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Speaker 2: Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Friday, March 7th. Here's the morning headlines from Tiffany Hanssen.

Tiffany Hanssen: The Adams' administration is launching a new interagency task force to tackle quality of life issues in Greenwich Village. Mayor Adams and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg say the task force is aimed at curtailing things like open drug use, retail theft, and homelessness. Adams says the task force will recruit neighborhood volunteers to coordinate 13 city agencies. He sidestepped questions about why volunteers were needed. This is the city's sixth such task force.

It comes as major crime falls, but some New Yorkers continue to say they feel unsafe. NYC Health and Hospitals is looking for a location for its new Bridge to Home program. It's designed to provide a landing pad for homeless patients after they're released from psychiatric hospital stays. Mitchell Katz is the system's CEO. He told a City Council hearing yesterday that he's looking in the vicinity of Manhattan Bellevue Hospital, which is a hub for psychiatric care.

Mitchell Katz: The ideal place, and we haven't yet found it, would be a hotel, not used, single rooms, a common space for the services that didn't require construction.

Tiffany Hanssen: The Bridge to Home program was first announced in January. It aims to keep patients stable while helping them look for permanent housing. It will have 100 beds to start and Katz says he hopes to launch the program in July. Governor Hochul wants to give New York's film and TV industry another $100 million in tax breaks. It comes as the industry has struggled to regain its footing in New York after the pandemic in a pair of labor strikes. Critics say the tax credit is a handout that does not get a good return on investment, but Josh Levin of the Motion Picture Association disagrees.

Josh Levin: It's an opportunity for a lot of people, and it's a lifeline for people in an ever-increasing, economically challenging region, so I think it's certainly not a handout.

Tiffany Hanssen: Local and state lawmakers increased the tax break from $420 million a year ago to $700 million just two years ago. The governor proposed this latest boost in her state budget plan. A final state budget is due by April 1st.

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Tiffany Hanssen: We should have a sunny day, will be gusty and chilly, the high near 50, but it will feel much colder. Currently 35 degrees.

Speaker 2: It's Friday. That means it's time for our segment of On The Way covering all things transportation. That's after the break.

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Sean: It's Friday, which means it's time for On The Way, our weekly segment breaking down the week's transit news. Joining us are WNYC's transportation reporters Stephen Nessen and Ramsey Khalifeh. Let's start with the ongoing eternal battle over congestion pricing. Last we spoke, the Trump administration ordered the MTA to wind it down by March 21st. Hochul sued to stop him and says no way she's turning off those cameras. What is the latest move?

Stephen Nessen: Until the next court date, which hasn't been set yet, both parties are taking the fight to, where else? Social media. To that end, Secretary of Transportation in the Trump administration, Sean Duffy, posted this video on X late last week with what appears to be man on the street interviews with construction workers and truck drivers set to a jaunty soundtrack.

Speaker 8: I think with raised toll prices, raised train fares, now you want to add tolls on the streets. I think it's definitely borderline stealing.

Speaker 9: It's ridiculous. It's destroying the city.

Speaker 10: I think it sucks.

Speaker 11: It makes it more expensive for me to come to work.

Speaker 12: Very bad for business.

Speaker 8: End it for sure.

Speaker 9: End it.

Speaker 10: End it.

Speaker 11: End it.

Speaker 12: End it.

Stephen Nessen: Okay, so they want to end it, and it took a few days, but Hochul came out with her own video, with her own man on the street interviews-

Sean: What?

Stephen Nessen: -and her own jaunty soundtrack.

Speaker 13: I don't mind paying the $9 toll because I can get through the city much faster. I think it must save me at least 45 minutes each time.

Speaker 14: A little bit after five o'clock, on a Monday, this is 42nd and 9th. No cars here.

Sean: Wow.

Stephen Nessen: Of course, any politician or journalist for that matter, can go out on the street and find an opinion to support their own perspective, but we did get some harder numbers this week.

Ramsey Khalifeh: Yes, and those numbers did come from a new poll from Quinnipiac University this week of registered New York voters, and it found 54% of registered voters actually oppose the toll program-

Sean: Oh.

Ramsey Khalifeh: -compared to 41% who are still in support of it, but that's actually the exact same breakdown from 2019 when the law was first passed. A majority of Democrats like congestion pricing, while an overwhelming majority of Republicans want to see an end to the tolls. What I did find particularly interesting in this data, this new poll, is for Staten Islanders who responded, 49% now support congestion pricing compared to 46% who oppose it, and I don't know if you remember this, it kind of aligns with some reporting we did, but the Staten Island Express bus riders, many of whom have seen big improvements to their commute times into Manhattan.

Sean: Wow. I also just can't believe the politicians basically are doing like On The Way politician style.

Stephen Nessen: We do On The Way.

Sean: Yes, you're welcome, politicians. Now, this week we reported on a new plan to fix, speaking of eternal issues, to fix the section of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway in Brooklyn Heights. Last year, the city unveiled a few options for replacing the Robert Moses creation known as the triple cantilever. What's new and what's the status of the BQE?

Stephen Nessen: The good news is the BQE is still standing, happy to report.

Sean: Good news.

Stephen Nessen: The city embarked on some emergency repairs to fix some of the deteriorating sections there in Brooklyn Heights. It also reduced traffic from three lanes to two lanes, you'll remember, on this 1.5-mile stretch of roadway, and last year, it started ticketing some of the overweight trucks that contribute to the most wear and tear there. Trucks are heavier nowadays than when the roadway was designed, so last November, it did start issuing $650 fines to overweight trucks there, and the DOT reports this week that the number of trucks on the roadway has dropped by 60%, which is good news for them, and that's because it'll extend the lifespan and basically buy the city more time to come up with a more permanent solution.

Sean: What about the replacement options?

Stephen Nessen: Last year, you said they unveiled these three options, different ways to deal with traffic and different ways to integrate the promenade at Brooklyn Heights to the Brooklyn Bridge Park below, but they also said these three options would cost at least $5 billion. Now, a Brooklyn Heights architect named Marc Wouters has a new option he believes will be cheaper by millions and likely a faster, less disruptful way of fixing the roadway. He believes the retaining wall there does not need to be torn down, which is what the DOT wanted. He also thinks an MTA fan plant there that the DOT said needs to be relocated could maybe not be relocated, and that would save a ton of time and money.

He also wants to keep two lanes of traffic in each direction. That's something that groups like the Regional Plane Association can get behind. They've said his proposal is something to take seriously, and quite basically I can't describe an architectural rendering to you in great detail over the air, but he basically wants to move all lanes of traffic to the lower level, which he said would allow for construction to take place without badly disrupting existing traffic. For now, the city says it will consider his plan, and this spring, it plans to begin the environmental review process for this project. That all means that we're basically stuck with the current BQE for a while. This is really still, believe it or not, the start of the process.

Sean: Ramsey, the MTA also announced a new round of those open-gangway trains on the G line. You rode the first one in service. What was it like?

Ramsey Khalifeh: Yes, so the MTA decided to move one of the existing open-gangway trains on the C line and move it to the G. Remember, those are the trains where you can pretty much walk the entire length because there's just no doors in between the cars. They pretty much converted one of the C open-gangway trains, those are 10 cars, into two open-gangways for the G, into 5 train cars each.

Sean: Oh, because they're the tiny trains on [crosstalk].

Ramsey Khalifeh: They're a lot smaller. Exactly. The transit agency says they'll be bringing in two more open-gangways to the G train, and like you said, if you've ever ridden the G, you'll know that the length of the train is a lot shorter than the regular subway lines. That's just because the line gets below average ridership. It's also the only subway line in New York City that doesn't go through Manhattan. The shorter train means riders typically have to run to the center of the platform to get onto the train. If they're late, they have to catch it.

Stephen Nessen: We should add the MTA will never extend it and make it longer.

Ramsey Khalifeh: Probably no plans for to make it long.

Stephen Nessen: They're asked about it all the time.

Ramsey Khalifeh: The president of NYC Transit, Demetrius Crichlow, says that this often leads to overcrowding at both ends of the subway car, so the open-gangway will somehow resolve that, because you can just leave the back and go to, like, let's say the middle of the car. The train also features wider doors, brighter lighting, more digital screens to see the next stop on the train. Here's Edwin Montes. He rode the first open-gangway to hit the G train.

Edwin Montes: I could get used to it. We all got to get accustomed to new things, and that's how things change.

Ramsey Khalifeh: Can you name maybe one thing that you like about the new cars, something that you noticed?

Edwin Montes: The shiny seats. They're very noticeable.

Ramsey Khalifeh: Pretty shiny, I should say. They also smelled pretty good, too.

Sean: Oh, nice. Good.

Ramsey Khalifeh: New train car smell.

Stephen Nessen: Pleasant change.

Ramsey Khalifeh: While riders were excited for a new train, many of them, like Montes, said that they still are nostalgic for those old trains with the orange and yellow conversational seats.

Stephen Nessen: Yes, and we should add that more open-gangway cars are coming to other lettered lines. The MTA appears to be a fan of these train cars. After all, last year it announced it would be ordering more, basically enough train cars to run four more open-gangways, and those could be arriving, and we should also say that is made possible with money from congestion pricing.

Sean: Speaking of the G train, every week in Gothamist On The Way newsletter, we answer a question from a curious commuter. This one is from Kenneth in Brooklyn. Why did G trains recently switch back to being older models? Will the G be getting back to the newer train cars it was running anytime soon?

Ramsey Khalifeh: Most of the current fleet now on the G Train are those older yellow and orange conversational seatings that I brought up. That's because the transit agency has been investigating a defect on the tracks, so they've had to pull a lot of those newer trains out of service. In the interim, they'll be using these older trains. Once they fix it, you can expect those new trains to come back.

Sean: Thank you, Kenneth, for the question, and thanks to WNYC transportation reporters Stephen Nessen and Ramsey Khalifeh. You can stay in the know on all things transit or ask a question of your own by signing up for our weekly newsletter gothamist.com/ontheway. Stephen, Ramsey, thanks so much.

Ramsey Khalifeh: Thank you, Sean.

Stephen Nessen: Thank you, Sean.

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Speaker 2: 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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