Tuesday’s Headlines: It’s War Edition

OK, another month — but this time, we mean it!

The big story yesterday was that the federal Department of Transportation — so frustrated by having New York State ignore its attempt to withdraw its previously granted approval of congestion pricing — has finally announced a series of punishments that will kick in on May 21 if the toll cameras are not turned off.

Everyone covered it, but it all boiled down to the same thing: Unless Gov. Hochul respects U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s illegal attempt to kill congestion pricing, Duffy will basically freeze out the city and state from crucial federal funding.

• The Daily News played up the new deadline.
• The Post has decided that Duffy is the hero and Hochul is the one who is acting lawlessly.
• The Times took the opposite view, making it clear that killing congestion pricing requires Duffy to convince a judge.
• Gothamist played it straight.

In other news:

• In case you missed it, the main takeaway from the Times’s mayoral questionnaire is that congestion pricing has proven so successful that Andrew Cuomo has stopped Heismanning it. “The results thus far have been positive,” said the former governor who slammed his successor for implementing it.
• It was nice to see some coverage of the City Council’s hearing on a bill to create daylighting at every intersection (amNY, slapdash; Streetsblog, comprehensive). Clarence Eckerson was also there:

• There are a lot of people way smarter than me debating the right way to wean America from fossil fuels, but you’d at least think that one of them would be the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, right? Wrong. (NY Post)
• The City says the Trump administration is about to target non-profit groups that work on climate change.
• BoroPark24 posted video of a crash at a dangerous corner, but, of course, called it an “accident.” Reminder: it is not an “accident” if there’s a crash at an intersection where the DOT has long been warned of the danger; that’s a choice, not an “accident.”
• And, finally, we were saddened to hear of the death of Pope Francis, which came shortly after he met with Vice President JD Vance. Putting aside the many controversies of his life as the leader of the world’s Catholics, this is how we’ll always choose to remember Jorge Mario Bergoglio — on an Argentine train: