And Did We Mention How Much Money We’d Raise?

Just in case the primary reason for instituting congestion pricing was unclear:

Queens politicians have been among the most steadfast opponents of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s congestion pricing plan. Only 2 of the borough’s 23 state legislators have so far spoken up for the scheme.

That’s confounding to Rohit Aggarwala, the city’s director of long-term planning and sustainability. He’s spent the last year crafting PlaNYC, which promotes 127 measures for not only a greener city but one that can accommodate a million more inhabitants by 2030. Congestion pricing is just part of the plan, but Aggarwala believes it may be the least understood.

. . .

The biggest benefit would be immediate improvements to mass transit, often in areas that are now lacking subway access. The congestion pricing system would claim $200 million of an anticipated $500 million federal grant, Aggarwala said, and the remainder would go to better transit.

“You can’t build a subway in five years, but you could increase bus frequency,” he said. “You could put in this signal-prioritization system so that the bus sends a signal to the traffic light and can get through. You can add new bus routes, either express or regular, and facilitate connections. There are places where the subway stations are three blocks apart, and we haven’t put in a free transfer. Well, with MetroCard you can do that very easily now — it’s a programming thing. You don’t have to build a tunnel anymore.”

He sees congestion pricing as a comprehensive, evolving plan, with dedicated bus lanes over East River bridges to compensate for increased subway ridership. An L train rider at Bedford Avenue, for example, may choose to switch to a bus for a one-seat ride to his Lower Manhattan office.

More importantly, the plan will take pressure off an already debt-ridden Metropolitan Transportation Authority, allowing it not only to provide better service but to keep fares down.

Congestion pricing, Aggarwala said, may save the Second Ave. Subway, East Side Access and other transit expansion projects.

“We need to come up with $31 billion in transit investment,” Aggarwala said. “That was really the fundamental place we started this plan. It wasn’t, well, do we do congestion pricing or not? It was, how do we solve this problem?”

For all the benefits of congestion pricing, it’s funny that you don’t see “alleviating traffic congestion” listed — or “reducing pollution,” for that matter.

I Guess This Means WASPs Support Catering Halls And Fabulous Restaurants?

Joe Sitt knows just as well as the next guy that blacks just want jobs, Jews just desire bookstores and Russians have got to have their nightclubs:

Joseph J. Sitt, who says his company has spent $120 million buying up land underneath and around the rides, said on Friday that he had “rolled over” in response to the criticism of his earlier plans for an entertainment and residential complex.

So the looming 40-story tower planned for the Boardwalk at Stillwell Avenue is gone. So are the hundreds of rental apartments and luxury condominiums in the old plan. The new proposal is less dense, he said, but has more of “the new, the edgy, and the outlandish” rides and attractions that America’s first resort was once known for.

“This is our way of showing the New York community that we’re responsive to what they want,” said Mr. Sitt, the founder and chief executive of Thor Equities, which buys and develops commercial, residential and retail properties nationwide. “Our design, in all its greatness, is a way of showing the world what Coney Island can be.”

. . .

The hotels, Mr. Sitt said, would offer black residents not only jobs, but careers. The Russian immigrants, who enjoy a “quality of life and activity by the water,” would flock to the hotels and nightclubs. Jewish and Italian-American residents would get the “quality retail, bookstores and entertainment venues” that they want. As for everyone else, “what’s better than having fabulous restaurants, catering halls, shows and concerts?”

“Tell me, what issue any one of these constituencies would have with our plan,” he said. “We’re asking for motherhood, motherhood. Apple pie, Chevrolet and Coney Island.”

Defining Down Disgustingness

It’s easy to be outraged by Taco Bell if you never ate there to begin with:

A TV report ratting out a frozen-yogurt shop for hosting a party of mice didn’t keep crowds of Upper East Siders from the trendy treat yesterday.

Footage on WABC News showed two mice running around the popular Pinkberry shop on Second Avenue at East 81st Street at 4 a.m. The station said it was tipped by a passer-by who saw about six of the critters.

“As long as there’s no rats in the ice cream, I’m OK,” said Josh Feldman, who was willing to wait 20 minutes on line for a serving of the dessert Paris Hilton asked for in jail.

His brother, Seth, said, “There are rats all over the city. I’m OK with it.”

Earlier: Wearing Latex Food Service Gloves Just Doesn’t Feel Right.

Hammer And $ickle

Manhattan real estate is irresistible — even to the most die-hard commies:

As the price of Gotham real estate climbs ever higher, the socialists who embrace the ideas of common ownership espoused by Marx and Lenin decided to stop mothballing their precious office space across the street from the Chelsea Hotel and turn it into hand-over-fist cash.

“This is Manhattan. It’s the biggest rental market in North America,” said Libero Della Piana, state chair of the state Communist Party. “We live in a capitalist society, and in order for us to play our role, we have to make money.”

Two months ago, the local hammer-and-sickle crowd opened the doors of its swanky, eight-story headquarters to yet another new tenant, Dumann Realty.

“We believe the market is great. We believe Chelsea is coming up,” said Richard Du, president of Dumann, which leases commercial and retail space in Manhattan.

And if that’s not ironic enough, know that this story can only get, uh, richer:

[Richard Du] laughed at the idea that the capitalist forces of Manhattan have forged a financial partnership with his realty company and the commies.

“I come from Vietnam,” said Du, who grew up with landmines outside his front door before leaving his homeland at age 13, unable to read or write.

“This is a free country,” Du said, “and everyone has to work together for financial freedom.”

. . .

The party, which bought the building 30 years ago, wouldn’t say how much it is raking in from tenants. But based on the latest local real-estate prices, rent for each 5,000-square-foot floor in the building could command well over $135,000 a month, considering the space is in the heart of Chelsea.

Other tenants in the building include two record companies, an art-supply store and the Sheila Kelley S Factor Striptease dance school, which features pole dancing.

Capitalism looks pretty good at the socialist headquarters, as they have been able to renovate their cramped 1970s-style office into a sleek, open-air space with environmentally friendly furniture.

The Best Example Of A Truly Ordinary Building

As the city gets more and more comfortable with historic preservation, it’s time to start thinking about preserving the best examples of the most ordinary architecture:

The six-story brick apartment houses of Pelham Parkway in the Bronx have little in common with the cast-iron emblems of SoHo, the opulent town houses of Gramercy Park or the palatial apartment buildings of Central Park West.

Yet a group of graduate students in historic preservation from Columbia University has proposed designating roughly 14 blocks of the seemingly unremarkable buildings as a historic district.

“What gets paid attention to in 20th-century housing in New York City is often atypical,” said Patrick Ciccone, one of the six students, in explaining the wisdom of designating the Pelham Parkway structures, which were built in the 1920s and 1930s. “These fairly standard buildings are important as examples of a type.”

On Tuesday, walking through the proposed historic district, which would lie generally south of the Pelham Parkway and east of Bronx Park East, Mr. Ciccone pointed to Alhambra Gardens, a fanciful 1928 building with Moorish elements set around a courtyard, and Tudor Arms, also constructed in 1928, with plaster lobby walls made to resemble travertine marble.

Other buildings had Spanish tile, crenellated rooflines and additional elements that, Mr. Ciccone noted, made them feel “not mass-produced to the degree that they were.”

. . .

Andrew Dolkart, the professor of historic preservation who oversaw the students’ work, thought they had made a compelling case for the neighborhood to become the city’s first historic district of six-story apartment houses.

“There’s so much interest in the preservation of the 19th-century row house, yet we have thousands of six-story apartment houses that very little has been written about,” he said. “It was really a civilized way to create housing for people who weren’t enormously wealthy.”