NYC NOW - Morning Headlines: Cuomo Floats Free Transit for Low-Income Riders, Staten Island Landmark for Sale, Rural NY Faces Doctor Shortages, and 34th Street Busway Plans

Episode Date: August 8, 2025

Mayoral hopeful Andrew Cuomo is proposing free subway and bus service for low-income New Yorkers. Meanwhile, a 100-year-old historic home near Staten Island’s New Dorp station is on the market for only the second time in its history. A new report from State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli warns of severe doctor shortages in rural New York counties, with some lacking pediatricians, OBGYNs, and mental health providers. Finally, in this week’s transit segment: plans for a new 34th Street busway, Cuomo’s free transit pitch, and safety upgrades to Canal Street following a deadly crash.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Friday, August 8th. Here's the morning headlines from Tiffany Hansen. Zoran Mamdani began his mayoral campaign with a promise to make city buses free. Now his rival, Andrew Cuomo, says he'd make buses and subways free, but only for low-income New Yorkers. WNYC's Elizabeth Kim has more. Quomo, who's running as an independent,

says Mamdani's idea is a giveaway for the rich. But besides playing socialist, why should New Yorkers subsidize the bus fare for rich people? Transit has been a key issue in the mayororal race. Mayor Adams earlier this week said he'd move forward with a busway plan for 34th Street in Midtown that would restrict most passenger vehicle traffic from the perennially clogged street. Asked about Cuomo's proposal, a Mamdani spokesperson said Cuomo, quote, created this crisis and cited budget cuts he enacted as governor. On Staten Island, just blocks from the New Dorp Station, a historic house is perfectly preserved. WNYC's Ryan Kyloth reports it's up for sale right now for only the second time in more than 100 years.

From busy Richmond Road, the house appears part wedding cake, part Gothic novel, sitting at the top of a half-a-half-a-half-a-half-a-half-a-half. sloping lawn. It's known as the Gustav Meyer House for the German-born Baker who moved into the home in the 1890s. He invented what became the Nabisco Nilla Wafer in his basement kitchen there. Meyer's daughters lived on there for a century, painting extravagant murals on the walls. The exterior is landmarked, and the current owner for 40 years has preserved the interior, which has starred in more than 200 fashion and film shoots. You can find photos and more backstory on our news website, Gothamist. If you live in a rural county in New York, state chances are that the doctor is not in.

That's according to a new report by state comptroller Tom Denapley. According to the findings, several counties have no pediatricians or OBGYNs and mental health practitioners are in short supply as well. The survey concludes shortages could worsen under federal Medicaid cuts. The report offers suggestions for filling the coverage gap, more telemedicine, mobile clinics, and incentives for serving rural areas. The 16 rural counties included in the survey include Green and Sullivan counties north of New York City. Looking for 81 for a high with some sunshine today. Right now we have 65 degrees in a fair sky.

Stick around. There's more to come. NYC. I'm Sean Carlson for WNYC. It's time for On the Way. Our weekly segment on all things considered breaking down the week's transit news, joining us as WNYC's transportation reporter, Stephen Nesson, and editor Clayton Gousa. Okay, we recently reported Mayor Adams planned to add a new busway to 34th Street in Midtown. Then we reported members of his administration were slow walking it. Now it's back on. Stephen, is this new busway a done deal or not?

Well, you never know. This one does seem pretty secure, and here's why. We got news that the busway is included as part of a Midtown South rezoning. That allows developers to add thousands of new apartments. That passed a key city council committee this week, goes to the full city council for a vote next week. And Adams put out a statement saying this is all part of his grand plan to pay our housing with infrastructure, and that includes the 34th Street busway. Right. And the idea for the street changes are pretty simple.

They want to ban most passenger vehicle traffic from the majority of 34th Street so that buses can move faster. That means if you're in a taxi or regular car or passenger vehicle, and you enter 34th Street, you have to make the immediate next turn or face a fine during most hours of the day. It's also good for trucks, right? They get the same benefits as buses. They can make their pickups drop-offs on the street. It can increase efficiency when it comes to commercial freight like that. But as we know, and we've highlighted time and again on this segment and over the years, just in general, anytime city officials seek to take something away from drivers, they face a pretty intense pushback. I mean, just look at the acrimony earlier this year when congestion pricing launched.

We've seen a lot of that pushback die down since, as people kind of saw the changes to congestion in the city after the tolls were imposed. And the last time the city put in a busway like this on this scale was six years ago on 14th Street. and anyone who walks down that street now knows that it's a radically different place than it was before the pandemic. It's nicer to walk, buses cruise there, but it also faced years of hand-wringing by the Mayor de Blasio's former administration. And if you look, some of the other bus projects in the city that had, you know, the DOT had big plans for Adams has walked a lot of them back after he saw pushback. You know, you look at Fordham Road. He proposed some big changes to increase bus speeds there and improved service. that got kind of put on the back burner and scaled down Flatbush Avenue.

He's proposed big changes to that. That's been on hold throughout his administration. So this is pretty monumental to 34th Street thing since they're pairing it with rezoning. But you're certainly, you certainly could expect some pushback, continued pushback from drivers. Yeah. It's also a really busy busway. This new busway would run from 3rd Avenue to 9th Avenue. It would be just like 14th Street.

And that route on 34th has 28,000 daily riders on the M34. It is also the third slowest bus in New York City, zooming along at 5.5 miles per hour. I think I jog about that fast. So it could be a big change for the street there. Yeah. All right, keeping on transit politics, Andrew Cuomo announced a big new proposal for transit. He wants to make the subways and buses free, like completely free for low-income New Yorkers. Stephen, what is going on here?

So Cuomo apparently wants to use the existing Fair Fares program, which now offers half-priced subway and bus rides to low-income New Yorkers. He just wants to give it to people for free. So Fairfares would become free fairs, I suppose. And, you know, he's really pushing back against Zeran Mamdani, the leading Democratic candidates proposal to make buses free for everyone. Cuomo is saying, well, why not make Subways free under this new proposal if you're enrolled in the Fair Fares program? Here he is speaking today. Why would you subsidize the rich? I get the theory of socialism and government provides, government controls.

I get that. But besides playing socialist, why should New Yorkers subsidize the bus fare for rich people? I should add, he would also expand just a smidge who qualifies currently to get into the Fairfares program. someone would need to earn a hundred and forty five percent of the federal poverty level, Cuomo would boost it to 150 percent. That's about $22,000 a year for a single person, single one person household. That's very, I mean, it's very low income. It's compared, you know, so just to put a pin, to kind of put a bow on it,

Mamdani wants free buses for everybody. Cuomo says free buses and subways, but only, you know, to the low income New Yorkers. But, you know, there's very little evidence that. Cuomo has spent a lot of time on an MTA area New York City bus. We, our reporter, Liz Kim, tried to get a question in as he was exiting the press conference today. He didn't answer. When the last time he rode the bus, in a previous life, when I was covering transit for the daily news, I would repeatedly ask the governor at press conferences to ride the bus with me to LaGuardia Airport.

This was when you're proposing LaGuardia Air train. He declined repeatedly. There's examples of other candidates riding the bus. Totally. You know, when you're leaning on somebody's characterization of bus riders as rich people, I don't, I don't know if he's the most reliable narrator. But it also comes this, you know, his proposal comes as a bunch of candidates are starting to hone in on transit reliability, transit service, transit affordability as a winning issue. Mammani had his free, fast and free buses proposal that really helped him in the primary. Adams this week, looking at 34th Street, as we just discussed. seeing that as improving bus service on that corridor as a winning issue.

So everyone's kind of honing in and saying, okay, Cuomo previously in the primary, leading up to it, it said his main transit proposal was about safety. Now he's kind of leaning more into the affordability, a little bit more into the service of it all. Interesting. And again, this just was announced today, so we don't have a ton of reaction, but the spokesperson for Riders Alliance, a group that's been very critical of Cuomo sort of responded along those lines, noting that when Cuomo was the governor. He had a much larger purse and the state controls the MTA. So he could have offered something like this much sooner. Basically, they're asking, why is he only proposing it now that he's running for mayor?

In other news about changes coming to city streets, the Department of Transportation says it's going to make some safety improvements to Canal Street. That's after a fatal crash there last month. Tell us more about that. So it was a really crazy crash, a really tragic one as well. Police say early on a Saturday morning, last month a woman drive. Having a Chevy Malibu came absolutely flying off the Manhattan Bridge at Canal Street. They say she was going 109 miles an hour, which is too fast. Yeah. And she was allegedly drunk as well. Lost control, killed a cyclist and someone walking on the sidewalk.

It's a notoriously dangerous area. Anyone who knows Canal Street, an area around there coming off the bridge, knows that it's bad. City knows it's bad. Advocates once called it Manhattan's Boulevard of Death. There are multiple studies over the year, multiple recommendations to try and fix it that have just never come into fruition until now on the heels of this real kind of tragedy. That's right. Now the DOT says it's going to be making a couple of immediate changes. For one thing, it's going to install Jersey barriers and sand-filled barrels in front of the pedestrian crossings at Canal Street and Bowery. That's where the crash was.

So drivers coming off the bridge would have a harder time driving onto the sidewalk. And over the next few weeks, crews are going to go out there and they will be reduced. the width of some of the lanes coming off the bridge. The funnels on the Canal Street, that's also expected to slow vehicles down. And the city, in case drivers don't get the message, is going to lower the speed limit from 35 to 20 miles per hour for vehicles coming off that bridge. And finally, the DOT says it's going to start meeting with the community, again, I suppose, to discuss a full redesign of Canal Street.

They say it's something it was already planned to do in the fall, but it's going to be doing it soon. Okay. Well, thanks to WNYC Transportation Reporter, Steve. and editor Clayton Goza. You can stay in the know on all things transit or ask a question of your own by signing up for a weekly newsletter at gothamis.com slash on the way. My friends, thanks. Stay safe out there. Thank you. Thank you, Sean. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WMYC. Catch us every weekday three times a day for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. More soon.