2010 June

We Hardly Knew V by Matt Levy

June 30, 2010

On Friday, June 25th the Metropolitan Transit Authority implemented another round of service cuts, slashing subway service and bus lines, and removing whole train routes from the system, specifically retiring the W and the V trains. This was the most radical restructuring of NYC’s mass transit system in a decade, a system that carries 5 million people M-F and is the only public transit system in the world that runs 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Some New Yorkers wrote letters to their congressman. Some called into WNYC to complain. We threw a party.

Jonah preaching to the people about the subway cuts!

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Cyclists to the Rescue! by Matt Levy

June 22, 2010

Although Matt wasnt riding this tall bike, he WAS wearing a helmet!

Aunt Reba was in town from Seattle and I only had one night to see her. This meant a bike ride from my apartment in Greenwood Heights Brooklyn, over the Manhattan Bridge, coast through Chinatown and zoom through the East Village over to Sheridan Square, where Reeb’s East Coast BFF Maxine has an apartment with million-dollar views.

After sliding down the bike ramp into Manhattan and turning north onto Chrystie street, I came up and passed another cyclist, a cool looking dude wearing a vintage Mets teeshirt and baseball cap, zooming on a powder-blue single speed fixie. I nodded, he nodded, just two cyclists in the city on a warm spring night.

After Delancey street, just north of Sammy’s Roumanian, something caught my eye on the West side of Allen; a taxicab pulled over at an acute angle to the sidewalk, with the driver out of his cab and face to face with yet another cyclist. This cyclist’s bike was flat on the street. The driver looked to be a modern Middle-Eastern man, mid 30s, polyester clubbing shirt and trimmed beard, and the cyclist was white, blue undershirt and curly hair sticking out from under his helmet. [Read more…]

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A Very Military New York by Mark Levy

June 3, 2010

Mark portraying Frederick August Bartholdi, lover of freedom.

As I watched the USS Iwo Jima sail down the Hudson to end Fleet Week and the Memorial Day weekend, I thought about Military New York. Some cities are widely known as military towns: San Diego, Washington, Norfolk; but New York has a hidden, yet proud and distinctly multifaceted military history.

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