Monday, December 30, 2024
Mostly sunny. High 55 degrees.
Temperatures will warm back up during the first part of the week, before turning colder once again on Thursday.
Notices
Our calendar has lots of local events. Click on the link or the lady in the upper righthand corner to check.
Tuesday is New Year’s Eve. Wednesday is New Year’s Day. Thursday is the last day of Hanukkah.
Upper West Side News
By Gus Saltonstall
The Upper West Side townhouse from “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York” that West Side Rag first reported on last December recently sold for $5.7 million, property records show.
The townhouse at 51 West 95th Street, between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue, was originally listed at $7.65 million, before eventually selling for the $5.7 million figure. The four-bedroom, five-bathroom building was originally constructed in 1900 and designed by Martin V.B. Ferdon.
While the facade and address were used in the iconic 1992 holiday movie, the interior scenes were filmed in a studio in Universal City, California.
It is unclear who purchased the Upper West Side address where Macaulay Culkin evaded bad guys, but the New York Post reported on a study last week that compared the prices of famous holiday movie homes, including the townhouse on West 95th Street.
Here are the top five.
- The Family Man: Jack’s Penthouse apartment in New York City — $15.4 million
- The Holiday: Amanda’s home in San Marino, California — $12 million
- Bridget Jone’s Diary: Mark’s home in London — $6.2 million
- Home Alone 2: McCallister’s townhouse on the Upper West Side — $5.7 million
- Home Alone: McCallister family home in Winnetka, Illinois — $5.25 million
You can check out the full New York Post story — HERE.
John Lennon’s sons recently spent time together in their father’s former Upper West Side home in the Dakota apartment building, as reported by People Magazine.
Lennon’s sons, Sean Ono Lennon and Julian Lennon, shared a photo earlier this month hanging out in the Dakota at 1 West 72nd Street.
Julian, whose mother is John’s ex-wife Cynthia Lennon, shared the photos with the following caption.
“A Goodnight kiss for my brother, after spending the evening with him, having a lil dinner & chatting the night away, at The Dakota. Something we rarely get to do…Thankful!”
Julian never actually lived in the Dakota, but Sean, whose mother is Yoko Ono, grew up in the Upper West Side building.
John was killed in front of the building in 1980 at the age of 40. Yoko now spends the majority of her time at a farm upstate.
For the third time in 2024, Lyft announced that it is increasing the price of riding a Citi Bike.
Starting on January 6, non-members will have to pay $4.99 to unlock a bike, up from the previous $4.79 rate. While there will be no change to the annual price for members, electric bike prices will increase from 24 cents to 25 cents per minute, and for non-members, they will rise from 36 to 38 cents per-minute.
A day pass for non-members will also increase from $19 to $25 starting on February 3.
A representative of Lyft told StreetsBlog that the increased price was due to inflation.
You can check out the full breakdown of the new Citi Bike prices — HERE.
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Gus does more work just for these Monday roundups than some reporters do in a week.
Winneteka is a typo It is Winnetka
— “A representative of Lyft told StreetsBlog that the increased price [for CitiBike rentals] was due to inflation.”
Shouldn’t they have been including the cost of keeping the tires filled with air all along?
cute 🙂
Besides the Citibike increase…..the MTA will be raising bus and subway fares in 2025.
That may be the address but the street in the movie does not look like the real W95th St. There’s an area in Central Park at 95th which was in the movie.
A reminder to CITIBike users: When you spot an abandoned CITBike, stop and scan the QR code with your CITIBike app to notify them of the location of the bike. Hopefully, CITIBike will recover it. I see a lot of CITIBikes abandoned, presumably stolen, and I have to presume the loss of these bikes contributes to the hike in costs for riders.
Is it now time that we, and the city, reconsider the entire CitBike program and evaluate its effectiveness vs.cost.
What began as a semi-private / public partnership has now fully become a unit of a major corporation (Lyft) whose primary objective is to make money. Considering the ever-expanding amount of curb space that the city has doled out to the CitiBike program (let alone the countless miles of bike lanes which mostly has benefited the company beyond any other single constituency) the recent price hikes will put the initial cost of getting on a bike at $4.99 (odd price, indeed) making it nearly twice the cost of a subway fare ($ 2.90) and even higher than the typical astronomical initial fare $4.50 in a yellow cab.
These are just the BASE cost. If one gets on an electric bike the fare increases to $0.32 per minute. At these rates, “bicycling” is no long an economical alternative for transportation that many of its advocates constantly rave about.
Considering the jump in these recent prices, perhaps we have arrived at the point in which Lyft starts paying for the curb space or develop some other “resident” pricing plan that real New Yorkers can afford.
The $4.99 fee doesn’t apply to those who pay ~$18/month for membership. They only pay additional amounts for riding eBikes and/or exceeding the 45-minute limit. The membership also includes 60 free eBike minutes a year. So, your comparisons to the subway fare and yellow cab initial fare are erroneous. Any member who averages more than 6 rides per month on a classic bike comes out ahead vs. the subway fares. And Citibikes are much cheaper than a cab ride. Bicycling is definitely an economical transportation alternative, especially when one takes into account the health benefits of being active than can be monetized.
Getting hung up on whether a for-profit company operates Citibike and how many miles of bike lanes and curb space is “doled out” to the program is somewhat sophomoric. Cities make such decisions routinely about many entities that improve the lives of its residents whether everyone uses all of them or not. The last thing I want is for the City to run most of these facilities. The MTA is a perfect example.
What began as a semi-private / public partnership has now fully become a unit of a major corporation (Lyft) whose primary objective is to make money.
^^THIS
I’ve never been on a Citi Bike, but was shocked to see it costs $4.99 + minute fees. What a complete and utter joke. 80% more expensive than a subway ride right off the bat. I can’t believe people pay so much to risk their lives riding a bike. PT Barnum was right, a sucker is born every minute.
Citibike’s target market is residents who pay for annual memberships which give them advantages over non-members. I don’t understand how you’re shocked that it costs $4.99 when it also says that applies only to non-members. It’s easy to call something a complete and utter joke right off the bat without comprehensively knowing the facts. What’s not easy is digging deeper to get an accurate understanding of the program.
There are also City/taxpayer costs related to City DOT’s administration of the Citibike program specifically as well as the bike lane infrastructure more generally.
Interestingly City DOT focuses a lot of resources on encouraging bicycling including Citibike.
Lots of messaging on x, lots of programming etc.
In contrast while City DOT’s generic mantra is to use public transit, City DOT does not specifically message to encourage use of MTA bus and subway.
And basically bicycling siphons from MTA bus and subway.
(And truly baffling that City DOT hurts bus riders – allowing “open streets” on avenues with buses which detours buses)
I am happy to hear nice news about Julian and Sean🩷
@UWS Person, I believe the non-member rate is generally for tourists. Residents like me go for an annual fee of $220 ($219.99), which gives you more or less unlimited rides. Electric is extra, but also not expensive. It’s generally faster than the train/bus and it’s cheaper. And it’s also fun. We should all be proud of CitiBike. It’s a truly great addition to our transportation system.