11. February 2012 by admin.

Walking down the street near my office the other day, I found myself contemplating New York City taxicabs.  A few years ago, the cab scene was a monoculture of Ford Crown Victorias; there are plenty of them still around, but there are Toyotas and Ford Explorer SUVs and Transit Connect vans, which are wheelchair-accessible.  (Nothing by General Motors, though.  Weird.)

New York City is under a court order to make all its taxis wheelchair-accessible.  On a practical level, it seems absurd: the proportion of taxi passengers who use a wheelchair is so small that the cost difference for a wheelchair-accessible taxis works out to over $100,000 per wheelchair-using passenger.  Drivers don’t like the boxy vans that are commonly used: besides the issue of maneuverability in city traffic, they’re less conducive to conversation with passengers, which leads to smaller tips.

But we have the Americans with Disabilities Act, which mandates wheelchair-accessible taxis and buses and countless other things.  OK: it’s the law, so we have to accept it.

For a moment, I contemplated the New York City I grew up in: the seat of commerce and finance of the most productive and powerful nation on Earth.  We had big Checker cabs that were almost wheelchair-accessible.  It wouldn’t have taken much redesign to make it happen, back then.

If the world had gone forward as we imagined it would in the 1960s, we’d probably have wheelchair-accessible taxis, buses, subways, and everything else by now.   We’d consider it a statement of our power and prosperity that we could make these simple amenities accessible to everyone, and we wouldn’t begrudge the cost.  And if the world had gone forward as we imagined it in the 1960s, I’d be planning my next vacation on the Moon.

But it didn’t happen that way.  After the novelty of visiting the Moon wore off, we stopped doing it.  We stopped being productive, because it’s cheaper to do productive things elsewhere.  The prosperity that would have made such things as wheelchair-accessible taxis effortless faded away.  In its place we have the enforced stinginess of the bean counters.

If we were truly a rich country, we’d have wheelchair-accessible taxis as a matter of the corporate pride of the taxi operators.

But we’re not really as rich as we imagine, so we have wheelchair-accessible taxis by government fiat.

Or, we’ll get them, eventually.

Posted in New York City, Dysfunctional Government | No Comments »

29. August 2011 by admin.

I know that Irene caused flooding and wind damage elsewhere, but in my little corner of Brooklyn, it was generally a dud.

It rained late Saturday night through most of Sunday morning, but with much less wind than I had been led to expect.  The power even stayed on.  It seemed like any of a hundred storms with no name and no press agent.

At 9:00 am yesterday, I put on my rain slicker and headed out.  There was moderate rain and some wind, and the Gowanus Canal was about 5′ over its normal level, causing some local flooding, but nothing dire.

In the afternoon, the report came that the subways might not be running for Monday morning.  The MTA posted pictures of flooding of their train yards near Coney Island and in Harlem.

In the evening, I went out for a walk with my wife.  The setting sun was finally breaking through the clouds, and it was windier than earlier in the day.  Weird.

And as I write this on Monday morning, the news reports that the subways are running again.  Let’s hope….

Posted in Weather, New York City | No Comments »

27. August 2011 by admin.

I missed writing about the earthquake earlier this week: I was on a business trip in the middle of Pennsylvania, when the room vibrated for a bit, as if there were a subway train passing underneath.  I suspected that it was an earthquake, but the power stayed on, nothing actually shook, and nothing further happened.  It was only afterward, when I watched the evening news, that the dimensions of the event were clearer.  My wife, in Brooklyn at the time, was unaware of it.

Anyhow, if the debt brouhaha and an earthquake were not enough, today we await the arrival of Hurricane Irene, which is now pounding North Carolina and headed north:

• The City has ordered the evacuation of locations in Zone A.  The zones are part of the citywide coastal storm plan, but there is no simple logic to them: it’s not like ‘five blocks from the water.’  You have to look it up on the map, or through the City Web site.  And while the map has been printed in the newspapers, it isn’t clear enough to resolve the details.  I live in Zone B: if I were two blocks south, I’d be in Zone A; if I were two blocks north, I’d be in Zone C; and if I were three blocks north, I wouldn’t be in any zone, and presumably safe from coastal flooding.  We live in a stout building, with windows high enough to escape any downed trees; we’re staying put.  I’m sure there will be plenty of confusion about evacuations today.
• Mass transit, including subways, buses, and commuter trains, will be shutting down completely after noon today.  It’s the first time that I can remember a total shutdown because of weather.

The latest reports suggest that the storm is weakening somewhat, and will probably hit the city as a tropical storm.  I figure that we have about a 50% chance of losing cable TV, and 30% of losing power.

Well, we’ll see.

Posted in Weather, New York City, Fearmongering | No Comments »

29. June 2011 by admin.

• This week, the New York Post raised the price of the daily paper to 75 cents from 50.  I’m sure its chief competition, the Daily News, will follow suit before the end of the summer.
• The back of my MetroCard features the word ‘optimism:’
  
  A line at the bottom of the card gives credit to Reed Seifer, under the MTA’s Arts for Transit program.  I’m compelled to ask:
  • Is this really art?
  • Did Reed Seifer actually get paid for suggesting the word ‘optimism’ on the back of a MetroCard?
  • If so, did the person responsible for that at the MTA lose his/her job as a result?  (Last I checked, they were crying broke!)
  • Are you now filled with optimism after reading this?
• For the last year or so, New York City has been giving restaurants and other food establishments ratings of ‘A,’ ‘B,’ or ‘C,’ based on their sanitary inspection results.  A restaurant in my neighborhood got written up in the newspaper for hiding their ‘C’ rating.  The next week, the sign was back up, but the orange ‘C’ had faded into invisibility.  It looked as if the sign had simply faded in the sun, but still I have to wonder….

Posted in New York City, Media, Money | No Comments »

29. December 2010 by admin.

A couple of thoughts about the snowstorm that arrived Sunday and dumped about two feet of snow on the city:

• The storm tied for sixth place among all-time snowfalls recorded in New York City in the past 150 years or so.  Among these seven greatest storms, four of them were in the past eight years, while the fifth was in 1996.  It’s definitely gotten snowier since I was a kid.  I don’t know if it’s global warming at work, or the coming of a new ice age, or God knows what.  But then, since I don’t drive, I actually like the snow.
• Everyone’s moaning about how long it is taking to clean up afterward.  The F train was out for a day and a half (and it usually keeps running), and even now, three days later, there are a lot of unplowed streets out there.  It’s funny: those other storms in recent years took place under the same mayor we have now.  And it surprised me at the time how quickly the streets were cleared.  What happened?

Posted in Weather, New York City, Environment | No Comments »

8. October 2010 by admin.

One of my earliest memories of midtown Manhattan as a little boy, besides obvious things like the Empire State Building, was the glass bank building at Fifth Avenue and 43rd Street.  I most keenly remembered the safe deposit vault at street level, that used to be opened during business hours.

As I grew up, it remained in my mind as the essential image of what a bank ought to be.  When I was a young man, it was a Manufacturers Hanover, which got swallowed by Chemical, which then got swallowed by Chase.  The ATM lobby was added as the machines came into use.  I don’t remember exactly when they stopped opening the vault during business hours, but it hasn’t been opened in a while.

It was pretty clear that the sleek, modern bank building had become an anachronism: a horrific waste of value to have a four-story building in midtown Manhattan.  It became clear that the end was near when Chase set up a new branch in an office building one block north.

Today was the last business day at the glass bank.  I don’t know what will happen next: perhaps some other bank will set up there, but I rather doubt it.

Posted in New York City, Life Goes On, Money | No Comments »

4. September 2010 by admin.

It’s been a while since I wrote.  I’ve been occupied with other things.  I’ve been able to kick the blogging software in the pants so that others can register and post comments.  If you register and don’t post a comment within three days, your registration will be deleted.

*          *          *

The big  issue this summer has been the proposed mosque and community center about two blocks north of the World Trade Center site.  An Islamic group bought a distressed building, damaged when the landing gear of one of the planes hijacked on 11 September hit it, and is currently using it for prayer services.  There is now a plan to build a shiny new mosque and community center on the site.  It used to be called ‘Cordoba House,’ but the developers of the plan are now calling it ‘Park51.’  No matter: I’ll stick with the former name, as I believe it’s more honest.

My first thought is if the local Islamic community is pooling their dollars to build this facility, we in the larger community have no rational basis to oppose it.  It’s their building and their land.

And the  First Amendment to the Constitution begins ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;’ which seems fairly straightforward.  We don’t have to like Cordoba House; we don’t have to support it; but we must grant its right to be there.

Opponents of Cordoba House make three points:

• Funding for the mosque is currently unclear: it may be coming from Saudi Arabia, and not the local community.
• Islam, in addition to providing moral and spiritual guidance, posits a political and legal system.  Cordoba House, consistent with history, represents the political aspect of Islam ‘planting the flag’ in New York City.
• Since the 11 September terrorists were followers of Islam, it’s disrespectful to have an Islamic center so close to the death and destruction of the World Trade Center site.

While all these points may be true, none of them represent a valid exception to a basic First Amendment right.  The First Amendment says nothing about what a religion is, or how it may be funded, a requirement to be ‘respectful.’  Islam may have its political aspects, but it would be a major effort (and probably not realistic) to establish that it is not actually a religion.

Still, people seize on the last argument to suggest, ‘perhaps it could be built somewhere else.’  If Islam is really the dark, powerful force that some imagine it to be, such moaning would only make us look weak and stupid.

What really bothers me about Cordoba House, more than its funding or its imagined political intent, is that when it is finished, the World Trade Center site will still be a hole in the ground.

Posted in Islam, New York City, World Trade Center | No Comments »

27. July 2009 by admin.

Recently, the city has had its contractors running around painting the streets green in my neighborhood to designate bicycle paths:

But my neighborhood is just an instance of a larger pattern.  New bike paths are being set up all over the city.  In some streets in Manhattan, pavement markings call for cars to park in what seems to be the middle of the street, so that the curb lane can be given over to cyclists.

On the one hand, I’m a bicyclist, and I appreciate anything the city can do to make my trip easier and safer.  But given that the city supposedly has a budget crisis, there are other things that I’m sure would be a better use of scarce funds.

Maybe it’s stimulus money: our tax dollars at work.  At least it’s work and jobs for people.

Still, I’m suspicious of this flurry of activity.  Are there plans for gasoline to go up to $50/gallon next year so we’ll all have to ride bicycles?

Posted in Bicycling, New York City | No Comments »

20. July 2009 by admin.

Yesterday I finally got around to seeing the new version of The Taking of Pelham 123, the story of a New York City subway hijacking.  The original 1974 version, with Robert Shaw and Walter Matthau, was one of the touchstones of my adolescence, and the first R-rated movie that my parents took me to see.

The reviews of the new version were all similar: it’s a good movie, but don’t compare it with the original.  Alas, such a comparison is inevitable: the new version sucks.

When the original was made, the Transit Authority was afraid that someone might actually try to hijack a train.  While much of the movie was actually filmed on the subway, a disclaimer at the end indicated that the TA did not render any technical assistance. Nevertheless, the movie presented an authentic view of the subway and its operation.

The current version was made with the full cooperation of the TA, and they seemed to go our of their way to get the details wrong.  If you ride the real subway regularly, the version in the current Pelham will seem ass-backwards.

Some of the biggest howlers come from the abject rearrangement of the city to fit the script.  There is no Federal Reserve Bank in Brooklyn, and the police car delivering the money appears a half-block from its destination (Grand Central Terminal) before getting wrecked on First Avenue.  And a train can’t go from the Lex line to Coney Island without backtracking.

While John Travolta and Denzel Washington put in good performances, they’re done in by the script.  Travolta is Ryder, a former Wall Streeter who was thrown in prison for embezzlement and now sports a tough-guy tattoo.  He is violent, but strangely philosophical when he talks on the radio.  The real Ryder (like the one in the 1974 movie) would have known to state his demands and shut up.  (But then, of course, there wouldn’t be a movie.)

Denzel Washington is Garber, a manager demoted to the Control Center because of an alleged bribe.  At least the scriptwriters tried to make him a realistic Control Center operator: he talks the talk and looks plausible through the made-up procedures.  But we lose him, too, when he turns into an action hero.

In brief, the charm of the original Pelham is that it feels real.  The new version does not.  The original turns on crisp dialogue, much of which has been replaced with psychobabble.  Perhaps if I had watched it in another frame of mind, I could have laughed at all their stupid mistakes. But as it was, I just found it annoying.

Nevertheless, I’ll probably get the DVD when it comes out, and keep it as a benchmark of how far we’ve gone down since 1974.

Posted in New York City, Movies | No Comments »

2. March 2009 by admin.

• One of the local throwaway newspapers, AM New York, ran a survey with the question, “Do the subway disruptions ruin your weekend?”  Every weekend, NYCT rearranges the service on some part of its network in order to do construction of one kind or another.  They post a list of changes a week before, and while I’ve had some unpleasant surprises, I can’t say that it’s ‘ruined’ my weekend.  Evidently other people’s weekends are far more brittle than mine:  64% of respondents answered ‘yes.’
• The Dow Jones Industrials dropped below 7000 today, down over 50% from its all-time high, below where it fell when the Internet bubble burst, below where it was when the Internet bubble even started to inflate.  Citibank and AIG have been effectively taken over by the government, which means they’re probably dead.
• Hulu.com is a Web site with streaming videos of old TV shows and a handful of movies.  Alec Baldwin appears in a commercial promoting it as a space alien looking forward to gorging on softened human brains.  The commercial is very effective: you wonder, for a moment, if Alec Baldwin really is a space alien and Hulu really is a plot to soften the brains of the populace before the invasion.  Nevertheless, they have an interesting selection of TV shows, probably worth the risk of having my brain turned to a ripe banana.

Posted in New York City, Television, Money | No Comments »

21. February 2009 by admin.

Editorial Note:  I know, it’s been rather a while (over a month!) since I last wrote.  Once upon a time, I pretty reliably had at least a half-hour a day for contemplation and… blogging.  But it is a harder world out there, and one of the ways that it is harder is that one has less time for such things.

On Thursday, my work took me out to Queens.  Riding the 7 train, I saw the nearly-completed Citi Field.  But what had happened to Shea Stadium?

I had sort of expected that it would be demolished in a grand theatrical style, but I guess that Citi Field is too close for that. Or perhaps we’re still in shock over 11 September, and can’t stand to see something blown up.

Instead, it was quietly taken down, piece by piece, leaving only piles of rubble.  By April, it should all be carted away and replaced by a parking lot, as one cannot have a modern stadium without ample parking.

Citi Field, the new stadium, looks vaguely like pictures I’ve seen of Ebbets Field.  It’s charming, I’m sure.  But Ebbets Field doesn’t mean anything to me: it was gone before I was born.  My baseball memories all live at Shea.

And now it’s gone, in the name of… what?  A ‘more intimate venue for baseball’?  It’s baseball, dammit, not ballroom dancing!  One can only pack so many seats close to the field: for the rest of us, baseball is something that is inherently witnessed from a distance.

What else is Citi Field supposed to give us?  I’ve bought Mets tickets often enough that they sent me a flyer in the mail:

• Superior sightlines:  Does this mean, ‘you can see the field better’?  Shea had some really crappy seats with only a partial view of the field.  But from the rest of the seats, you looked out and saw… a ballfield.  Maybe you’ll be able to see it better now, but a billion dollars’ worth better?
• Wide, comfortable seats:  I never had a problem fitting in the seats, and I’m watching a baseball game, not flying to Europe.  (Or is it that the general population has gotten wider?)
• Spacious aisles and rows, with generous legroom:  OK, I’m 6′ tall and always can go for a little more legroom.  If you give me a foot more legroom, I’ll be tickled.  But from the pictures, it looks like only a few more inches.
• Wide concourses that invite fans to move around the entire ballpark:  Why, why, why???  When I go to a baseball game, I make one trip to the concession stand, and one trip to the can.  If I want to go wandering around, I can walk around the neighborhood with my wife: it’s much cheaper.
• Upscale dining options, including… a climate-controlled restaurant:  Spare me!  Part of the live baseball experience is the concession-stand food, eaten alfresco in the stands.  If you want air conditioning, stay home!  (And if they’ve gotten rid of the sausage sandwiches, my preferred downscale dining option, I may consider becoming a Yankees fan.)

At Shea, there were ten major categories of seats, not counting the really fancy seats behind home plate.  Now there are 26, a feat accomplished by zoning each level into ‘infield’ and ‘outfield,’ and further charging extra for the first few rows. The better to juice the fans, I guess.

Yes, I’ll go to see the Mets at Citi Field.  I may even like the new stadium when I see it.

But for now, I’m ticked.

Posted in New York City, Life Goes On | No Comments »