Joe Lhota

Transportation didn't get much airtime during last night's debate between Bill de Blasio and Joe Lhota, but the candidates did trade a few jabs. Over the course of the debate, which aired on WABC, the pair fielded a handful of questions on MTA fares, traffic enforcement, waste management, and development -- with Lhota at one point deriding Robert Moses.

It looks like Joe Lhota didn't listen to Nicole Gelinas or Transportation Alternatives. Yesterday, Lhota released what his campaign billed as a "comprehensive policy book" [PDF], but New Yorkers interested in safer streets or better bicycling and walking are still awaiting much of any policy from the Republican candidate.

On his radio show this morning, John Gambling asked Joe Lhota what he thinks about congestion pricing and transportation issues generally. Lhota spent the next three minutes (starting at 8:25) explaining that under his administration, DOT would focus on its "core competency." Bus lanes didn't make the cut. Bikes? Forget about it.

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.

At a mayoral forum on transportation this morning, the first since a February event hosted by Transport Workers Union Local 100, eight candidates offered ideas on how they would improve the city's road and transit network. For the most part, the candidates were eager to support buses, quick to get agitated about bike lanes, and short on realistic ideas for how to fund their plans.

Republican mayoral candidate Joseph Lhota, on WNYC's Brian Lehrer Show yesterday, said that while he didn't "know this for a fact," he views the bike-share program as an example of failed agency coordination in the Bloomberg administration, because he'd read press reports that people were complaining about new bike-share stations potentially impeding emergency response. Despite Lhota's speculation, based off hysterical media reports, the Fire Department says they were consulted by DOT and that the stations have not been a problem.

A few quick thoughts on the news that MTA Chair Joe Lhota is going to leave the agency at the end of week to clear the way for a mayoral run...

The tri-state area's transportation and infrastructure leaders are gathered at the Waldorf Astoria today for the Regional Plan Association's annual gala. For a few years now, the proceedings at the Regional Assembly have been haunted by the death of congestion pricing and bridge tolls in Albany, and lately the complete gridlock in Washington over a national transportation bill has weighed heavily as well. With large-scale transportation projects like the ARC tunnel falling by the wayside and funding streams for infrastructure getting weaker every year, there's not much new stuff in the pipeline, at the regional scale, to get excited about (unless you get excited about boondoggles).

Four New York City members of Congress joined the chairman of the MTA today to bluntly denounce the House GOP's anti-transit transportation bill.