Thursday’s Headlines: #DontTrashNYC Edition

How many times have you been coming home late from a bar after watching the A’s play totally lifeless playoff baseball only to see a rogue private garbage truck speeding through red lights or driving the wrong way up a street in a frenzied race against time (and competitors)?

Mayor de Blasio once said he didn’t know anything about it — but real New Yorkers do. And on Thursday, they’ll get a chance to be heard at the Transportation Alternatives and Transform Don’t Trash NYC “Twitter Town Hall” on the subject of reforming this unsafe industry.

From 11 a.m. to noon today, share your stories on Twitter with the hashtag #DontTrashNYC to help our elected officials hear that the time has come for change. Our editor got a jump late on Wednesday.

Until then, here’s the news from yesterday:

• Everyone joined Streetsblog in doing a preview of the 14th Street busway, which launches today. Guse at the Newsuh was concerned that the bus-only route won’t work well enough to encourage the city to do more of them, while the Times focused on the city’s decades-long war on cars. The Post played David Meyer’s reasonable story as a “car ban” (even though pickups and drop-offs are still allowed), while columnist Gary Taustine raised a few good points before blaming cyclists for everything bad in the city. Vin Barone at the soon-to-be-defiled amNY reported that the busway may portend better streets to come. Politico’s Dana Rubinstein put the supposedly massive change into its actual context: this is not such a big deal. Then again, the reliably pro-car CBS2 played it as a “huge” problem. (Ironically, Andrea Grymes’s piece shows a lot more pedestrians than cars on 14th Street — so why not advocate for them, CBS?).
• The latest episode of “The War on Cars” podcast is the first of a two-part mini-series on the rash of public meetings designed to gaslight cyclists into thinking they’re the real danger on the roads. It’s interesting to hear the hosts — Doug Gordon, Aaron Naparstek and Sarah Goodyear — discuss how to best confront individual drivers about their decision to participate in a deadly, toxic, inherently anti-urban form of transportation.
• Gothamist provided a broad overview of the latest changes to the city’s East Side Coastal Resiliency Project, while Streetsblog focused on the impact on cyclists.
• VozIzNeais followed our story on Council Member Chaim Deutsch’s decision to give up his car for commuting to City Hall. Mayor de Blasio — see how much great press you get when you stop driving!
• And, finally, Quartz tried to figure out who’s behind the “Crazy Rudy” ads on the subway.