State DOT just killed the Cross Bronx highway expansion — the whole thing, not a trim — and the LIRR is back up, though that strike deal is already getting a hard look. I’m Devin, Cassidy’s here, and this is New York City Politics and Urbanism Daily. Today we’ve got a real stop on a bad highway project, a $97.8 million affordable co-op closing in Harlem, and a budget that still has a hole in it the size of the Carter case. And that budget hole is getting a little more specific every day. City Journal says Mamdani didn’t pull two levers on special-ed costs, and we’re going to get into the numbers. But first, the Bronx got a win today, and I want to say that before we go anywhere near the rest of the mess. Dave Colon, writing in Streetsblog New York City:
New York State is kiboshing plans to repair and widen five bridges along the Cross Bronx Expressway after a multi-year fight with local Bronx residents who objected to the plan on the grounds that a wider highway would bring even more cars and traffic to a noted asthma alley.
State DOT — not City Hall, not the MTA — said Monday afternoon it’s killing the whole Cross Bronx bridge-widening project. All five bridges, gone. And Streetsblog is saying its coverage was part of what moved this, alongside years of organizing from Bronx residents who did not want more cars shoved into an asthma alley. I’ll take the win. I just want to know who looked at widening bridges on the Cross Bronx, near NYCHA’s Bronx River Houses, and thought, yeah, let’s do that in 2026. DOT didn’t suddenly discover conscience. They got boxed in. Streetsblog called their shot — their words were, ‘Streetsblog gets action’ — and, honestly, they earned the brag. A local outlet pushed a state agency off a multi-year infrastructure plan. Say that plainly. And the Bronx still doesn’t have the Metro-North commuter stations it was promised. So, yes, the borough dodged more highway traffic, but it’s still underserved on rail. Both things happened this week, and they’re not separate stories. From New York City Planning:
New York City is facing a severe housing shortage that makes homes scarce and expensive. Outdated, restrictive, and complicated zoning laws limit opportunities to build new homes and make those that do get built more expensive. The rental vacancy rate is 1.41% – the lowest since 1968 – and more than half of renters spend over a third of their income on rent.
This one's from New York State:
Governor Kathy Hochul today announced that the redevelopment of the former Lincoln Correctional Facility in Harlem has reached a major milestone, with the development team closing on $97.8 million in financing to transform the long-vacant site into 105 affordable cooperative homeownership units.
Worth keeping straight: this is a State project. Empire State Development and Hochul’s office are announcing it, not City Hall. The site was state property, the financing is state-structured. That matters when the new mayor is talking like he controls the whole housing pipeline. From David Meyer at Streetsblog New York City:
The deal Gov. Hochul announced late on Monday to end the Long Island Rail Road strike does not appear to have yielded any substantial concessions on the railroad’s outdated work rules. Those work rules had been top of mind for some transit watchers eager to wring more efficiency out of the LIRR’s highly compensated workforce, but workers refused to negotiate over them — and Hochul and the MTA acquiesced.
Update on the LIRR thread we’ve been carrying since last week: the walkout is over, and Hochul announced the deal late Monday. But Streetsblog’s read this morning is pretty blunt — the work-rule fight seems to have gone nowhere. Hochul gets on camera, calls it a fair deal, says no fare hikes, no tax increases — and the structural dysfunction that made the strike possible is still right there. The union didn’t budge on work rules, Albany blinked, and that’s the story. To be precise, she’s pitching this as a win on fares and taxes, and those are real constraints. But ‘a fair deal’ with no details out yet is a press statement, not a sourced fact. The LIRR moves 140,000 people a day, and the first Monday of the strike was described as muted — shuttle buses, some remote work. So commuters took the hit, and Hochul got to hand the union a 5-percent raise plus retro and call it diplomacy. This one's from City Journal:
Even after the projected reduction, the New York City Department of Education will still spend more than$1.4 billion on Carter cases next year, more than triple what it spent a decade ago. It’s now one of the largest items in the DOE budget and the only one that grows automatically each year, as new cases are filed and old cases are renewed automatically.
City Journal today puts a number on something I’ve been watching since May 15th — the FY2028 gap. The piece says Mamdani’s budget assumes $149 million in Carter-case savings, calls that illusory, and says there are two concrete levers he hasn’t pulled to bring that $1.4 billion line down. One point four billion on Carter cases alone — triple what it was a decade ago — and it’s the only DOE budget line that grows automatically, no vote required, just new filings and renewals piling up. And the budget answer is a $149 million projection City Journal is already calling fictional. The piece is falsifiable, which is why it’s worth taking seriously. It says there are exactly two levers: build stronger public programs so fewer families opt out, or contest the cases more aggressively. It says Mamdani did neither. You can check that against the actual budget document. And if that $149 million disappears the way City Journal says it will, you’re not closing the gap. You’re just kicking it into next year and handing it to somebody else to explain. Got thoughts on today’s stories, a tip we should follow, or a correction we need to make? Send us a note at nydailyfix at lantern podcasts dot com. We do read them.
You’ll find links to every story we covered today in the show notes, so if something stuck with you, that’s the place to dig in a little further.
That’s New York City Politics and Urbanism Daily for this Tuesday, May 19th. This is a Lantern Podcast.