Noah Kazis
Noah joined Streetsblog as a New York City reporter at the start of 2010. When he was a kid, he collected subway paraphernalia in a Vignelli-map shoebox.
Before coming to Streetsblog, he blogged at TheCityFix DC and worked as a field organizer for the Obama campaign in Toledo, Ohio. Noah graduated from Yale University, where he wrote his senior thesis on the class politics of transportation reform in New York City. He lives in Morningside Heights.
Recent Posts
Promising Parking Reforms Brewing Inside Department of City Planning
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A generation ago, every new building in New York City had to include parking. Even in downtown and midtown Manhattan, the law required developers to build parking spaces for 40 percent of all new residences. The most walkable, transit-accessible districts in the country had mandates to set aside space for car storage. The passage of […]
Who Killed Transit on the New Tappan Zee? Feds and State DOT Won’t Say.
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Call it the mystery of the missing transit. One of the state’s biggest transit projects, in the works for nearly a decade, was canceled overnight and no one will explain why, or even claim responsibility for the decision. Two weeks ago, each of the four alternatives for replacing the Tappan Zee Bridge included a new […]
Weprin Survey Finds 61 Percent Like Bike Lanes, Even in Eastern Queens
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Several surveys this year by top polling organizations have found citywide support for bike lanes. And in Park Slope and the Upper West Side, questionnaires put out by local elected officials have shown consistent neighborhood-level approval for new bike infrastructure. Now, another member of the City Council has found widespread enthusiasm for the city’s bike […]
Latest Q-Poll: Bike-Share Even More Popular Than Bike Lanes
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After a series of polls showing big majorities of New Yorkers favor expanding the city’s bike lane network, the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute has turned its attention to a wider range of bike issues. It turns out that with 58 percent support, bike lanes aren’t even the most popular bike program the city is undertaking. […]
Jay Walder Came to the MTA With a Plan to Improve Transit. Will Joe Lhota?
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Any moment now, Governor Andrew Cuomo is expected to announce that Joe Lhota, the former budget director and deputy mayor for Rudy Giuliani, will be the next chairman of the MTA. There will be a press conference and press releases — a singular opportunity for Cuomo and Lhota to put forward their vision for the […]
Chicago Proposes “Congestion Fee” On Parking to Fund Transit
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In last winter’s Chicago mayoral election, all the leading candidates made ambitious promises to increase funding for the city’s struggling transit agency. Now, with a proposed $2 “congestion fee” — really a downtown surcharge on the city’s parking tax — Emanuel plans to make drivers pay their fair share and use the proceeds to build […]
Flatbed Truck Driver Hit and Killed Cyclist in East Williamsburg Last Night
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A flatbed truck driver struck and killed a cyclist in East Williamsburg shortly after midnight last night. As first reported by Gothamist, the 30-year-old male victim was riding to the right of the truck while traveling southbound along Morgan Avenue, according to NYPD. The driver turned right at Meserole Street, striking the cyclist, who was […]
DOT Hell’s Kitchen Study Produces Slate of Pedestrian Safety Upgrades
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The Department of Transportation presented the findings [PDF] of its five-year study of transportation in the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood at a packed public meeting last night. The massive transportation analysis included many critical projects that have already been announced, such as the 34th Street Select Bus Service route and extensions of the protected bike lanes along […]
Bike-Share Presentations Continue at CBs This Week, Beginning Tonight
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With two stops in Brooklyn and one in Manhattan, the Department of Transportation this week continues its tour of community boards to present plans for city bike-share. In last week’s presentation to Manhattan Community Board 2, DOT officials provided new details on the proposed boundaries for the bike-share system, its cost structure, siting criteria and […]
Planning Experts Call for an Overhaul of NYC Zoning Rules
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New York City’s zoning regulation turns 50 this year. Though the zoning ordinance has been amended extensively over the last half-century, land use in New York is still governed under a basic framework established under Mayor Robert Wagner. In a panel discussion held last Friday by the Municipal Art Society, experts put forward a vision […]
NYCHA Chairman: Parking Minimums “Working Against Us”
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Leaders in New York City’s public housing community are interested in transforming city-owned superblocks into mixed-use, mixed-income communities that engage with the pedestrian realm. There are of course many obstacles to this kind of ambitious project, but only one was identified specifically in a Municipal Art Society panel on the topic last Friday: the city’s […]
Chris Ward: NYC Truck Traffic “an Economic and Environmental Crisis”
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Speaking at the Municipal Art Society’s annual summit this afternoon, outgoing Port Authority chief Chris Ward said he wouldn’t be sending any parting shots at the New York region’s leaders, but he didn’t hold back from proposing some big and bold ideas. With only a few weeks left at the Port Authority, Ward issued a […]