Janae Pierre: Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City, from WNYC. It's Friday, August 15th. Here's the morning headlines. I'm Janae Pierre. Officials say a fourth person has died in the Legionnaires’ outbreak in Harlem which has sickened 99 people so far. City officials say new cases are starting to decline, but they have not declared the outbreak to be over. They identified several buildings with water cooling towers that tested positive for Legionella in Harlem, including a city run hospital and health clinic. They say all but one of the towers has been disinfected. The final one is scheduled for remediation today. City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams says the Council will vote to override the mayor's vetoes of bills intended to help food vendors and delivery workers. The speaker says the vetoes took the Council by surprise.

City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams: The administration was for this legislation until they were not, a few days ago.

Janae Pierre: Instacart heavily lobbied against one of the bills which would raise the wages of third-party grocery app workers. Another bill would decriminalize penalties on food vendors. Mayor Eric Adams is defending the vetoes. He says raising wages for delivery workers would result in higher food prices and that cracking down on illegal street vending protects small businesses.

Getting evicted in the summer heat isn't just an inconvenience. A new report says it can be dangerous. New York City data shows that more than 500 people die from heat related illness each year in the five boroughs. Now, an organization called Legal Services NYC is asking the city to pause evictions on days when the heat index is hotter than 90 degrees. Donna Harvey is one New Yorker who has spent some of the hottest days this summer searching for a new home while facing eviction. She says the heat added to her stress.

Donna Harvey: I started to catch a panic attack, an anxiety attack, because my mental was already in a place of finding adequate housing, stable housing for my child, and I get to a place where now I'm even more flustered.

Janae Pierre: City officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Bojangles is making a comeback in New York City. The Southern fast food chain known for fried chicken, biscuits, and sweet tea is opening a location this winter in East Flatbush, Brooklyn. It's part of a plan to open 20 spots across the five boroughs over the next decade. The franchise deal is being led by Habib Hashimi, a restaurant operator with locations across New York and Connecticut. Bojangles last had a presence in the city back in the '80s. This time they say they're in it for the long haul. The air quality is moderate today due to some particle pollution, and so far, all is looking clear for your commute this morning.

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Janae Pierre: It's 76 degrees. It'll be mostly sunny today with a high around 87. Partly cloudy skies ahead tonight with a low around 70. On Saturday, you can expect a sunny day with a high around 85 degrees. It's Friday. That means it's time for our weekly segment of On The Way, covering all things transportation. That's after the break.

Speaker: NYC, NYC, NYC, NYC, NYC.

Sean Carlson: I'm Sean Carlson for WNYC. It's time for On The Way, our weekly segment on All Things Considered. Breaking down the week's transit news. Joining us, WNYC's transportation reporter Stephen Nessen and Ramsey Khlalifeh, and editor Clayton Guse. PATH train riders cannot just get a break, man. The Port Authority said they're going to be closing down the Hoboken Station over the Labor Day holiday to fix a broken piece of equipment. What is going on?

Ramsey Khlalifeh: Just for a little context, the Port Authority actually shut down this station earlier this year for a month. They installed a new system to basically direct trains into the platform, made track replacements and other infrastructure upgrades, but now they're saying that because of a "design issue" with that new system, they'll actually have to close the station down again so they can try and resolve the problem. Issues with this new system have really created a bunch of disruptions throughout the PATH system over the summer, especially through Hoboken, so the lines that go to World Trade Center and 33rd Street.

When we reached out for a comment, the Port Authority says if, let's say, the contractor or the manufacturer had anything to do with this problem, they will be held accountable. If you look at procurement documents for this project, it costs about $10 million to install, by a company called J-Track, LLC.

Stephen Nessen: It's really just the latest indignity that PATH riders have to suffer. In addition to the fires, the signal issues, all the things that Ramsey was talking about, there's a bunch of weekend closures that are coming for PATH train riders while the Port Authority makes $400 million worth of upgrades. I spoke with the mayor of Hoboken, Ravi Bhalla, and he says these problems that we've been speaking about, he thinks it's symptomatic of systematic infrastructure failures. He says that PATH needs to declare a state of emergency.

Clayton Guse: Might as well call it Hobroken station.

Stephen Nessen: Ooh.

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Clayton Guse: I mean, to put a finer point on it, the Port Authority and PATH can blame the issues on the contractor all they want, but at the end of the day, it's their contract, it's their system, they have oversight. This is far from the first problem we've seen at Hoboken. Less than 10 years ago, back in 2016, a lot of listeners might remember when an NJ Transit train crashed at Hoboken terminal, which shares with PATH. After whenever a bumper block rider said it never slowed down, a person died and dozens of others were injured. So it's kind of a recurring theme, over the years here, that we continue to have problems and incidents and delays at the station.

Sean Carlson: Yes. All right. The MTA just installed new benches to the LIRR mezzanine at Grand Central Madison. What can you tell us about that?

Ramsey Khlalifeh: Yes, they added 42 new seats to the mezzanine level of the train station. That's in three different waiting areas next to the track, so 21 benches. If you've ever been to that station, there's the main concourse that's a bit higher up where riders buy their tickets, there's a bunch of art. Then there's a very, very steep escalator that goes down to the mezzanine, and a lot of people like to hang out there. It's closer to the train station, it's closer to the tracks. If you're in a rush or if you just want to feel more comfortable before the train arrives, you can hang out over there.

They mostly wait there, and MTA officials really receives a lot of feedback from customers saying, "Hey, we need a place to sit before the train comes." Also, they said that there's been growing ridership on the LIRR, so there's more demand. This all started last October, they added a couple seats, and now they're just doing a lot more. If you actually look at the benches, just a little visual, they're black and gray. You can seat two people, and they have a medium-sized handle in between. So you actually can't really lay down, but we'll get more to that in a second.

Clayton Guse: Yes. I mean, really, what we're talking about is two years of the MTA hand-wringing and wondering over a really simple question, "Should we add seats to a train station for people to sit in while they wait to ride?" You compare that with-- Grand Central Madison is the newest train station in the city. One of the other new ones, Moynihan Train Hall. It's not a new station, but kind of an extension of Penn, so to speak. They're famous, since it opened in 2020, that they have no seats.

People are sitting on the floor throughout the lobby. That's run by the Empire State Development Corporation, not the MTA, like this one, but this isn't crown jewel, so to speak, of an MTA station. I mean, it was years of delays. It's way deep under Grand Central. It's covered in marble. It finally opened a couple years ago. There's still no bar down there, to give you the delight of having-

Sean Carlson: They'll love that. [laughs]

Clayton Guse: -a drink while you wait for a train. So you can't sit at a bar. That's going to change soon [crosstalk]-

Stephen Nessen: It's also a tremendously long hallway and a long hike to get to the tracks. You would be tired.

Sean Carlson: Yes.

Clayton Guse: You need a breather.

Sean Carlson: Yes.

Clayton Guse: So, but really, we can call this what it is, and we can get to this a little-- we can dive in a little bit more. This is a deterrent to keep people from sleeping and/or loitering, particularly homeless people, in the station.

Ramsey Khlalifeh: Another indication of that really is just, look at the rules that have been applied to these new seats. You need to be a ticket holder. The MTA also put a 90 minute time limit for how long you can actually sit there.

Sean Carlson: How do you even enforce something like that?

Ramsey Khlalifeh: I don't know how you'd enforce it. I think there are police nearby, but I don't know who's sitting there for that long.

Stephen Nessen: With a stopwatch.

Ramsey Khlalifeh: Officials, when they rolled this out, it's kind of interesting when you hear the language. They said they wanted to be "smart" about where they place these seats, about the process of rolling it out. What's clear is that both in the design and in the rollout, that they just want to, or they're rather thinking about the homeless population or people who might loiter. I spoke with Jon Ritter, he's a professor of architecture and urbanism at NYU. He really places these new benches in the city's history of hostile architecture.

Jon Ritter: Certainly clearly designed so you can't lie down on it or sleep on it, which is the thing that they clearly want to avoid. They want to keep people moving through there. I mean, look, what this responds to is the fact that public space is the space of last resort for people who have no resources.

Ramsey Khlalifeh: This citywide shift towards this more hostile design, it really stems from the rise in homelessness in New York City in the 1980s. What Ritter said is, the continuation of these ideas in new designs might really not be necessary, especially in a day and age where we have police all over the train system. There's also increased surveillance. Maybe you don't really need the design to change, or rather you don't need the design to be anti-homeless to really, I guess, achieve those goals.

Sean Carlson: Yes. All right. Every week we answer a question from a curious commuter. This week, Michael from Brooklyn asks, why do the fare gates not display your remaining balance on your OMNY card? With the machines, it seems they decided to not bother with anything to make them user friendly. What's up with that?

Stephen Nessen: The MTA acknowledges that there are limited displays on the OMNY screens. Spokesperson Eugene Resnick tells us that OMNY readers are designed to be fast, simple, and secure. The MTA now expects their users, people that use OMNY, that they're going to check their balance on an OMNY vending machine, or online, like your bank account, or one of the customer service centers located around the city.

It's true. It's not as easy to check the balance as it was with the MetroCard. Where you just swiped and it was right there. That said, the MTA hinted that when the MetroCard is fully phased out early next year, the MTA may be updating the OMNY screens to provide more information.

Ramsey Khlalifeh: I mean, I'd hope so. You have this screen that's actually not so little, you can really see it well. I mean, they got to use it for all kinds of things you'd hope for.

Stephen Nessen: What kind of things would you want? Like baseball scores, the weather?

Ramsey Khlalifeh: I mean, realistically think about it. I don't know how many taps I've done in that seven day period. When have I got to my 12th tap? When do I get free? Also, since they transition from the Monday through Sunday schedule and a seven day period, whenever that week starts for you. I guess I just don't really know when my day starts. I'm curious to get more information from that-

Stephen Nessen: When your week begins, right?

Ramsey Khlalifeh: Exactly. When is my week [crosstalk]?

Stephen Nessen: Is it Saturday or is it Tuesday?

Ramsey Khlalifeh: I don't know when that started. Yes.

Stephen Nessen: You work all the time.

Clayton Guse: Right. They should put the Knicks scores on these.

Stephen Nessen: [laughs] Okay.

Ramsey Khlalifeh: Put the scores.

Stephen Nessen: All right. Noted.

Clayton Guse: Yes, keeps them wondering. Compare this to what the MetroCard does, I guess, still. If you have a-- like I used to, I don't use one anymore, but when you used to have a 30 day pass, you'd swipe and it would show you when it would expire. It would expire on midnight that day. So you'd swipe in the morning, and it'd be like, oh, no, it's going to expire tonight. Because of the way that it worked, you'd have to use it by midnight. I remember busting my butt to get to a subway station and through a turnstile by midnight, and you felt like Cinderella. Sometimes I still feel like Cinderella, but for different reasons.

Sean Carlson: [crosstalk] Clayton Guse.

Clayton Guse: Yes.

Sean Carlson: Yes. Before we go, speaking of OMNY, real quick, isn't that going to be the only option next year when the MetroCard phases out?

Stephen Nessen: That's right. It's the only option. Starting early next year, you'll have to use OMNY, but it's not the only big change that's coming. That's when the MTA's biannual fare hike goes into effect. Subway fares, bus fares are going to go up to $3, tolls and bridges are going to go up to 7.5%, and LIRR and Metro-North riders will pay 4.5% more for their 7 and 30 day tickets. Next week are the fare hike hearings. You can weigh in. Three chances, on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Sean Carlson: Okay. Well, thanks to Michael for the question. Thanks to WNYC transportation reporters Stephen Nessen and Ramsey Khlalifeh, and editor Clayton Guse. You can stay in the know on all things transit or ask a question of your own by signing up for our weekly newsletter at gothamist.com/ontheway. My friends, thanks so much.

Stephen Nessen: Thank you, Sean.

Clayton Guse: Thanks.

Ramsey Khlalifeh: Thank you, Sean.

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Janae Pierre: Thanks for listening. This is NYC Now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. More soon.

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