Yayyyy… It’s Friday! Still riding the wave of Wednesday and ready for the weekend.
The last couple of nights have been an intensive diet of local screentime. Last night, I watched “Miracle of 42nd Street” for the first time (yes, really… and you thought I knew everything about Hell’s Kitchen!). What an amazing story.
My other two video binges were Manhattan Community Board 4 (MCB4) committee meetings. The Transport committee session produced a story about the NYPD’s parking on W54th Street. In two-and-a-half-hours last night, I watched the Housing, Health & Human Services Committee (bear with me). If you want to know what’s happening with local vaccinations, you can hear from the amazing Dr Zehra Siddiqui from Ryan Chelsea-Clinton Community Health Center, and hear about plans from the Hell’s Kitchen Neighborhood Coalition to create “public safety corridors” to deal with local issues related to the hotels being used for temporary housing of the homeless. The full session will appear on their Youtube channel later this morning. Go watch (it’s not Netflix — but these folks are unpaid volunteers working to help our neighborhood)…
The Port Authority was once dubbed “the single worst place on Planet Earth” by John Oliver. The bus terminal even had its own episode in the series Everybody Hates Chris called “Everybody Hates The Port Authority.” Now the 70-year-old building is going to be rebuilt, at an estimated cost of at least $10 billion.
Interestingly, in our report, you will see the same MCB4 “stars” in action back in 2016 at a Town Hall meeting fighting to stop the Port Authority from buying up blocks of Hell’s Kitchen to demolish them for a new bus station. Read on…
If you fancy some lighter video viewing, I’d recommend Faulty Defense Mechanisms. It’s an exhilarating digital drag production filmed around Hell’s Kitchen. Each short show has a monologue and a lip-sync performance. Enjoy…
What we’ve been reading
LGBTQ small businesses have been given minority status for city contracts. (CBS)
So, who is a “real New Yorker”? (New Yorker)
The boss of the Hudson River Park is stepping down. (The Village Sun)
What are your thoughts about casinos in Times Square? (PIX11)
Charting the rise and fall of Broadway’s Moulin Rouge. (New York Times)
Freeze Frame
With Andrew Yang in quarantine, it’s nice that Bernie Sanders took the time to support our local bars and restaurants yesterday. I now know where to find photoshop skills in Hell’s Kitchen!