River waterfront in Long Island City.

Last Thursday’s meeting was the third of three workshops designed to solicit public opinion on a segment of the trail, with the session devoted to the easternmost stretch between Fort Totten and Willets Point.

Many homeowners are concerned about the impact such a trail might have on residential streets in areas where the shoreline is not readily accessible or even visible because of privately owned residential or industrial properties.

The DOT’s roughly 20-minute slide presentation delved into the history of the area in question, its present conditions and what the city sees as potential opportunities presented by the project.

The crowd then was asked to break up into groups at many tables where DOT staff took suggestions based on massive maps of Northeast Queens.

The format is common for community workshops on major projects in the city, particularly ones that could mean massive change to many streets. But it was not long before several of the group conversations devolved into heated exchanges between homeowners and plan supporters. One hour into the meeting, at just about 7 p.m., no conversations could be heard above the angry exchanges for a period of several minutes.

 

 

Here's what the Queens Chronicle forgot to write about, CM Paladino found out that the ones really calling the shots and that will authorize this "decorum" is some think tank that is tied to Transportation Alternatives. The DOT may be the most corrupted agency in New York City now that all of Mayor Adams crony hires have stepped down.

MTA to Far Rockaway: Drop Dead

 Image

 Gothamist

The MTA will shut down A train service in the Rockaways for five months starting in January, disrupting the commutes of more than 9,000 daily riders.

Beginning on Jan. 17, the A train won’t run between Howard Beach-JFK Airport and the last stops of the line, either Rockaway Park-Beach 116 St. or Far Rockaway-Mott Ave. The Rockaway Park Shuttle trains will also stop running to and from Broad Channel.

The MTA says the lengthy suspension of service is necessary to fortify infrastructure against extreme weather. The viaducts and bridge that carry trains across Broad Channel need “major upgrades to help protect the line from future storms,” the MTA wrote in an announcement.

The agency noted that much of the work is in response to extensive damage caused by Hurricane Sandy. It took seven months to restore service to Rockaway after the storm in Oct. 2012.

Free bus shuttle service will be available along the affected stops. The announcement gave no indication that NYC Ferry service from Rockaway would be expanded while the upgrades are underway.

Far Rockaway resident Quazel Trower said the shutdown will upend his life.

“There’s only one train that goes to Far Rockaway. It’s not like two trains, three trains. It’s literally one,” Trower, 27, said. “Taking the shuttle bus always makes your commute longer than it needs to be.”

Trower said his typical commute into Manhattan already takes more than an hour.

In a statement, MTA Deputy Chief Development Officer, Mark Roche, said that the plan was consistent with what has been done in the past for the L train Canarsie Tunnel project and G line modernization work.

"This next phase of the A train resiliency work has undergone internal and external expert review to weigh alternate delivery and construction methods,"he said. "It was determined that the plan presented is the best option for getting this work done as quickly as possible, with the least impact to commuters.”

So if congestion pricing started, this would have happened anyway. Nice of the MTA to drop this right when the weather got chilly, it's really no different how they obfuscate reasons during train delay announcements. 


 

Sunday, October 27, 2024

Graveyard Bay

 

 NY Post

Jamaica Bay is quietly earning a reputation as the Big Apple’s version of the Bermuda Triangle — with at least eight dead bodies discovered in and around the area over the past year, some under mysterious circumstances. 

Investigations into five of the eight “floaters” who washed ashore or turned up in either Jamaica Bay or the nearby Atlantic Ocean side of The Rockaways have been closed, authorities said.

However, many questions still remain.

The “manner of death” on four of the bodies was deemed “undetermined” by the city Medical Examiner’s office, including Emmy-award winning cinematographer and photographer Ross McDonnell, who authorities have said loved to “wild swim” in the ocean and other waterways.

The 44-year-old Irishman’s headless, armless torso washed up on a Breezy Point beach Nov. 17, two weeks after leaving his Brooklyn home. 

 Police initially said they believed McDonnell likely drowned taking a late-night dip, but the ME said it declared the cause of death “undetermined” based on the lack of evidence off the predominantly sparse skeletal remains found.

 Three other deaths remain under investigation by authorities, including Marco Ramirez, 48, of Brooklyn, who was found dead Oct. 15 along the Cross Bay Boulevard shoreline of the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge in Broad Channel, and an unidentified female who washed ashore in Breezy Point on Oct. 5.

City coroners have so far only been able to determine both the cause and manner of death for one of the eight deceased — a headless man whose unidentified remains were found in April by a fisherman near 165th Avenue and Cross Bay Boulevard in Queens.

About a 1,000 feet away, authorities found a rope hanging from the Joseph P. Addabbo Memorial Bridge.

That case was declared a hanging suicide, according to the Medical Examiner’s office.

Councilwoman Joann Ariola (R-Queens), who represents much of The Rockaways, said she expressed concerns to authorities over the summer after the body count reached five — only to be told by law enforcement they didn’t believe the deaths were connected.

Thursday, October 24, 2024

Driving malfeasance

 Brooklyn Borough President Expense Payee NA Privacy Security 2023

 White Collar Fraud

Welcome to New York City’s most impressive disappearing act yet. Following our previous exposés of fiscal acrobatics and car service extravaganzas, we present something remarkable: $4.2 billion of taxpayer money that’s simply vanished from public view.

In what could be called innovative municipal recordkeeping, New York City has classified an astounding $4,201,873,479.51 under the vendor code “N/A (Privacy/Security)” in 2023. Of this impressive sum, $4,131,414,624.59 lists its purpose as “blank” – presumably because even “N/A” felt too specific. The remaining $70,458,854.92 gets the slightly more descriptive purpose of “N/A,” for those times when someone felt compelled to write something.

A sum of $4.2 billion is almost too massive to comprehend, let alone cover in a single post. So, let’s start small – with our borough presidents, whose modest contributions to this trend are particularly telling. After all, if routine expenses like office supplies and travel can be deemed too sensitive for public disclosure, what hope do we have of understanding the billions classified elsewhere? These smaller examples reveal a culture of opacity that has trickled down from the highest levels of city government to the most mundane of expenses.

 Borough President Antonio Reynoso leads with $135,827.35 in classified spending. His office’s signature move? Converting $124,515 into “Professional Services Other” – a category that explains nothing while saying something. They’ve also managed to make $5,388 worth of books disappear from public scrutiny.

 Vanessa Gibson’s office presents $30,680.41 in mysterious expenditures, including $13,618 in travel expenses to undisclosed locations. The destinations remain as mysterious as the purposes.

Under Donovan Richards Jr.’s watch, Queens contributes $13,345.20 in classified spending, featuring $9,100 in “Temporary Services.” The nature of these temporary services remains, appropriately, temporary.

 Mark Levine keeps it modest with $6,358.10 in classified expenses, including an intriguing -$3.50 credit. Even refunds, it seems, can be confidential.

These are the hypocrites who want to abolish parking mandates.

 

But these borough-level activities are merely a prelude to the city’s larger production. Consider $4.2 billion – enough to fund significant public works – simply marked as confidential. More impressively, they’ve managed to make the purposes disappear as well.

When the purpose of $4.1 billion of spending is classified as “blank,” it raises questions about the very nature of public disclosure. The remaining $70 million marked “N/A” almost seems quaint in comparison.

 

Driving mandate

 https://www.amny.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/2024-09-04T225214Z_2142606164_RC2YT9AREMHW_RTRMADP_3_NEW-YORK-TUNNEL.jpg?resize=1200,800

 AMNY

The number of people traveling in and out of New York City by car is higher than ever before, even as mass transit ridership continues to lag behind levels seen before the COVID-19 pandemic, a new report on MTA finances from State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli revealed.

Crossings on the MTA’s seven bridges and two tunnels across New York City climbed to 335 million in 2023, already a record, and are expected to hit 339 million in 2024, according to DiNapoli’s report. That comes even as paid weekday ridership on the subway still hovers at around 70% of pre-COVID averages, with higher numbers registered on weekends, suggesting a permanent shift to working from home even as New Yorkers take transit for personal activities.

Even worse, MTA ridership over the next several years is expected to recover still more slowly than officials once projected: in November 2020, consulting giant McKinsey & Company predicted ridership would rise to 86% of pre-COVID levels by 2026, but MTA brass now concede it will likely average only 80% by that time.

Suck it, Open Plans.


 

Sunday, October 20, 2024

The people, the lies and the conspiracy of the City of Yes

 

 

With the City of Yes of Housing Opportunity about to get heard by City Council and New Yorkers the next two days, Intrepid City Planner Paul Graziano dropped a report on the sneaky tactics at the previous zoom hearing and sneaky people trying to get the worst housing plan in New York City history approved in spite of majority rejection by community boards and residents.

Here are the best parts on Paul's X account.


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The video above happens to be from this farcical rally with everyone from Paul's COY list. They can't even answer housing related questions and defend their agendas without their YIMBY scripts and talking points. And they refuse to answer the most important question no one is asking these dopes, who is going to build this City of Yes?Image

Luxury public housing tower development in Ridgewood is still in a coma

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QNS

Construction has been put on hold for a 17-story mixed-use building at 3-50 St. Nicholas Ave. in Ridgewood.

Known as The Ridgewood, this tower will be the tallest structure in Ridgewood. It will cover 284,000 square feet. In addition to 97,000 of that square footage being dedicated to retail space, including two large stores and other amenities, The Ridgewood will have 133 rental apartments, with plans to set 30% of them aside for affordable housing. A community facility was also planned to be included as part of this structure.

Delays have previously plagued the construction process of The Ridgewood. A fatal accident on the construction site in April 2022 led to multiple stop work orders as a result of unsafe working conditions. While the developers of the building had initially hoped to complete the project in the winter of 2023, the stop work orders delayed construction for multiple months. It was not until December 2022 that the building was finally topped out. The latest construction delay likely means that the project will not be done before the end of 2024.

Prior to the most recent pause, the facade was partially enclosed. Progress had been further along in the exterior, at the podium. Current features of the podium include a red metal envelope and broad stretches of glass with black mullions. The main southern elevation is close to being completed, but the northern face is still mostly exposed, with metal frames currently in place to support the installation of paneling. A tall sidewalk shed is blocking the view of the tall sidewalk shed.

 

The plutocrats of poverty


Gothamist 

Nepotism. Self-dealing. Executive salaries in the high six figures.

These are some of the allegations leveled in a new report on New York City’s multibillion-dollar shelter system released by city investigators on Thursday.

The review, which began in 2021, found a range of potential improprieties at 51 nonprofits that receive taxpayer funds to provide shelter and services for clients of the city Department of Homeless Services, which manages the biggest municipal shelter system in the United States. On an average night, over 87,000 people stay at the more than 500 New York City shelters funded by the department.

The city’s Department of Investigation found multiple instances of apparent conflicts of interest, potential nepotism and failure to comply with competitive bidding requirements on the part of shelter providers, according to the nearly 100-page report.

“City-funded nonprofit service providers pose unique compliance and governance risks, and comprehensive city oversight is the best way to stop corruption, fraud, and waste before it starts,” Department of Investigation Commissioner Jocelyn Strauber said in a statement. “Today’s report provides ample evidence of the risks specific to nonprofits and shortcomings in city oversight and makes 32 recommendations to strengthen controls around this essential network.”

In some cases, insiders were paid outside of their normal compensation through personal business interests involving the shelter where they worked, such as security companies that staffed those shelters — and were owned by the nonprofits they served. In other cases, shelter providers told investigators they did not employ any immediate relatives of senior employees or board members, which would violate their city contracts — but the investigators later found that adult children of shelter executives had been employed by the nonprofits for years.

 Multiple nonprofit executives received more than $500,000 annually, and in some cases more than $700,000 annually, in compensation from the shelter providers and related organizations. Investigators emphasized these salaries were funded largely or in part by taxpayer dollars and said the city lacks sufficient rules to guard against excessive compensation.

Many of the groups have annual revenues in the tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars. More than 90 nonprofit contractors now provide shelter services for the city, up from at least 70 just a few years ago, according to the report. New York City has a decades-old legal right to shelter that generally requires that a bed be provided to anyone who needs one — though this right was curtailed for migrants earlier this year.

The report comes as the city faces a stubborn housing and homelessness crisis exacerbated by the migrant influx since the spring of 2022. The homeless services department’s budget for shelters rose to $4 billion in fiscal year 2024, up from $2.7 billion two years earlier, according to the report. Migrant shelters run by NYC Health and Hospitals — called humanitarian relief centers — were not covered by the review and are being separately monitored by city investigators and a major accounting firm.

A spokesperson for the city’s Department of Social Services, which oversees the shelters, said it has “completely stopped doing business with a number of providers highlighted in the report,” and taken other steps to strengthen accountability for the nonprofit contractors.

“To be clear, this report does not reflect our current contracting and oversight processes given that the review began years ago prior to the current administration, but we look forward to continuing on these improvements to better serve New Yorkers,” the agency said in a statement.