Welcome to New York Fuckin’ City*, where even our psychics are crotchety old coots who should have decamped to the interior years ago:

Will New York be prosperous in 2007? Will it be a year of unrest? Metro asked some of the city’s astrologers and psychics for their predictions . . .

. . .

“I think New York City in 2007 is going to be a repeat of the ’70s,” said psychic Jackie Barrett. “Fortunately for us in the working-class, [the real estate market] is going to come to a crashing halt, and I believe there will be more developments where landlords thought they would profit that will crash in on them.”

She predicted many New Yorkers will move away and those who stay will find themselves in a class clash.

“There will be a fight for all those beautiful buildings going up in places like Williamsburg,” Barrett said, “where lower-income people will be fighting for space. If millionaires want to stay, they’ll have to share with the common folk.”

*And I believe that appellation has been trademarked by certain novelty T-shirt makers.

Actually, on second thought it’s not really at all like Nigeria*:

It evoked what-might-have-been comparisons to a 1985 accident on Staten Island.

The explosion of a gasoline pipeline in Nigeria on Monday killed 265 people.

On Sept. 23, 1985, a backhoe operator working on the Buckeye Pipeline accidentally severed a valve, which caused high-octane jet fuel to geyser 60 feet above Victory Boulevard near North Gannon Avenue in Willowbrook.

Miraculously, nobody was killed. And there was only one injury.

The jet fuel, which travels underneath Staten Island from New Jersey to LaGuardia and John F. Kennedy airports, never ignited.

In the 15 minutes it took firefighters to respond and shut down the pipeline, 75,000 gallons of jet fuel had gushed out of the line.

. . .

The Buckeye pipeline system — comprising two 12-inch lines — carries more than 8 million gallons of fuel to the city every day with few problems, Haase said

“I don’t think people should be concerned,” said Haase, explaining that the 14-mile pipeline is constantly patrolled by vehicle and by foot, and “leak detection and location systems” automatically shut down both pipes when a leak is detected.

. . .

The twin Buckeye pipelines — and another major pipeline, the Transcontinental Pipeline — enter Staten Island from Carteret and Linden, N.J., at points along the West and South Shores and run underground near the Staten Island Expressway before exiting in Rosebank by the Alice Austen House.

Besides transporting jet fuel, the Buckeye pipeline system carries gasoline and home-heating fuel oil to storage yards in Brooklyn.

The Transcontinental Pipeline, meanwhile, carries natural gas from the Gulf Coast, by way of the borough and New York Harbor, to facilities in New York City.

Calls to Tulsa, Okla.-based Williams Companies, owner of the Transcontinental Pipeline, were not returned.

A spider web of pipes carries natural gas and fuel across the borough, including about 15 minor pipelines that touch Staten Island as they carry products from Linden and Carteret to Bayonne. Also, the Colonial Pipeline, which runs to the Northeast from Gulf Coast oil refineries, ends at Kinder Morgan Staten Island, formerly Port Mobil.

*See, for example.

Then again, if you’re reading newspaper articles on December 29 to figure out how much to tip your doorman, it’s probably hopeless:

End-of-season tipping can be fraught with anxiety at large Manhattan buildings. This year, there was out-and-out conflict at one Upper West Side building, where resident manager Efrain Lopez confirmed last week that staff members had been suspended after changing locks on the lockboxes where they receive holiday gratuities.

Management at the Columbia Condominium, at 275 W. 96th St., last year set up individual boxes for staff to receive gratuities, with each employee receiving a key. In prior years, envelopes from residents to employees were dropped into a common box that lay behind the front desk, under video supervision.

This year, three employees, concerned that the same keys were being used as last year, decided to have the locks changed on their boxes. They were dissatisfied with security precautions to protect their tips from theft or loss.

On December 11, the management company disciplined them, suspending two and giving one a warning. All three are now back at work, the director of communications for SEIU Local 32BJ, which represents building service employees, Matt Nerzig, said. The union is looking into the matter and has filed a grievance, he said.

. . .

A doorman at a building with about 100 apartments in the West 90s told The New York Sun most tips he receives are in the $50 to $150 range. He said often the most demanding residents tip least. “That’s a true statement,” he added, “You can ask any doorman.”

(Last year I think we got the tipping thing straightened out a little earlier . . . thanks for nothing!)

If you happened to see a Ford Club Wagon van speeding up I-95 sometime in the last couple of days, that could have been James Brown:

William Murrell, who had shuttled the music legend around for the past 15 years, drove Brown’s body on an 800-mile pilgrimage from Augusta, Ga., to Harlem — a trip that took him from 10 p.m. Wednesday to 10 a.m. yesterday.

“I drove him in life, and I drove him in death,” said Murrell, 47. “I can’t say no to Mr. Brown.”

The coffin had arrived too late at the funeral home for staff there to make a scheduled flight out of Atlanta. And the remaining flights that could carry the remains were all booked as well.

Without a second thought, Murrell yanked the backseats out of his Ford van and loaded up. He and a co-worker piloted the Ford Club Wagon van up I-95 with the Rev. Al Sharpton, the funeral home director and Brown’s 24-karat gold-plated coffin in back.

. . .

The incredible journey started with a frantic phone call from the C.A. Reid Sr. funeral home around 5:30 p.m. Wednesday telling Murrell there was trouble.

The custom-designed coffin — which needed its blue lining replaced with a special one of white satin — was running late.

There was no time to make the 2-1/2-hour trip from Augusta to Atlanta in time for the 7:45 p.m. scheduled Delta flight — or any other flights that night — they said.

All charter flights were booked, including Murrell’s two planes. And eager crowds were already massing in Harlem to say goodbye.

“They had to get him to the Apollo. They tried everything,” said Murrell, “It was my last chance to give him a ride of a lifetime.”

. . .

So Murrell didn’t hesitate in taking out the back three seats of the van, snagging a co-worker and racing to the funeral home to pick up the coffin, Sharpton and the funeral director.

And as if Brown himself were clearing their way, they zipped along the darkened roads at high speed.

“I didn’t go over 90,” Murrell chuckled yesterday, hours before he was set to drive Brown’s coffin on the return trip to Georgia.

The Queens Chronicle crunches the numbers and deems Councilmember John Liu grandstander of the month for December:

One of the modern personalities that accompanied the invention of e mail was the electronic chatterbox. Friends who forward every chain letter, relatives who send a new digital photo every time their child eats a new type of food, and dates of little consequence who keep sending text messages long after the initial spark is gone are all prime examples of this.

In the world of Queens politics, the leading electronic chatterbox is City Councilman John Liu (D Flushing). Over the past month, the Queens Chronicle has collected every e mail and fax sent by Queens representatives at all levels of government: city, state and federal. The paper tabulated the total number of communications and Liu came out ahead by a large margin.

Between Nov. 21 and Dec. 21, he sent 37 separate e mails and three faxes about his work on the council. He sent out advisories about his intentions to take part in rallies after the police shooting of Sean Bell, releases about his opposition to Rosie O’Donnell’s impersonation of Asians and announcements about his appearances on television. He also chronicled his participation as the council’s Transportation Commitee chairman and outlined his opposition to the expansion of a gas station in Flushing. On one day in particular — Dec. 1 — Liu sent five individual e mails on topics ranging from the announcement of new free Chinese language courses to the dedication of a new mobile computer lab in a local school.

Stink still not resolved. DEP on the defensive:

At a town hall meeting organized by Community Board 10, State Senator Marty Golden and City Councilmember Vincent Gentile, representatives of the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) faced the crowd almost sheepishly, acknowledging long-standing shortcomings in their handling of the operation of the plant and the smells that have fouled the community’s air. Of all of DEP’s 14 wastewater treatment facilities, the Owls Head plant has recorded the most complaints.

“We apologize for the quality-of-life impact of the plant on the community,” Mark Lanaghan, assistant commissioner of intergovernmental relations for DEP told the crowd gathered in the auditorium of Xaverian High School, 7100 Shore Road. “It doesn’t have to be like that. It hasn’t always been like that, and it won’t always be like that.”

. . .

Said Vincent Sapienza, assistant commissioner at DEP’s Bureau of Wastewater Treatment, the agency is currently covering the plant’s primary settling tank launders, where turbulence during the first stage of treatment causes a high level of noxious odor. The covers, which are constructed of steel beams and laminated plywood, are being installed with the expectation that they will last several years till a permanent solution can be created, Sapienza said.

In addition, according to Sapienza, the agency is in the first steps of “design(ing) an odor control system” for the primary settling tanks, which also appear to be responsible for emanations of odors into the community. The first step, he said, is getting a contractor to “model” an appropriate system, then to build it.

We should assume (hopefully!) that this next part contains a typo:

Other steps the agency is taking include putting out for bid once again the $20 extension of the facility’s grit and scum building. This will enable tanks stored in the open air, to be enclosed. The contract for this work is expected to be awarded in early 2007, with containers stored indoors by late 2009.

$20?

Speak for yourself, you incontinent old kook:

Bladders may be bursting in the city’s third largest commercial hub, but currently there are no plans to install public toilets in Downtown Brooklyn.

And this was the loudest criticism at last week’s Community Board 2 transportation committee meeting, where two landscape architect firms presented their plans for a new Flatbush Avenue streetscape and revitalized Fulton Mall.

“There’s no public toilets anywhere in this downtown area. How can these people be making these plans to try to entice the public to come down and feel happy and buy when the planners don’t have the courtesy to install some toilets for people’s use,” said an outraged CB 2 member Bill Harris.

“A lot of the folks who shop here come great distances from way out in central and southern Brooklyn, and here they are stuck with bursting bladders. It’s insulting, stupid and very short-sighted, and just plain cheap,” he added.

Years from now on the couch this boy will have plenty to discuss:

A mother who tried to throw ammonia at her neighbor during a fight missed her mark and instead hit her 11-year-old son, police allege.

The fight happened inside 65 Winter Ave. in New Brighton at about 1 p.m. Tuesday, police allege.

Gina Lawson, 39, threw the ammonia at her female neighbor, but Ms. Lawson’s son was standing between them, police allege.

The fluid ended up striking the boy in the face and eye, causing “burning of the eye, an abrasion of the eye and substantial pain,” according to court papers.

Authorities charged Ms. Lawson with third-degree assault, child endangerment, fourth-degree weapon possession, for the ammonia, and third-degree attempted assault — all misdemeanors.

The Times revisits the Daily News’ famous headline after the former President, er, passes away at the age of 93:

Mr. Ford, on Oct. 29, 1975, gave a speech denying federal assistance to spare New York from bankruptcy. The front page of The Daily News the next day read: “FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD.”

Mr. Ford never explicitly said “drop dead.” Yet those two words, arguably the essence of his remarks as encapsulated in the immortal headline, would, as he later acknowledged, cost him the presidency the following year, after Jimmy Carter, nominated by the Democrats in New York, narrowly carried the state.

“It more than annoyed me because it wasn’t accurate,” he recalled years later. “It was very unfair.”

That view is echoed in an evolving version of historical revisionism. Only two months after saying or meaning or merely implying “drop dead” — or, perhaps, resorting to tough love by holding the city’s feet to the fire — Mr. Ford signed legislation to provide federal loans to the city, which were repaid with interest.

. . .

The Ford administration’s politically suicidal demands to city officials — raise transit fares, abolish rent control, scrap free tuition at the City University — prompted Victor Gotbaum, the municipal labor leader, to complain that Mr. Simon barely believed in government at all, except for police and fire protection, “and he’s not sure about fire.”

David R. Gergen, an assistant to [treasury secretary William E.] Simon at the time and later a presidential adviser, recalled that Mr. Ford himself “was one of those moderate Republicans who actually liked New York” — he chose Nelson A. Rockefeller as his vice president — but that “he was offended by the city’s profligate spending.”

“The president’s speechwriters whipped up one draft, and I was asked by the White House chief of staff to write an alternative version,” Mr. Gergen said. “I wrote a hard-hitting piece, assuming that if it ever saw the light of day, the White House would, in the normal course, invite me to smooth the rough edges. Instead, someone plopped a few of my rough, unedited paragraphs into the final text.”

In the speech, the president said: “The people of this country will not be stampeded. They will not panic when a few desperate New York officials and bankers try to scare New York’s mortgage payments out of them.”

The speech had a powerful impact, Mr. Gergen said. “It was a doozy of a speech, but events caught both sides by surprise,” Mr. Gergen remembered. “New Yorkers had not foreseen how tough the president would be, and Republicans in Washington had not anticipated how angry the response would be.”

The best concierges can come through on any request, no matter how outrageous:

A six-month undercover operation, during which cops posed as out-of-town guests, resulted in the arrests of a night manager at the Park Lane Hotel, a delivery-staff member and the man who allegedly supplied them with more than half a dozen guns and half a pound of narcotics.

The sting was launched after police received a tip from hotel employees that several brazen colleagues were turning the deluxe property into a drug and firearms bazaar.

. . .

Howard Rubenstein, the spokesman for Leona Helmsley and the Helmsley hotel chain, said management “acted promptly to turn in these people. They are appalled at the thought that their employees would stoop to this terrible level.”

Acting on the tip, detectives from Manhattan South Narcotics in April went to the hotel — where rooms range from $310 to $480 a night — and started chatting up night manager Diogenes Peña, 31, who worked at the hotel for 10 years, sources said.

The “tourist” cops returned two months later. This time they arranged to buy five bags of cocaine from Peña, who sent room-service worker Luis Quinones — another 10-year hotel veteran — to room 804 with the drugs, according to a court complaint.

Over the next two months, detectives bought more cocaine in Park Lane rooms and a second-floor bathroom, and even heard Peña telephoning his supplier and ordering him to “bring the doughnuts now.”

On Aug. 7, an undercover officer upped the ante and asked for guns, a request Peña allegedly fulfilled. During that transaction, Peña said his partner was waiting downstairs, which allowed cops to get a glimpse of Cesar Victorino, 34, his alleged cocaine distributor.

After two more buys, one of which yielded four guns and more drugs, police swooped in on Peña and Quinones and arrested them at work. Victorino was later arrested outside his Inwood home, police sources said.

A second suspect in the brazen mid-Christmas mass theft has turned himself in to authorities:

A man suspected of helping a real-life Grinch swipe $20,000 in parishioner donations from a Queens church during a Christmas-morning Mass turned himself in to police yesterday and returned $6,000 in cash.

Dennis Almodovar, 24, walked in to the 109th Precinct station house with his lawyer yesterday morning and was questioned for several hours before being charged with burglary.

The lawyer also turned over the money, said prosecutors, adding that the rest of the missing donations were nonnegotiable checks that can be replaced.

If I hear “Shoomy shoomy pwetty Princess” one more time, I swear I don’t know what I’ll do:

Max, Lucky, Princess, Rocky and Buddy were the five most-popular dog names in 2005, according to a Health Department review of dog licenses that was released yesterday. The same names took thetop five spots the previous year.

Mixed breeds came out on top of the list of popular breeds, followed by Labrador retrievers, pit bulls and Shih Tzus.

Although the Health Department issued 101,274 dog licenses last year, that figure represents only a small portion of city dogs. Many owners never bother to get their dogs licensed, even though that’s required by state law.

In other dog-related news, Councilmember Peter Vallone, who is good at proposing excessive and/or unconstitutional legislation, is now looking to crack down on one of those top breeds:

Pit bulls will be an endangered species in the city if one lawmaker gets his way.

Calling them potentially lethal weapons, City Councilman Peter Vallone renewed his call yesterday to ban pit bulls from the five boroughs.

“I am an animal lover,” said Vallone (D-Queens). “But I have always thought they should not be allowed on our streets. They have been bred to be violent.”

. . .

Vallone, whose two daughters own a Bichon Frise, pointed to several incidents in which children suffered serious injuries after being attacked and bitten by pit bulls.

He wants the state Legislature to change the law so cities like New York can ban specific breeds. Although he wants to bar people from owning or breeding pit bulls in the five boroughs, current owners would be exempted.

Vallone said it’s too early to say how a ban would affect thousands of homeless pit bull mixes that end up in city animal shelters every year.

Yesterday everyone was wondering who the fuck would steal from a church during Christmas mass. Today we find out who would do such a thing:

Cops arrested a suspect yesterday in a Christmas poor-box heist at a Queens church, and were looking for another sticky-fingered Grinch.

But the whereabouts of $30,000 in checks and cash stolen from St. Mel Roman Catholic Church in Flushing remains a mystery.

Daniel Morales, of 246 Bergen St., Brooklyn, was charged with burglary. Detectives released no details of the investigation while they tried to close in on a second man.

Earlier, the Rev. Christopher Turczany urged parishioners to cancel Christmas checks they’d donated and make new contributions.

“We were just about breaking even. This interrupts the positive cash flow. That’s what’s really difficult. We are choking financially,” he said.

“We’ll get through this. Many people have offered support.”

You can certainly see why officials expect such an unprecedented population boom in years to come when the economy here is so conducive to growth:

The cost of doing business in New York is a whopping $35.3 billion more than the national average, an alarming new study shows.

New York businesses are paying significantly more than their out-of-state counterparts in state and local taxes, as well as for health care, energy and workers’ compensation, said the report, released yesterday by the state Business Council’s Public Policy Institute.

. . .

Taxes pose the greatest burden for New York’s businesses. Previous studies have shown New Yorkers pay the highest combined state and property taxes in the nation.

New York businesses pay $8.1 billion more in property taxes, $14.4 billion more in income taxes and $2.8 billion more in corporate business taxes.

New York businesses also pay nearly $7 billion more in energy costs, $1.7 billion more in health care and $1.3 billion in additional workers’ comp, compared with the national average.

*At least I thought I heard that.

Because it’s not like it’s crass or anything to shore up the 9/11 widow constituency for a potential 2008 run:

Supporters of former Mayor Rudy Giuliani have started discussions with relatives of 9/11 victims about backing him if he runs for president in 2008, some family members told The Post.

The conversations have taken place in recent weeks, according to some victims’ families, who described the talks as “casual.”

Marian Fontana, who lost her firefighter husband on 9/11, said she got an invitation to go to a Giuliani exploratory committee dinner last week from a former firefighter working with Giuliani’s committee. She described the invite as “last-minute.”

Fontana said she was appreciative of what Giuliani did after 9/11, but would want to know a lot more about any candidate’s stand on a variety of issues.

“I feel like I’m not ready to endorse,” said Fontana, who added, “I could see why [Giuliani supporters] would want to reach out to family members.”

But wait, there’s more:

But some relatives who are anti-Giuliani are already planning “Swiftboat”-type attacks against the ex-mayor — modeled on the negative campaign against John Kerry in 2004 by his fellow Vietnam vets. It seems likely that 9/11 kin could help Giuliani counter that criticism.

Some 9/11 family members have been deeply critical of Giuliani, blaming him for communications failures the day of the attacks.

Others have faulted his administration for allegedly not doing enough to protect rescue and recovery workers from polluted air at Ground Zero.

For the most part, those family members who have spoken with Giuliani supporters are family members who have maintained a relationship with Giuliani in the years since the attacks and were already fans of his.

A Giuliani spokeswoman declined comment.

San Men must need more overtime or something:

Times Square revelers will greet the new year amid a blizzard of 7,000 pounds of confetti — three times the usual amount, event organizers said yesterday.

A hundred confetti-tossers will hurl the more than 3 tons of shredded paper from 11 buildings during a five-hour celebration leading up to midnight.

And this year, the party paper will be inscribed with such goodwill messages as “peace,” “celebrate” and “dance,” according to event coordinator Treb Heining.

“It’s inspirational,” Heining said of the celebration, which is sponsored by retailer Target.

Beginning at 7 p.m. a countdown at the top of each hour will prompt a 1,000-pound torrent of the flame-proof notes, called word-fetti. Fireworks will accompany the first five confetti drops leading up to the finale.

“It’s millions and millions and millions of separate pieces,” said Heining, of Newport Beach, Calif., who has been managing the Times Square confetti drops for 15 years.

. . .

Volunteers, working in supervised crews, are trained in the craft of paper-pitching to avoid an occupational hazard Heining calls confetti arm.

They also must shed any rings or watches to ensure that they don’t accidentally drop anything heavier than the paper they scoop out of 45-pound boxes.

“You don’t just pick up the box and dump it out, because there’s a possibility the box will fall,” Heining said. “You have to pick the confetti out, there’s really a special technique for throwing it that I can’t describe, but it’s all coordinated with the crew chiefs using the walkie-talkies.”

You know, while Wal-Mart has remained a perennial punching bag here (”‘Our people are crazy about bling,’ he said. ‘They aren’t crazy about Wal-Mart’”), Target makes out pretty well in this town . . .

Even if you don’t believe in hell, there should be a special place there for certain degenerates:

The morning heist in Flushing, Queens, yesterday seemed too bad to be true.

It happened at the Church of St. Mel during the 9 a.m. Christmas Mass, which was said in Italian. The parishioners had helped fill the safe in the sacristy with something north of $20,000, including money for needy children. The thieves, according to police and witness accounts, opened the safe, and lugged a heavy metal box with the money to a white sport utility vehicle with Vermont license plates.

There are, certainly, much more heinous offenses, especially considering that the collection in the safe consisted mostly of checks that could be stopped, and that the whole amount was insured. But the nerve shown by the thieves made it hard — especially for parishioners who had attended the church for decades — to imagine a worse transgression.

. . .

The Rev. Christopher J. Turczany, who was saying Mass at the time of the theft, still sounded shaken in an interview after the noon service. “They were very bold — not even scared,” said Father Turczany, who believes he saw one of the thieves about an hour before the robbery. That it happened on Christmas, he added, “is heartbreaking.”

. . .

[Father Turczany] said that about 8:30 a.m., as he was preparing for Mass, he saw a man in a striped gray winter hat — “full faced,” as he put it, with an olive complexion — wandering near a staircase close to the sacristy. Nearby was the safe, which contained church valuables, including money from collections and a gold chalice.

“He said, ‘I’m looking for a bathroom,’” Father Turczany said. “I told him, ‘Well, you’re going the wrong way.’ My suspicion was aroused.”

After directing the man, who he said weighed more than 200 pounds, to the bathroom, Father Turczany warned the sacristans, Nicholas Nangino, 19, and Christopher Urena, 20, to keep an eye out. Then he went into the sanctuary to start the Mass. “I spoke about the shepherds who came to see the newborn Christ,” he said.

Perhaps half an hour later, the sacristans, looking down a hallway, heard sounds and saw lights flickering on and off. Already on their guard, they went to investigate.

“It was a diversion,” Mr. Nangino said. “We find nothing downstairs. We find the safe open upstairs.”

It was unclear how someone had been able to open the safe. Father Turczany said that a lever on the safe was “in an open position — but locked,” without elaborating. The chalice was left behind, but a box, described by Father Turczany as a 2-foot cube and an “absolute heavy dead weight,” was gone.

The police said a witness, whom they would not identify, watched the men take the box to their car, a white Lincoln Navigator. The witness apparently asked them about the box, and the men said it was equipment used to install an elevator.

All this occurred during Mass, causing some confusion. As Father Turczany, standing at the altar, prepared to deliver the final blessing, an usher frantically signaled him.

The box contained cash and checks from the last four collections, between $20,000 and $30,000, though Father Turczany said it had not been counted. Some of the money was earmarked for church expenses, while the rest was intended for poor children in Brooklyn and Queens.

The controversial proposed alcohol ban on commuter trains gets more sinister:

The MTA board member leading the charge to ban the sale of booze on commuter rail platforms and trains works for a law firm that represents several of the restaurants and bars at Penn Station that would stand to benefit from the prohibition.

Long Island Rail Road bartenders, who fear their jobs are on the line, say it was only after Mitchell Pally was hired three months ago to handle “government relations” at the Weber Law Group, a Melville-based firm, that talk of the prohibition began.

“We’ve all been wondering where this whole thing came from, and when we checked the company’s Web site, we thought we may have our answer,” said one LIRR bar-cart attendant, who asked not to be identified.

The Weber Law Group lists restaurant-franchise giant Riese Restaurants as one of its clients.

Riese, whose Penn Station restaurants include TGI Friday’s and Houlihan’s, would likely see a spike in beer and liquor sales if the railroad stopped selling booze to passengers.

“There’s no question this would be good for business,” CEO Dennis Riese said. “But just a little.”

. . .

Pally said he brought the issue to the table because, as public policy, “it did not make sense” for the state to serve as bartender to customers who get in their cars when they arrive at their home station.

“I have been here [at Weber] three months and I don’t discuss my MTA activities with anybody,” Pally said.

Andrew Albert, a non-voting MTA board member, said he would need more information, but thought Pally’s employer could represent a conflict of interest in this matter. “It does not sound good,” he said.

Meanwhile, the unions that represent service attendants, along with the commuters who say they have a right to a drink on their train ride home, are stepping up their campaigns against the proposed ban.

On second thought, since it’s Park Slope, it probably is:

Two exes each own a pastry shop: one is the shop they built together, Delices de Paris, and the other is the just-opened patisserie on Seventh Avenue that will be called Zana Café.

Owner Rosana Rosa opened the cute shop without her ex-husband, Michael Martin — with whom she opened Delices de Paris during happier times six years ago.

At her new joint, she sells French-Italian pastries and European products — just like Delices de Paris. And her walls are painted happy yellow — just like Delices de Paris.

No wonder Martin hung a sign in his front window (inset) telling his customers that he has nothing to do with his ex’s new shop — despite how much it looks like Delices de Paris.

“They are completely different products,” he said. “She used the same [paint] to mislead the customers and make them think that the two shops are related.”

. . .

Rosa also said she has nothing to be ashamed of: “I built Delices de Paris with my own hands. When we began, there was no place in Park Slope to get a chocolate croissant, now you have Colson Patisserie on Sixth Avenue and everyone is doing the French thing.”

What about her ex-husband’s sign on his door?

“Well you know divorce is tough, it is complicated,” she explained. “Some people never get over it.”

The only problem with 1 Times Square is that there isn’t much in the way of natural light:

It’s the most famous building in the world on New Year’s Eve, but it’s also the emptiest — so the owners of 1 Times Square, where the ball comes down, are making a daring offer:

Rent the vacant, three-story store at the bottom for $4.5 million a year and they’ll throw in 19 floors of empty offices for free.

“You rent the retail, you basically get the building upstairs for free,” said Newmark Knight Frank real-estate broker Jeffrey Roseman, who represents the owners.

The 23-story tower, originally built for The New York Times in 1904, has not housed any office tenants for years. The base was home to a Time Warner studio store until it closed in 2001.

Ever since then, owners Jamestown and Sherwood Equities have made up to $30 million a year renting the building’s exteriors to giant electronic displays and painted ads.

Retailers have balked at the location in the middle of an island between Broadway and Seventh Avenue at 43rd Street, even as the area around it thrives.

. . .

The upper floors are small, and the interior is in disrepair. And they don’t offer much in the way of views — nearly all the windows are covered by signs.

Not to worry — that possible post-9/11 bias attack actually was just garden-variety mafia intimidation:

What started out as an arson investigation into a deli fire that some believed was anti-Muslim backlash in the months after the attacks of September 11, 2001, has led investigators to the conclusion that a Gambino associate ordered the hit to keep a competitor under control.

Edward “The Irishman” Fisher, 54, was charged with ordering the 2001 firebombing of My Deli & Grocery in the Fox Hills section of Staten Island. Investigators yesterday said the owner of the deli, Hamim Syed, 48, was planning to open another deli that would compete with Fisher’s bagel shop.

When threats didn’t deter Mr. Syed, a Pakistani immigrant, Fisher turned to two underlings to carry out the arson attack, the commanding officer of the NYPD’s Arson and Explosion Squad, Lieutenant Dennis Briordy, said.

“It took this whole deli out,” he said, adding: “He wanted it to go away.”

At 4:50 a.m., the men appeared at the door of the deli at 200 Rhine Ave. with a lit commercial fireworks launcher. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives classifies the launcher as an “extremely powerful destructive device,” a spokesman, Special Agent Joseph Green, said.

Anthony Maniscalco, 36, held the door, while Salvatore Palmieri, 54, tossed the explosive inside, Lieutenant Briordy said. Within minutes, the store was completely engulfed in flames. Four employees managed to escape without injury.

In other news, authorities made some additional collars:

In addition to Fisher’s arrest, the joint investigation by the New York Police Department, the FBI, and the ATF yesterday resulted in seven other arrests on a wider range of charges, including racketeering, loan sharking, extortion, and murder.

Also arrested was a Genovese family soldier, John “Little John” Giglio, 48, who was charged with nine racketeering acts, and crime family associates Vincent “Vinny Bastille” Garcia, 34, Richard Dacunto, 44, John “Hammer” Laforte, 38, Anthony “The Retard” Stocco, 24, and Raymond Spitale, 62.

Palmieri was also charged with the 1990 murder of Ronald Peteroy outside of a bar on Forest Avenue. If convicted, he faces life in prison.

All the men, except Mr. Stocco, were remanded without bail in the District Court of the Eastern District of New York because of a flight risk.

Of course — he’s “The Retard” . . .

If you think the Christmas tree business is all about the sweet smell of pine and hot French-Canadians, think again:

There are a series of secretive cash drops, about three cell phone numbers and a land line that connect the street force to cash managers and suppliers, specific phone calls that need to be made after the border crossing, and a boss known by some as the “Myth.” Welcome to the Christmas tree business in New York City.

Kevin Hammer, the man behind the majority of sidewalk tree stands in the city, runs a cash-only conifer enterprise that some former and current employees say grosses more than a million dollars during the month-long holiday season.

Although Mr. Hammer’s mostly French-Canadian workforce has been specifically instructed not to speak publicly about his business practices, several of Mr. Hammer’s experienced tree-sellers, asking to remain anonymous in fear of not getting paid, spoke with The New York Sun to explain how the city’s largest Christmas tree business operates.

“Everything is very organized and incredibly secretive,” one tree seller who works for Mr. Hammer said.

. . .

Every day, a “collector” arrives at the stand in a SUV with Florida license plates. He pulls up at an unannounced time after the tree-seller has called a number with a 212 area code saying how much cash was collected for the day.

When the collector arrives, the tree seller approaches the car with an envelope full of cash from the day’s sales up his or her jacket sleeve, according to the source. The “drop” includes a daily cash report worksheet printed in both English and French and is passed to the “collector” through the passenger side window. Conversation is usually brief.

. . .

One of Mr. Hammer’s former employees who currently works for another tree business in the city said the average tree-stand grosses about $30,000 a season, of which Mr. Hammer promises employees 50% of the profit after expenses.

“There is no way of knowing the expenses,” the source said. “You don’t know the cost of each tree.”

Tree-sellers receive cash payments from Mr. Hammer’s staff on the night of December 24, after excess trees have been collected and stands have been dismantled. The amount varies each year, and tree-sellers on the same team sometimes get paid different wages.

. . .

Tree prices at Mr. Hammers stands vary dramatically, and are dependent on the location of the stand. Buyers in affluent neighborhoods generally pay more for trees.

“We’re told to get the highest price possible, but to always sell the trees even if we get bargained down,” the source currently working for Mr. Hammer said.

Mr. Hammer did not return phone messages from the Sun.

After early reports of a terror plot to blow up the PATH tunnels leading into Lower Manhattan seemed to downplay the extent of destruction that could be inflicted, officials now admit that the tunnels are actually pretty vulnerable:

An analysis done for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey says that the PATH train tunnels under the Hudson River are more vulnerable to a bomb attack than previously thought, and that a relatively small amount of high explosives could cause significant flooding of the rail system within hours.

The analysis, based on work by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, revises some critical aspects of an assessment of the system’s vulnerability that was presented to the agency last spring. It makes clear that the tunnels — four tubes of varying design and sturdiness that stretch across the Hudson riverbed — are structurally more fragile than first thought.

A draft summary of the most recent analysis was given to The New York Times by a government official who was troubled by what the official felt was a lack of action in response to the analysis, which the official said the Port Authority got about three weeks ago. The official said the latest analysis indicates that it would take only six minutes for one of the PATH tubes to flood if a significant but not necessarily very large bomb were detonated.

. . .

The analysis appears to be the most detailed and sophisticated government review of the train tubes’ vulnerability. Initial findings were shared last May with some members of the agency, but were not made public, and further tests were ordered. More tests are being done in an effort to come up with the best way to strengthen the tunnels.

The Hudson River tubes of the PATH system, which suffered serious damage in the 2001 terror attack, are more vulnerable than most other tunnels that pass under the city’s waterways because they lie in the soft riverbed, unlike other tunnels that are bored through the underlying bedrock. Silt over years has built up atop the tubes, which were laid roughly 90 years ago, but they are not in bedrock.

Several city subway tunnels beneath the East River are in many ways similar to the four PATH tunnels — essentially cast-iron tubes that run along the riverbed. An official at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said that agency is working on an analysis of its tubes.

The PATH analysis, which is characterized as preliminary and continuing, examines the three different types of PATH tubes under the Hudson. Roughly three-quarters of the tubes’ total length is made of unlined cast iron, with the balance made from concrete-lined cast iron or brick. Many of the details of the analysis — including the size of the bombs under discussion, their placement and the exact nature of the vulnerability — are being withheld by The Times.

The worst case included in the analysis suggests that a bomb that could be easily carried aboard a train could punch a 50-square-foot hole in one side of a tube, possibly breaching both sides of the tunnel. Under that situation, 1.2 million gallons of water a minute could pour into the tunnel, flooding parts of the system in a matter of hours.

Don’t just stand there, create an acronym:

A proposed booze ban on Metro-North and the Long Island Rail Road has a group of commuters banding together to insist that the next stop not be prohibition.

. . .

Board member Mitchell Pally said the MTA, a state entity, shouldn’t encourage alcohol use. Some riders drive home after riding the train, he said, raising a safety concern. And alcohol use can lead to boorish behavior, Pally said.

But a spokesman for the recently formed Commuters Allied for Responsible Enjoyment, or CARE, said taking away a cold beer on the ride home after a hard day at the office would be an injustice.

“I’ve been burdened by people talking loudly and too long on their cell phones, by people eating pungent foods . . . awful odors from the bathrooms and overcrowding, but I’ve never had a problem where someone was acting in a drunken manner,” CARE spokesman Richard Shea said.

Kevin Pearce, a Metro-North rider and founding member of CARE, said the concept of Pally’s prohibition is patronizing and insulting.

“I’m not a child,” Pearce, an editor at a cable television network, said. “I’m not the frat-house rush chairman. I’m an ordinary taxpaying commuter who is a calm, peaceful person, just like 99.9% of people on the train.”

Another founding member and Metro-North rider said a booze ban would be an affront to American freedom - and he’s from London, where they still stop traffic for royalty.

“It’s preposterous,” said David Karat, a finance executive. “All we’re trying to do is have a quiet respectable drink on the train on our way home to our families.”

The first shot in the battle will be a letter-writing campaign to pressure MTA board members and elected officials to reject any ban. CARE will soon have a Web site up and running (www.alliedcommuters.com).

The broker reveals the big secret to never having to pay a broker’s fee — keep expectations ridiculously low:

How then, without a license or an abundance of contacts, was I able to find each of my six apartments without ever paying a fee? I like to think I was guided by raw real estate instincts, but truthfully it has a lot more to do with being flexible. I have never paid a broker, but I’ve also never had my heart set on a perfect little gem of a space in hopes it would complete my lifestyle. Again renting comes back to dating: keep your standards low if you’re looking for a deal.

And who among us hasn’t gone for a cheap date every now and then?

The new owners of the Times Ledger newspapers (ahem) should probably intervene here. A fluff piece on Scientology? Is Rupert Murdoch a Scientologist or something? I can’t even fathom what they were thinking*:

A Bayside native has been appointed to lead the Church of Scientology’s anti-drug campaign in New York, a drug education effort that the group says is the largest in the world. Meghan Fialkoff of Bayside will run the New York “Say No to Drugs, Say Yes to Life” campaign, part of the secular nonprofit Foundation for a Drug Free World. Although the campaign is run by Scientologists, Fialkoff said they do not promote the religion, only their anti-drug message.

“In our church basically we’re helping people go free,” she said. “It’s all about helping people live lives where they can be free, and if you’re doing drugs, you’re not. You’re a slave to whatever your buying and how you’re going to get it.”

The campaign will distribute millions of booklets about how to prevent drug use, Fialkoff said. The information covers drug use in general. There are pamphlets tailored to information about specific drugs, everything from crack to painkillers to ritalin, which the campaign calls “kiddie cocaine.”

*What a bad week for the Queens weeklies.

Haverford College issues a curious apology in the wake of a disastrous attempt at satire:

Last month, a New York City Parks Department employee named David Langlieb drew the ire of Greenpoint’s Polish community with an essay entitled “The Black Squirrel’s Burden.” In it, a narrator refers to Poles as “stupid” and “ugly,” and argues in favor of gentrification that would replace neighborhood churches with high-end retail stores.

Since the discovery of “The Black Squirrel’s Burden,” which was published in the alumni magazine of Haverford College, Langlieb’s alma mater, the author has come under heavy criticism. He recently issued a statement defending his essay as satire in the tradition of Jonathan Swift, who used the genre as a tool for social commentary. Claiming to be of half-Polish descent himself, Langlieb wrote that his intent had been to make fun of gentrification’s proponents, not Poles, and to “defend the wonderful community of Greenpoint from the forces of economic and social change.”

While the author has issued the mea culpa, and even his employer, Parks Department Commissioner Adrian Benepe, has simultaneously distanced himself from Langlieb and praised the virtues of Poles throughout New York, some individuals who took offense at the essay are still waiting for Haverford College to apologize. They need wait no longer.

But does “upon further review we just didn’t understand what he was getting at” really count as an apology? It should stick in your gut like a Manhattan Avenue pierogi*:

Haverford College deeply regrets that an opinion-page article printed in our latest alumni magazine was clearly offensive to Polish-Americans and others. The writer’s stated intent to support residents of communities which are under siege from new arrivals was not evident since the point of view of the article was so difficult to understand . . .

OK, so what happened to the editor then? David Langlieb should really reach out to Alan Sokal!

*That’s obviously not to besmirch the wonderful restaurants in the wonderful community of Greenpoint, whose very existence is threatened by the forces of economic and social change.

The residents of a two-block stretch of 70th Street in Maspeth have been victimized by frivolous and malicious 311 complaints:

Earlier this fall, in the span of just two days, 21 anonymous complaints were filed via the city’s 311 system about a two-block stretch of 70th Street, all on the eastern half of the blocks between 52nd and 53rd avenues. Three days later, on November 4, two more such complaints came in. Statistically speaking, that’s well over 70 percent of the houses in less than a week, all supposedly and suddenly guilty of allowing illegal renters into their basements.

It doesn’t take much common sense to figure out that this was likely the work of a mischievous or vindictive prankster. Unfortunately for the residents of this section of northern Maspeth, the people in charge of fielding these complaints, according to many community leaders, have not always exhibited the most common sense; they were employees of the New York City Department of Buildings (DOB).

The same department vilified by residents, activists, and politicians throughout the five boroughs for failing to competently or honestly supervise the city-wide construction boom of the last several years, was somehow able to snap itself into action this past month, diligently knocking on doors opened by the wives and daughters of men away at work, demanding to be allowed into the basement.

“I’m done,” explained an angry Ann McGee, whose husband, George, works for the Post Office. “No more strangers in my house.”

“Honestly,” added her neighbor Jackie Abramaitis, “no one here has illegal basements. There are no problems, otherwise I would be calling.”

Abramaitis lives across the street, in a stretch of attached brick rowhouses left largely untouched by the merry, dialing holiday complainer. Perhaps even this anonymous tipster knew it wouldn’t make sense to call in complaints of illegal renters in houses that don’t even have basements — as most of the homes on the western side don’t.

Coincidentally — or perhaps maliciously — a complaint was filed on that side of the block about a month before the 311-call spree, on October 4, in regards to the home owned by Roe Daraio, who just happens to be the president of the local civic group Communuities of Maspeth and Elmhurst Together (COMET). “Illegal basement apartment,” read the DOB’s summary of the matter, “with a kitchen and bathroom.”

“I don’t even have a basement,” explained Daraio curtly. “They’re wasting taxpayers’ money looking for complaints that can’t even exist.” COMET’s president is incredulous that the very city agency entrusted with the blueprints for every building is the same one that doesn’t bother to check them before they ring a doorbell.

Is all press still good press** if media outlets*** basically reproduce your press releases verbatim? The headline**** “Weiner Gets $2.5 M for Safety Improvements” just gives it away:

Five schools in Congressmember Anthony Weiner’s district will be getting upgraded traffic safety measures, thanks to a $2.5 million grant from the federal Department of Transportation, the lawmaker announced.

The public safety improvements were announced at a press conference held by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Schools Chancellor Joe Klein, city Department of Transportation Commissioner Iris Weinshall and Weiner (D–Queens/Brooklyn).

The schools involved, according to Weiner, are P.S. 220, Edward Mandel School, Forest Hills; P.S. 71, Forest Elementary School, Ridgewood; I.S. 250, Robert F. Kennedy Community Middle School, Flushing, and St. Elizabeth School and J.H.S. 210, Elizabeth Blackwell School, both in Ozone Park.

The DOT studied all 1,471 elementary and middle schools in New York City. One hundred and thirty five had the highest accident rates and were designated priority schools for safety improvements. Of these, 34 are in Queens.

Weiner said the Safe Routes to Schools Program is a nationwide effort aimed at making travel to school safer by reducing traffic congestion, reducing the number of collisions in and around schools and lowering the speed limits in residential neighborhoods by installing signs and speed bumps.

For children ages 5 to 9 in New York City, getting hit by a motorist is the number one cause of death and injury, said Weiner of Forest Hills.

To achieve better safety for the students, each school involved in the program will receive infrastructure additions and upgrades such as speed bumps, traffic signals bicycle lanes, medians and crosswalks. Construction is set to begin next year.

Weiner holds a seat on the House Transportation Committee from which he secured the school safety grant. The total amount of funding needed to improve safety at all 135 priority schools is $30 million.

And John, the dangerous thing about lazily reediting press releases is that these days, they’re all on the internets (”WEINER ANNOUNCES $2.5 MILLION FOR PUBLIC SAFETY AROUND SCHOOLS”):

Today, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-Brooklyn & Queens), a member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, announced $2.5 million for public safety improvements around New York City schools, including six schools in the Ninth Congressional District. The funds will be used to add or upgrade safety measures such as crosswalks, signs, speed bumps and medians as part of the Department of Transportation’s (DOT) Safe Routes to Schools Program.

Last week, Rep. Weiner joined Mayor Michael Bloomberg, DOT Commissioner Iris Weinshall and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein at P.S. 21 in the Bronx where the list of schools slated for enhancements was announced.

The Department of Transportation studied all 1,471 elementary and middle schools in New York City and established a list of 135 schools that are considered priority schools for safety improvements — schools with the highest accidents rates. Of the 135 priority schools, 46 are in Brooklyn and 34 are in Queens.

The project is part of a nationwide effort aimed at making it safer for kids to travel to and from schools by reducing traffic congestion, reducing collisions in and around schools, and decreasing speed in residential neighborhoods. For children ages 5 to 9 in New York City, getting hit by a motorist is the number one cause of death and injury.

To accomplish these goals, each priority school in New York City will receive infrastructural additions or upgrades such as speed bumps, traffic signals, bicycle lanes, medians and crosswalks. Construction is set to being on the first 32 priority schools in 2007.

Rep. Weiner, from his seat on the House Transportation Committee, was instrumental in securing funding for the project. Rep. Weiner’s $2.5 million in federal funds, which comes from federal gasoline taxes, makes up a significant portion of the estimated $30 million needed to complete work at all of the 135 priority schools.

In addition to the 135 schools announced today, Rep. Weiner is working with Commissioner Weinshall to fast track improvements at 10 additional City schools.

“Looking both ways before crossing a street isn’t enough to protect our City’s schoolchildren,” said Rep. Weiner. “We have to stop speeding, reckless driving and collisions around our schools.”

The following schools in Rep. Weiner’s Congressional District are priority schools slated for improvements:

QUEENS

Saint Elizabeth - 94-01 85th St Ozone Park - Ozone Park

P.S. 220 (Edward Mandel School) - Forest Hills

P.S. 71 (Forest Elementary School) - Ridgewood

I.S. 250 (Robert F. Kennedy Community Middle School) - Flushing

J.H.S. 210 (Elizabeth Blackwell School) - Ozone Park

BROOKLYN

Yeshivat Ateret Torah – Ocean Parkway

*I’ll tell you, he’s no Chan.

**Duh!

***Maybe Connie Rosenblum isn’t so crotchety after all.

****And — just a guess here — if instead of “Weiner Gets $2.5 M for Safety Improvements” it read “Queens to Receive $2.5 M in Safety Improvements” I’m pretty sure no one would have bothered to look it up. Moral: If you crib from press releases, at least change the headline!

ATMs, like those new-fangled parking meters, are just so darn smart nowadays:

You walk up to the ATM. Feed your card into the slot, and it disappears. Maybe you get an error message.

What do you do? Contact the bank manager? Push the button and ask for customer assistance? Fiddle with the ATM numbers?

Lawrence Grey went a different route, cops say — he got a tire iron and sought vengeance on the machine.

Now he faces a felony charge.

Early on Thursday, at about 2:20 a.m., the 44-year-old Brooklyn construction worker slipped his sister’s expired ATM card into the machine at the SI Bank & Trust at 6975 Amboy Road in Tottenville, according to court papers.

When the machine wouldn’t give the card back, he tried to pry the front plate off with a tool he had on him, likely a screwdriver, then left, according to a source close to the investigation.

A few minutes later, “he came back with a tire iron, and started whaling on the machine,” the source said.

The attack cracked the face plate and damaged the wiring underneath, according to court papers.

One source estimated the damage at more than $5,000.

Bank security notified the police, but Grey was gone before they arrived, authorities said.

But a security camera caught him in the act, and a detective from the NYPD and FBI’s Joint Bank Robbery Task Force used his sister’s card to track him down, according to a law enforcement source.

He ultimately admitted to cops that he realized “what I did was stupid,” but was worried about losing his sister’s card, the source said.