Here's a regularly updated group of stories of interest from the New York Metro area, frequently with links to other news sources.
04/30/2019 - 09:35
Late yesterday, the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation announced that it will receive a $5 million award from the New York State Department of Transportation’s TAP (Transportation Alternatives Program) for the construction of a bike lane on the East Promenade.
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04/29/2019 - 18:39
Updated 41 weeks ago
"Yet 16 years after the service hotline debuted, some 425,000 New Yorkers aren’t fully integrated into the system. That’s because of a bureaucratic quirk that essentially shafts folks who live in public housing, Battery Park City and on Roosevelt Island..." The City, April 26th, 2019.
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04/24/2019 - 09:01
Updated 42 weeks ago
In 1963, it was a different New York, unaware it was about to be convulsed in civil and financial crises. In February, the Transit Authority proposed a two track subway tunnel under 76th Street to be built in conjunction with the new 2nd Avenue subway line. By May 2nd, it’s location migrated southward to 59th Street, and by the time Mayor Robert Wagner weighed on the 24th of the month, declaring it should “be built with all deliberate speed,” the tunnel meandered even farther to “around 61st Street.”
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04/22/2019 - 09:14
Updated 43 weeks ago
"When the going gets tough, the tough get going," a saying attributed to both Joseph P. Kennedy and Knute Rockne, is locally reflected in the Roosevelt Island Cherry Blossom Festival corollary: "Those who act tough and proud will vacate a situation when it becomes difficult lest they be proven not as tough as they appear to be."
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04/20/2019 - 09:08
Updated 43 weeks ago
We've seen how grossly inadequate planning and callous event day management soured the Cherry Blossom Festival for so many attending or hoping to. But what about our neighbors who had other plans and found their lives rudely disrupted, even endangered? Would you be surprised to learn that the organizers treated them, during and after, with arguably even less respect and consideration?
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04/18/2019 - 09:17
Updated 43 weeks ago
With the Roosevelt Island Tram unlikely to return to full service as hoped by Saturday, the MTA's decision to junk Manhattan bound F Trains, beginning Friday at 11:45 p.m. means another weekend of transportation headaches for us.
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04/17/2019 - 09:02
Updated 43 weeks ago
It took both the Common Council and RIOC three full days to cook up responses to calamities created by inadequate planning and preparation for last weekend's Cherry Blossom Festival. For all they were worth, they might as well have spit them out Saturday night and been done with it.
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04/14/2019 - 09:20
Updated 44 weeks ago
With cherry blossoms opening just in time and the best weather of the spring season defying forecasts, Roosevelt Island's 2019 Cherry Blossom Festival entertained and delighted, but by day's end, inevitable transportation shortcomings fed New York City media and Twitter storms feverishly dramatizing long delays getting on and off the Island.
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04/12/2019 - 09:00
Updated 44 weeks ago
Although the pace has been laggardly and the process ragged, sponsors and organizers of Roosevelt Island 2019 Cherry Blossom Festival seem to be tightening up in time for Saturday's event. Changes begin at 7:00 tonight.
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04/11/2019 - 10:09
Updated 44 weeks ago
On RIOC's Facebook page alone, 13,000 say they will enjoy the Cherry Blossom Festival on Saturday in Southpoint and FDR Four Freedoms Parks. Another whopping 69,000 declare they're "interested." Unpredictable numbers of others are likely to challenge security and transportation. Are we ready?
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_0.jpg "Cherry Blossom Festival Committee Seizes Chance To Praise Itself, Throw RIOC Under Bus")
