Elections

If you're a registered Democrat in New York City, tomorrow is one of those rare occasions: an election where your vote carries a lot of weight. This is especially true in the City Council primaries, where winning candidates typically need just a few thousand votes to represent districts of more than 150,000 people.

If you thought the last Democratic mayoral debate was thin on transportation issues, you could be forgiven for thinking that the issue didn't come up at all during last night's event. Blink, and you might have missed it. Like last time, transit was relegated to the lightning round, and thin questions from the moderators didn't elicit much information from the candidates.

Borough presidents have limited power, but the influence they wield can still make a big difference for livable streets, especially by making community board appointments and weighing in during the city's land use review process. The four Democratic candidates for Manhattan borough president -- City Council members Gale Brewer, Robert Jackson, and Jessica Lappin, plus former Community Board 1 chair Julie Menin -- often sound very similar to each other, and few distinctions emerged at a forum hosted last night by the Center for Architecture featuring Brewer, Jackson, and Menin. But telling differences emerged when the candidates were asked for their thoughts about the bike-share program and the planning process that preceded the launch of the system.

At last night's Republican mayoral debate, the candidates -- Gristedes owner John Catsimatidis, former MTA chair and Giuliani deputy mayor Joe Lhota, and Doe Fund founder George McDonald -- offered a few glimpses into what transportation policy might look like under a GOP mayor. McDonald, who was until last year a registered Democrat and is trailing in the polls, trumpeted his more aggressive stance on livable streets issues, while leading candidates Lhota and Catsimatidis were far more cautious, and sometimes outright hostile, when it came to street safety interventions.

We continue our series on City Council candidates with a Q&A with government transparency advocate Ben Kallos, who’s running to represent District 5 in Yorkville, Roosevelt Island, and the Upper East Side. Yesterday, we ran a Q&A with Republican candidate David Garland. Streetsblog did not receive questionnaire responses from Democrats Edward Hartzog and Micah Kellner.

In New York -- the most walkable city in America, where millions of people ride trains and buses every day -- transit and street safety tend to be second- or third-tier issues in mayoral elections. At last night's Democratic mayoral debate, none of the candidates seemed inclined to change that.

Streetsblog continues our series on City Council candidates with a look at the race for District 5 in Manhattan, covering Yorkville, Roosevelt Island, and the Upper East Side. The seat has been held by Jessica Lappin, who is now running for Manhattan borough president, for two terms.

The first Democratic mayoral debate hosted by the Campaign Finance Board is scheduled for tonight. The debate's sponsors -- NY1, Citizens Committee of New York City, Citizens Union, Gothamist, Hispanic Federation, Transportation Alternatives, and WNYC -- have developed a scorecard [PDF] so viewers can rate how the candidates performed.

It looks like Bill Thompson didn't get the word about how well bike lanes and pedestrian plazas are polling.