Today is Monday, September 28th, 2026
Hang in there: The forecast calls for one last day of overcast skies, drizzle, and temperatures on the cool side (predicted high: 63), but that should be the last of the rain, at least for awhile. The rest of the week is expected to be cloudy, with some breaks of sun, and warmer, with highs in the mid to upper 70s.
On this date in 1974, First Lady Betty Ford underwent a radical mastectomy, which made the news not just because her husband, Gerald Ford, was president of the United States, but because she allowed the release of her medical records, talked openly about her diagnosis, and allowed herself to be photographed in her hospital bed after the surgery. In an era in which breast cancer was rarely discussed publicly, her approach was revolutionary and changed the national conversation — or, perhaps more accurately, started one — about this disease, which will affect an estimated 1 in 8 women at some point in their lives.
Notices
Our calendar has lots of local events. Click on the link or the lady in the upper righthand corner to check.
News Roundup
Compiled by Laura Muha
Do you have memories of or memorabilia related to the late, great UWS Café des Artistes? If so, restaurateurs Ariel Arce and Max Katzenberg want to hear from you as they finalize plans to reopen the beloved UWS restaurant, Eater reported.
Yes, you read that right: A new Café des Artistes will open early next year in the same space at 1 West 67th Street that it occupied from 1917 to 2009. That space most recently was home to The Leopard at the Hotel des Artistes, which opened in 2011 and closed earlier this year.
Arce and Katzenberg hinted at the reopening in an Instagram post on Friday, showing a photo slideshow of images from the halcyon days of the original restaurant, and the words “A return to glamour.”
They followed up over the weekend with an ad in The New York Times. “Were you there?” it asked, in block letters. “Give us a call or send us a note with your favorite memories, photos and stories.” The ad included the email address memories@cafedesartistesnyc.com, and a phone number: 646-389-1005.
Eater reported that the restaurateurs “will draw on those responses as the restaurant takes shape for its new era.”
The original Café des Artistes opened in 1917 as a dining room for residents of the Hotel des Artistes, an artists’ apartment building where many apartments were without kitchens. The café “eventually became a destination, particularly for performers, musicians, writers, and artists drawn to nearby Lincoln Center,” Eater wrote. The restaurant was known for its French cuisine and for the murals painted by one of the hotel residents.
“If ever a restaurant had fine, aristocratic bone structure it is Café des Artistes,” wrote former New York Times restaurant critic William Grimes in 2003. “Diners have only to take one step inside, and the tumultuous New York world outside disappears in a flash, replaced by lush floral displays, flattering lighting and Howard Chandler Christy’s pastel murals of naked beauties prancing through romantic landscapes.”
Read the full story of Café des Artistes’ return — HERE.
Every year, Con Edison inspectors identify thousands of locations throughout the city in which stray voltage is leaking from electrical cables and traveling upward through sidewalks, metal street plates, light poles, and parking meters. But there is no publicly available map of where they are, NBC New York reported.
“Electric companies are required to report stray voltage data to the New York Public Service Commission each year,” the station said. “However, one datapoint is absent from their public reporting. The precise location of electrified objects. That absence of geographical data tied to stray voltage reports is now drawing criticism in the wake of a deadly carriage horse accident in Central Park.”
In May, a carriage horse bolted in the park, killing a teen who was visiting the city with his family. The transportation union that represents the carriage drivers announced last month that it had requested Con Edison to check the area where the accident occurred, and that the utility confirmed that stray voltage had been found, but that it was not coming from any cables or equipment maintained by the utility.
“The city’s Department of Transportation, which maintains municipal lamp posts and traffic lights, did not respond to questions about its own stray voltage inspections and repairs. The DOT does publish annual results of random stray voltage checks, listing the hundreds of intersections where readings are taken. But a review of DOT inspections over the last five years includes no mention of any inspection location within Central Park,” NBC reported.
The teen’s family has filed a notice of intent to sue several city agencies, and paperwork cites the presence of stray voltage in the area.
The NBC report also said that more than 7,000 “energized objects” were detected citywide during Con Ed’s inspections last year. “Most of the time the stray voltage would be virtually undetectable to human touch, but more than 500 of the objects involved readings greater than 25 volts, a point at which humans might be able to feel a tingle.”
Read/watch the NBC investigative story — HERE, and see a 2022 Rag article on how to protect your pets (and yourself) from this invisible hazard — HERE.
It was a week of UWS-related reminiscing by mega-celebrities Tom Cruise and Sylvester Stallone, both of whom held jobs in the neighborhood in the days before they became famous.
In an interview with Good Morning America that was picked up by Entertainment Weekly, Cruise grinned as he talked about his time as an assistant to the superintendent of a building on the Upper West Side, describing how residents would call him with complaints when something wasn’t working in their apartments.
“I would have to go down and fix their stuff,” Cruise explained. “I was a handyman before; I had many jobs growing up. I would go down to fix their heating.
“I shoveled the ice every day. I made sure that the garbage was taken out. I took care of it. Whatever you need!”
Stallone, meanwhile, described his days of cleaning lion cages in the Central Park Zoo. “That’s a rough one, because I felt so bad for these magnificent animals,” he told CBS “And then I felt bad because I smelled like them. You know, going home, it’s pretty pungent, so I would jump in the shower with my clothes on.”
“You’d shower with your clothes on?” correspondent Tracy Smith repeated incredulously.
“I had no choice,” Stallone replied. “I couldn’t afford a laundry.”
[Note: The Central Park Zoo no longer houses lions.]
Read Cruise’s interview and see a clip of it — HERE; watch a clip from Sylvester Stallone’s interview– HERE.
A reporter for the United Nations recently paid a visit to Central Park to see how one of the city’s most recognizable landmarks is being affected by climate change — and also how it is helping to mitigate some of the effects for New Yorkers.
The park “is experiencing heavier downpours, flooding and soil erosion, while prolonged heatwaves are putting pressure on the ecosystem as well as visitors,” his report concluded. “But the park also helps New York cope with the heat. It helps cool the city, clean the air, capture stormwater and gives people a place to escape the heat under the trees. The temperature in the park can be around 5°Celsius (10°F) lower than on surrounding streets, according to the Central Park Climate Lab.”
“The Park’s celebrated crabapple alleys, for example, have become one of its most spectacular sights in spring, when branches burst into white, pink and purple blossom. … But winters that are too warm could prevent apple trees from flowering altogether, while spells of warm weather in February can cause magnolias and cherry trees to bloom too soon,” and might ultimately stress them to the point where they don’t bloom at all.
The article also explores ways that the Central Park Conservancy is attempting to mitigate the impact of climate change, including composting and experimenting with plants from other climate zones, but “[t]he challenge is a delicate one: adapting a landscape conceived in the 19th century to 21st-century conditions without allowing Central Park to lose the character that has made it recognisable around the world,” the article said.
Read the full story — HERE.
In Other UWS News
- The delivery worker who helped the NYPD catch a man accused of two hate-related stabbings on the UWS in July told his story (and was honored) at UJA-Federation of New York’s Rally to Stop Anti-Semitism last week. Read the story — HERE.
- The New York Bar Association is weighing in on the Central Park carriage-horse debate, joining calls for a ban. Read the association’s full statement — HERE, and an amNY story about it — HERE.
- A five-bedroom, five-bath town duplex penthouse in The Henry at West 84th Street topped the list of luxury sales in the neighborhood the week of Sept. 14, closing at $26.8 million, Patch reported. See the full story — HERE.
- USA Today tagged along with Elias Weiss Friedman — the street photographer and creator of the wildly popular social media account The Dogist — as he photographed a black lab pup in Central Park. See the photos — HERE, and read an interview with Friedman — HERE.
ICYMI
An Interview With a Woman Who Broke Her Hip in the UWS Trader Joe’s Escalator Mishap
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Not sure why New York takes its official temperatures in Central Park. It is often much cooler there than say Midtown.
Heavier and more intense rain is affecting Central Park, but its impact on Riverside Park is and will continue to be far greater.
The Park is heavily sloped and the rain will move soils downhill at increasing rates. Many of the flatter surfaces hosting ball fields and playgrounds were enabled through landfill that the heavier rains are eroding which is why we’re seeing sinkholes in many places.
And perhaps worst? The supporting earth around the retaining walls such as those along Riverside Drive will be eroded and undermined.