Speed cameras begin catching speeders around NYC school zones

Speed camera at Richmond Avenue and Hylan Blvd in Staten Island

Speed cameras begin catching speeders around NYC school zones | New York Post
By Michael Gartland
February 2, 2014

Smile, scofflaw, you’re on candid camera!
The city has nabbed 900 drivers speeding around schools in the first two weeks of its six-camera crackdown.
At $50 a pop, that’s $45,000 the city Department of Transportation expects to rake in.
The tickets were issued to drivers doing 10 mph or more over the posted limit, which in most cases is 30 mph.
The violations are issued in the name of the vehicle’s registered owner, and do not result in points against the driver’s license or insurance penalties.
“Just two weeks in, DOT’s speed-camera program is putting motorists on notice that we will not tolerate dangerous driving on New York City streets,” said DOT Commissioner Polly Trottenberg. “Speed cameras will help save lives and make our streets safer for pedestrians, especially children and seniors.”
The agency will not say where the six cameras in the pilot program are located, saying only that some are stationary, others were moved periodically, and all are within a quarter-mile of a school with a scofflaw problem.
At least three schools eyed for the program were surrounded by drivers who sped 100 percent of the time — PS 233 in Brooklyn, PS 54 in Queens and PS 60 in Staten Island.
At least one camera-generated ticket, according to a political insider, was issued at the corner of Hylan Boulevard and Huguenot Avenue in Staten Island, close to both IS 7 and Tottenville HS. Motorists were clocked speeding 97 percent of the time near the high school in DOT traffic surveys.
Bloggers claimed to identify other speed-camera corners, including White Plains Road in The Bronx; the intersection of Seaview and Pennsylvania avenues in Brooklyn — just a block away from IS 364; and the corner of Blake and Howard avenues, down the street from PS 156.
Police unions have been critical.
“Speed cameras will certainly raise revenue for the city,” said PBA President Patrick Lynch. “They cannot do the job of a live, professionally trained police officer who, having stopped a speeder, may make an arrest for driving under the influence, driving without a license or insurance, or even worse offenses like carrying an illegal weapon.”
The DOT intends to use a total of 20 cameras throughout the city.

NY School Zones Driving Safety  Driving responsibly in school zones.

Progressive punishment-New York Post editorial

EDITORIAL: Progressive punishment http://t.co/28AYTzvrLp

— NY Post Opinion (@NYPostOpinion) February 8, 2014

(excerpt)

In theory, Mayor de Blasio’s progressivism is embodied in his slogan: “One New York, Rising Together.”

In practice, we’re learning de Blasio-style progressivism is more about punishment: punishing the wealthy by raising their taxes; punishing charters by depriving them of space; punishing cops by branding them as racist; even punishing workers whose only crime is to take folks on horse rides around Central Park.

Pussy Riot meets NYC admirer - the Mayor

@NewYorkObserver: Details from Mayor de Blasio's meeting with ex-members of Pussy Riot tonight: http://nyob.co/NhbJs8
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A Rough Final Winter for New York’s Sanitation Chief

Nicole Bengiveno

A Rough Final Winter for New York’s Sanitation Chief - NYTimes.com

By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM
February 5, 2014
New York City has faced a messy meteorological start to the year, a spate of storms that has sapped the patience of even its most stoic residents.

For the man in charge of cleaning the city’s streets, the wild weather has also been something else: an unexpected, end-of-career test, and perhaps a final chance at a snowy form of redemption.

John J. Doherty is New York’s longest-serving sanitation commissioner, with decades of blizzards under his belt. But he did not expect quite such a tough time when he agreed to postpone retirement for a few more months to aid the infant administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio.

Now, Mr. Doherty, 75, is the butt of criticism, facing the usual snowstorm complaints about sluggishness and poor preparation, along with a few novel accusations, such as plowing poorer neighborhoods before wealthier ones.

On Wednesday, after battling the latest mix of ice and sleet to afflict his city, Mr. Doherty stood stern-faced at a news conference as another nuisance, a potential salt shortage, was raised by reporters. When it came time for Mr. de Blasio to thank his team, the commissioner’s name went conspicuously unmentioned.

The Democratic party shift on Israel

@YWN: Op-Ed: Albany Earthquake Registers in Jerusalem - There was a political earthquake in Albany yesterday and its ... - http://t.co/JdO5hqpTzN
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Recchia’s rivalry with Assemblyman Bill Colton

Rep. Michael Grimm challenger Domenic Recchia’s rivalry with Assemblyman Bill Colton — plus scoops on Councilman Mathieu Eugene and Andrew Gounardes • Brooklyn Daily

by Will Bredderman, Feb. 5, 2014

Will Brooklyn’s Democrats defeat Domenic Recchia’scongressional bid?

Political experts agree that to unseat incumbent Rep.Michael Grimm (R–Bay Ridge), former councilman and Gravesend native Domenic Recchia will need an overwhelming victory in Brooklyn and a strong showing in his opponent’s home turf in Staten Island, where roughly three-quarters of the district’s voters reside. But insiders say Recchia will have difficulty racking up votes in what ought to be his base, thanks to long-standing hostilities with members of his own party.

Races are won with the dedicated legwork of volunteers who carry petitions, staff phone banks, talk candidates up door to door, and run get-out-the-vote operations leading up to Election Day. And the man with arguably the largest ground operation in the district is one of Recchia’s most ardent enemies — Assemblyman Bill Colton (D–Bensonhurst).

Where other Brooklyn pols have struggled to keep up with the sweeping demographic changes in Bensonhurst, Colton has harnessed them to his advantage. His support for public sector unions has secured him the loyalty of the older generation of Italian-American civil servants, and his outreach to the fast-growing Chinese population has made him a hero to that community. Colton’s rallies draw mobs of 18- to 21-year-old Asian youth with a dedication that some observers referred to as “cult-like.” His political operation was able to obtain an impressive 5,000-plus petition signatures to keep Colton, as well as his allies CouncilmanDavid Greenfield (D–Borough Park) and CouncilmanVincent Gentile (D–Bay Ridge), on the ballot in 2013. It also played a major part in the election of Colton’s protege, Councilman Mark Treyger (D–Coney Island), to Recchia’s old seat.

“It’s hard to imagine any Democrat winning this seat without strong turnout in this part of the district,” an insider said. “And Assemblyman Colton and Councilman Treyger have demonstrated a tremendous ability to drive turnout in their area of Brooklyn.”Experts say wringing every possible vote from Colton’s Dem-heavy Bensonhurst turf is crucial if Recchia is to triumph over Grimm.

Recchia came up out of Colton’s machine, but the two had a falling out shortly after Recchia won office in 2002. Several sources said their relationship soured due to Recchia’s desire for independence, but all agreed the decisive splitting point was Lafayette High School. In the early 2000s, Chinese-American parents and students at the Bath Beach school — now marked for closure —complained of racially-motivated assaults and abuse in the hallways. Colton pushed to replace Lafayette’s administration, but sources said Recchia — who had formerly headed up the local community school board — viewed the school as his turf and demanded the assemblyman back down. Colton instead stepped up his efforts, and forced out Lafayette’s principal in 2007.

Recchia has since sought to damage and undermine Colton, mostly unsuccessfully. Sources said that Recchia deliberately had the residential complexes along Cropsey Avenue where Treyger grew up gerrymandered out of his district when the Council redrew the lines in 2012, hoping vainly to prevent a Colton ally from succeeding him.

Recchia, who also did not comment for this column, faces resentment from hard-core Democrats in Bay Ridge as well, due to his close working relationship with state Sen.Marty Golden (R–Bay Ridge) — who perhaps edges out even Grimm as the bête noire of Brooklyn liberals. Insiders describe the pair as “buddy-buddy” thanks to a heavy overlap in donors, and because of disgraced Dem boss — and Recchia ally — Vito Lopez’s long-standing arrangement not to put up serious challengers to the six-term GOP state legislator.Neither Colton nor Treyger responded to calls for comment on whether they plan to lend their support to Recchia’s run.

It should be noted that Golden is even closer to Grimm, and has endorsed and provided support to the Republican Congressman.

It’s also doubtful that organized labor will provide Recchia with the ground-level support he needs, either. Grimm, the son of a union carpenter, is known as one of labor’s few Republican allies in the House and has enjoyed the endorsement and funding of several powerful unions. The labor-backed Working Families Party gave its ballot line to Grimm’s opponent Mark Murphy in 2012, but declined to lend the Democrat its elite door-to-door canvassing operation — and it stayed entirely out of the 2010 race when Grimm unseated Rep.Michael McMahon

Half a solution

@NYCMayorsOffice @BilldeBlasio But unless the city cleans the crosswalks and street corners our seniors can only walk around the block.
— allanshweky (@allanshweky) February 5, 2014

Moving to Kensington

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/02/09/realestate/affordability-in-kensington-brooklyn.html?referrer=

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Flashing is legal

@WSJ: Judge: Drivers have a First Amendment right to warn other vehicles of speed traps: http://t.co/izz3uua2TO
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Falling snow on the Sheepshead Bay station

Special effect pretty cool but will only work if you have google+

Snowstorm sneaks into Sheepshead Bay

Fresh snow on the Sheepshead Bay elevated platform

View up Sheepshead Bay Road

Tough place for riders to wait

Waiting for the B train

Kids in Brooklyn have a super new field to call their own

LISC: News/Media: While the Broncos and Seahawks play the Super Bowl in NJ, kids in Brooklyn have a super new field to call their own

Jaywalking for Dummies

The Savvy New Yorker’s Guide to Jaywalking -- Daily Intelligencer 

The Savvy New Yorker’s Guide to Jaywalking

by Adam Martin

(Excerpt-Click here to read the entire article)

New Yorkers — perpetually rushed and just a bit obstinate by nature — jaywalk instinctively, it seems. The act is as natural a part of living here as riding the subway and waiting on (instead of in) line. But like many things, there’s a right way and a wrong way to do it.

As the city tallied a startling twelve pedestrian deaths in the first few weeks of the year, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a new focus on pedestrian safety, something that lagged during Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s reign. That new focus has taken various forms, from the NYPD deputy inspector cracking down on scofflaw drivers in Park Slope to the far more controversial increase in jaywalking tickets citywide. De Blasio has said there is no coordinated crackdown on jaywalking, but that local precinct commanders are free to enforce the law as they please. In the Upper West Side earlier this month, one such crackdown led to a bloody scuffle between police and the 84-year-old jaywalker they were ticketing. He’s now suing.

Since then, jaywalking has been a hot topic. In the Village, some NYU students created a special crosswalk signal that lectures people about pedestrian safety.ABC’s Brian Ross hit someone who was crossing against the light just this week. And outlets such as the Associated Press and Los Angeles Times have taken to marveling at New Yorkers’ street-crossing brazenness.

Nobody is going to tell residents and workers of this city not to jaywalk. But this might be a good time to offer up a few reminders about how to do it safely and effectively, especially with hoards of people flowing in for the Super Bowl. We spoke with transportation engineer and former city Traffic Commissioner“Gridlock” Sam Schwartz, as well as cycling and pedestrian activist Keegan Stephan, an organizer with the group Right of Way, about how the savvy New Yorker jaywalks

The Truly Affordable NY Apartment

NYTimes: The Truly Affordable New York Apartment click here.

In a city of soaring real estate prices, New Yorkers love to hear the tales of people who found the Promised Land: a truly affordable apartment.