Its modern appearance is more historically accurate, but the Gothic Revival style cottage now used by the Garibaldi-Meucci Museum out on Staten Island looked WAY cooler with the open air colonnade memorial pavilion built on top of it to mark Garibaldi's 100th birthday.

"If we're going to keep unnecessary conductors on trains as make-work jobs, should we also still have elevator operators?" is a rhetorical question often brought up in the discussion on subway automation, but the union's answer is unironically yes. And in 2023 a judge agreed!

"Equity" in NYC means even the rich folks in wealthy neighborhoods like the Upper West Side have to squeeze between mountains of recycling and trash bags on their evening strolls.

It's funny how everyone understands it makes sense to store trash in the street (even if it takes up a parking space or two) when it comes to construction, but loses it when someone proposes doing the exact same thing for regular waste. Status quo bias is a bitch, huh?

I get why NYC tore down most of the elevated trains in Manhattan, but from the right angle they really do look so amazing 😍

The lack of interest in how transit works abroad (e.g. fare enforcement, pass structures, staffing policies) among many local professional transit advocates makes more sense when you recognize that a lot of them actually view themselves primarily as anti-poverty activists.

I don't think I've seen this level of parking in a crosswalk since the last time I strolled around South Philly. We need better enforcement across all of NYC, but this crosswalk leads DIRECTLY to the Greenpoint Playground in Brooklyn. Young kids and parents with strollers deserve better.

There are way fewer store signs today in Manhattan compared to the streetcape photos Bernice Abbott took in the 1930s for a WPA project. But there are A LOT more street trees nowadays. And in this case a decent bike lane! Jefferson Market Court/Library and 6th Ave 1938➡️2026

Seems pretty obvious to me bike lanes makes parenting young kids in the city way easier. And more fun! But it can't just be some paint squeezed between traffic and parked cars. If you wouldn't let your toddler scooter in the bike lane it doesn't count.

One way Queens is just straight up better than Manhattan is how quiet the riverfront parks are. In Manhattan all of the waterfront parks are pretty much immediately adjacent to highways and all the noise they produce. But the Hunter's Point South Park Extension was so tranquil.

Congestion Pricing: How it started vs How it's going

America's legacy cities like NYC don't have to become museum pieces. We can still have dynamic, growing neighborhoods IF we maintain the political will to say yes to growth and abundance. Long Island City, Queens 2014➡️2026

I hope Mayor Mamdani's Land Inventory Fast Track Task Force will seriously reconsider repurposing some of the less robust publicly owned community gardens for social housing. It's one thing if the property is accessible to the public and well maintained, but some are eyesores.

The lack of actual protected infrastructure and any sort of enforcement often defeats the nominal bus lanes in New York, frequently forcing the buses into the mixed-traffic lanes anyway. No wonder the MTA struggles to maintain decent and even headways on these routes!

Everyone knows the view of the Manhattan skyline from Long Island City in Queens is one of the coolest in the world, but the vista of the Greenpoint skyscrapers in Brooklyn across the Newtown Creek from the Hunter's Point South Park Extension is also pretty neat.

NYC literally spent decades watching its transit infrastructure rot because politicians were too terrified to touch the nickel fare. Seeing @ridersalliance.org repeat those same mistakes for a 10 cent increase is just disappointing. How about fighting for a lower pass multiple??

So many haters of Billionaires' Row south of Central Park are convinced the residential towers replaced a neighborhood of affordable housing, when in reality the corridor was a bunch of gimmick chain restaurants more appropriate in a Sun Belt exurb (and eventually Times Square).

Getting ready to "mind your business" on the subway in the year 2030 as half the passengers blast TikToks and the other half vape.

I'm not sure how decent the ferries are for transit, but I understand subsidizing them as an economic development tool because watching them travel up and down the East River is one of the coolest things you can do in New York City.

So many of the bike lanes in NYC seem to run along heavy arterial roads, which seem really uncomfortable and scary. But not so bad when cyclists are actually very protected, like here on the Pulaski Bridge connecting Long Island City in Queens and Greenpoint in Brooklyn.

Just took a G train without a conductor and of course it was fine. Thank God @governor.ny.gov vetoed the mandatory overstaffing bill because it would've made the mediocre headways worse for no benefit to riders.

There really is an implicit threat of violence that allows one person in a subway car to subjugate dozens of fellow riders to the loud noise from their phones. That's why it's not just an annoyance but a form of public disorder normal folks are understandably uncomfortable with.

It always seems so unnatural to me to see 2 story buildings so close to multiple subway stations in Lower Manhattan, but this Japanese place and apartment at 231 E 9th Street in the East Village used to be a car repair shop, so still better than it used to be! ~1940➡️2026

"We won't force the homeless to go into shelters when it's extremely cold BUT we will let them smoke on subway platforms" doesn't seem like a recipe for sustainable social democracy in our cities.

I don't think I'll ever get tired of watching trains cross over NYC's many cool bridges, like the Park Avenue Bridge over the Harlem River here.

One thing that immediately sticks out about old photos of residential streets in Manhattan is how many fewer street trees there were back then compared to today. West 4th Street frontage of 53 Perry Street West Village 1940s➡️Today

Often when I point out it's dumb for the Jefferson Market Garden in Greenwich Village to remain closed all winter folks will argue nobody would visit the park anyway. But this afternoon there were locals and visitors hanging out at the NYC AIDS Memorial Park just a block away.

Mamdani's new Land Inventory Task Force won't have to work very hard to identify publicly owned potential development sites in Manhattan because @marklevinenyc.bsky.social already identified them as part of his Housing Manhattanites report, like this parcel in Harlem.

Thank God there were no zoning regulations mandating that new developments match the character of the neighborhood when the General Electric Building was built in 1929-31. Imagine if New York was denied this iconic Art Deco masterpiece because NIMBYs thought it too tall!

I understand why its demolition didn't provoke an outcry like the razing of Penn Station across the street, but I love the cute little Streamline Moderne terminal Greyhound built in Midtown 😍

Mamdani's inauguration is a nice reminder that any transplant can go on to become mayor in NYC, and I think that's beautiful.

One of the empty parcels on this vacant piece of land I walk by all of the time has been owned by the City since 1968. There are PLENTY of potential development sites already publicly owned, but with limited resources Mamdani has to be realistic about affordability requirements.

The brick work on the new condo building at 525 Sixth Avenue looks great, but it's way too short. If we're going to lose a cool Romanesque Revival building the replacement should be way larger. Especially as there's a subway entrance right there! 2022➡️2025

Manhattan doesn't need any new gunsmiths, but American cities were definitely cooler when merchants had unique signs advertising the goods & services they sold. 6 Centre Market Place Photo by Berenice Abbott

I just submitted my first Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request with the NYC government. Now I REALLY feel like a New Yorker!

The old church at 136th St and Frederick Douglas definitely had a unique look, but this new mixed-use building is looking pretty good too. I'm a sucker for a brick facade and big windows. And now 53 more households get to live here in Central Harlem near the subway! 2012➡️Today

A view of buildings that disappear into fog or clouds, and/or provides iconic wayfinding is a public good.

Looking up the history of this surface parking lot we walked by the other day in Lower Manhattan made me so sad. Broome Street Tabernacle➡️Parking Lot

Many progressives are loathe to admit it but community gardens are a quasi privatization of public space. The waiting lists to use them are long and few get to participate. Public parks are much more accessible to many more people.

This gas station near a Metro North station is permissively zoned (M1-6/R9) and was included in Special East Harlem Corridors District to spur redevelopment, but I doubt anything will go up as long as the mandatory inclusionary housing applies. Why not see if normal housing pencils out?

The Harlem River Park seems so underrated. Doesn't get better than watching the trains cross the Park Avenue Bridge at dusk.

Seems less than ideal some of the walking paths between buildings in NYCHA properties now have an underground bunker vibe. And this sidewalk in the Abraham Lincoln Houses isn't even particularly close to any building facades. What are we even doing here?!

You would think the nearly 4,000 pages of text and maps in NYC's zoning code would cover everything, but there's an additional oral code passed down from generation to generation covering such nuances like "auto repair shops are actually allowed to store vehicles on the sidewalk".

Often when land in Harlem is less intensely developed than it was decades ago it's owned by a religious institution. But actually this Five Percent Nation congregation is on City owned land?? I wonder what the story is. Still exempt from property taxes tho. 126th St & Adam Clayton Powell Jr Blvd

Such a bummer that because Suffolk County was too corrupt to build sewers 50 years ago when Feds were still willing to pay for these projects we''ll probably never fully clean up the Long Island Sound. Suburban sprawl once again causing environmental problems for the whole region.

As a pedestrian I just don't understand why I'm supposed to be terrified of autonomous vehicles when this is the alternative: www.nytimes.com/2025/12/26/u...

Gas station and a parking garage into 170 homes 300 West 122nd Street, Central Harlem 2009➡️2025

You don't have to be Anglican to be moved by the beauty of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine while strolling through Morningside Park. The appearance of nice large buildings hardly ruins the vibe of an urban park, despite what the NIMBYs claim.

We're rewatching season 4 of The Wire, and I had forgotten Marla Daniels defended the construction of a new halfway house during a debate, right after the incumbent City Councilmember promised to kill it. Nobody's favorite character, but much respect for this YIMBY stance.

After a nonprofit purchased this parcel at 54 W 129th St in 1999 they signed a conservation easement with the city promising to use the land as a park. But as far as I can tell it's never been more than a fenced off lawn. Still exempt from property taxes though. 1940s➡️2025