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Traveling within city limits on the Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North is about to get cheaper.

The MTA on Tuesday announced that trips that start and end within the five boroughs on these two lines will get discounted tickets as part of the rollout of congestion pricing in Manhattan, according to Gothamist.

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The MTA board will approve a 10% discount for these fare zones, reducing the cost of a monthly LIRR pass between Jamaica and Penn Station from $220 to $198 and monthly Metro-North passes between Grand Central Terminal and the northern Bronx from $199.75 to $180, the publication says.

The hope is that some commuters will start taking public transit once congestion pricing goes into effect on June 30. The discounts hit on July 1. 

“Getting on board the rails, getting on board subways, getting on buses, getting on express buses is the way to travel. Nobody likes to sit in traffic,” Lisa Daglian, executive director of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA, told Gothamist. “New York City has the best transit in the United States. It will save time, it will save money and it will help to save the environment and climate.”

Aside from this discount, NYC Transit has been running an additional 1,200 subway trains every week over the last several months and six more lines—the B, D, M, J, 3 and 5 trains—will get increases in service in June. “Subway service continues to deliver the best on-time performance in the last 10 years,” the MTA says.

It also says that The Staten Island Express Bus Network and the Bronx Local Bus Network redesign have brought service increases during off-peak periods and other service improvements, for an increase of 6% ridership since they launched. With added busways and Select Bus Service, there’s been a 60% increase in bus speed.

By opening Grand Central Madison, service increased by 41%, adding more than 77,000 trains a year, including a 35% increase at eastern Queens stations, 30% increase in Brooklyn trains (55% increase in weekend service), and 50% increase in reverse peak service, the MTA says. It also added a $7 peak City Ticket for travel on the LIRR and Metro-North Railroad between commuter railroad stations within city limits, and an LIRR Far Rockaway ticket.

Metro-North Railroad has also increased service in the Bronx with its own $7 peak CityTicket. According to the MTA, already this year, the railroad averaged an on-time performance of 98.9%.

All this to say, the city has been working to ensure its public transit can handle an influx of riders who won’t want to pay the congestion pricing fees.

Additionally, the MTA opened its application portal for discount and exemption plans for households earning less than $50,000 a year, disabled individuals, emergency vehicles, buses and commuter vans and specialized government vehicles.

For more information about NYC’s congestion pricing plan, read our explainer here.

* This article was originally published here

In a startling revelation, U.S. immigration judges issued a staggering 136,623 deportation orders during the initial six months of Fiscal Year 2024, according to an analysis by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), a nonpartisan, nonprofit data research center affiliated with the Newhouse School of Public Communications and the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University. 

This figure marks a significant surge compared to the peak removals observed in FY 2019 under the Donald Trump administration, with today’s pace of new removal orders soaring by 50 percent. This surge coincides with the expansion of immigration judges during the current administration.

The findings shed light on the geographic distribution of these removal orders, providing a detailed portrait of the areas most affected across the country. New York City emerged as the epicenter of deportation activity, with just under 11,000 removal orders issued to immigrants residing there. Following closely behind was Harris County, Te., which witnessed more than 8,000 removal orders, while Los Angeles County, Calif., faced nearly 6,000 removals.

Despite the prominence of those three top regions, Dallas County, Tex., and Miami-Dade County, Fla., also witnessed substantial deportation figures. The disparity is evident in Miami-Dade County, with only one-fourth of the removal orders compared to New York City and less than half compared to Los Angeles.

The trend persists with the next four counties having the highest deportation numbers being primarily located in Texas and California. Montgomery County, Tex., stood out as the residence for just under 2,000 immigrants ordered removed, with San Bernardino County, Calif., and Travis County, Tex., closely trailing behind.

Orange County, Calif., registered the ninth-highest deportation figures, showcasing the contiguous counties of Los Angeles, San Bernardino, and Orange as significant deportation hotspots, accounting collectively for more than 9,000 removal orders in the past six months.

In contrast, Cook County, Ill., represented by Chicago, ranked tenth in deportation numbers, reflecting relatively fewer completed court cases despite its status as a major metropolitan area and recipient of new asylum seekers.

These findings underscore the widespread impact of deportation orders in various regions, highlighting the complex dynamics in the U.S. immigration system and the need for comprehensive reform to address the challenges faced by immigrant communities nationwide.

Alarming lack of representation

Meanwhile, analysts also found that as immigration judges accelerate the issuance of removal orders, fewer immigrants ordered for removal manage to secure legal representation to advocate their cases. ATRAC examination of year-by-year trends over the past decade reveals a nuanced trajectory.

Between 2016 and 2019, the total number of removal decisions saw a modest increase, but there were notable improvements in representation rates. However, the onset of partial government COVID-19 shutdowns precipitated a sharp decline in decisions, coinciding with a surprising uptick in the likelihood of finding legal representation. This anomaly probably stemmed from the decreased demand for immigration attorneys due to the reduced number of court hearings, subsequently alleviating supply constraints, TRAC found. 

Since Fiscal Year (FY) 2021, representation rates have plummeted as removal hearings surged. Last year, representation rates dwindled to a mere 20 percent. Data for FY 2024 illustrates a further decline, with only 15 percent of immigrants ordered for removal managing to secure legal representation. This decrease is in stark contrast with the current representation rate of 30 percent for all immigrants in the court’s backlog.

The implications are profound: Immigrants without legal representation face significantly higher odds of being ordered for removal. This disparity underscores the urgency of addressing the challenges encountered by immigrants navigating the legal intricacies of deportation proceedings in the Democratic Biden administration.

Felicia J. Persaud is the publisher of NewsAmericasNow.com, a daily news outlet focusing on Black immigrant issues.

The post Immigration judges order record number of deportations in first half of FY 2024, TRAC finds appeared first on New York Amsterdam News.

* This article was originally published here

Yes, we love a toasty mug of hot chocolate when it’s cold outside but who says we can’t indulge in the sweet bev even in the summer months? Thankfully for us, the folks over at Glace—the Upper East Side ice cream and dessert shop from Sasha Zabar (yes, that Zabar)—is kicking off the warm-weather season by partnering with viral hot spot Bad Roman on a frozen hot chocolate-inspired treat. 

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Available from Thursday, May 2, through Sunday, May 5, Glace will reimagine their famed hot chocolate as a creamy frozen dessert inspired by an Italian classic: the Glace x Bad Roman Tiramisu Frozen Hot Chocolate will feature frozen layers of hot chocolate and coffee in a crunchy chocolate shell with mascarpone whipped cream, black cacao powder, and Glace’s signature toasted marshmallow rim.   

Along with the new collaborative dessert, Glace is launching an entire series of new menu items, ranging from frozen hot chocolates to ice cream cakes and sundaes and more. There will be a frozen version of the shop’s viral S’mores Hot Chocolate, made with “frozen” chocolate, a chocolate hard shell and a toasted marshmallow “halo,” and a Frozen Chocolate Brûlée topped with frozen custard, caramelized sugar and marshmallow sauce. 

Other cooling treats include a range of ice cream sundaes, including a Cosmic Brownie Sundae with your choice of ice cream, flourless brownie, whipped cream, fudge and chocolate “meteors,” and several featuring brand-new soft serve flavors: Meyer Lemon soft serve (house cultured yogurt with house-grown Meyer lemons) gussied up with honeycomb and honey drizzle, and a Brown Sugar Vanilla soft serve finished with flake bar and chocolate stracciatella. There will also be new cakes like a Classic Glace S’mores Cake, a Caramel Honeycomb Cake, a Cookies and Cream Cake and an old-school Birthday Cake. 

Check out the yummy-looking, cacao-dusted Glace x Bad Roman Tiramisu Frozen Hot Chocolate below, and keep the hot chocolate vibes going all summer long:

* This article was originally published here

Outdoor dining season is finally upon us—in our humble opinion, spring is by far the best time to enjoy NYC’s outdoor dining spots, BTW—and one of the city’s newest Thai restaurants is celebrating with the launch of its own al fresco dining area.

Debuting in Chelsea this past January, Sappe (pronounced “Sep”) is a new Northeastern Thai restaurant from the Thai expats behind the East Village’s highly-regarded SOOTHR and continues the team’s goal of bringing lesser-known, regional Thai cooking to New York City.

The West 14th Street newcomer specializes in elevated Esan-style street foods—think fried dumplings, mushroom rolls, marinated chicken wings, curry noodle soups, and a wide variety of grilled skewers, from chicken skin to pork intestine to ox tongue—and creative cocktails, both of which will be on offer in the recently launched dining patio. (The outdoor space is conveniently enclosed in case of a rogue sun shower but still opens up to enjoy those rising temps.)

Further celebrating the warm weather, the vibrant eatery is pouring frozen Thai cocktails for summer, such as a Somsri slushy, made with Cointreau, tequila, lime and guava puree. And it also recently introduced weekday lunch specials (available noon to 3:30pm from Mondays through Fridays), which come with complimentary fried chicken meatballs or spicy fried tofu, plus a free beverage. 

Tapping into the buzzy energy of 1950s Thailand—”a golden age when the country opened itself to occidental influence in culture and music,” reads a press release—Sappe aims to transport diners to the bustling streets of Bangkok with custom Thai street signs, carts of sweet treats for guests waiting for a table, and a still-to-come back room that will evoke Thailand’s Hua Lamphong station. Thai stained-glass windows, a Breccia Scoppio marble bar, mirrored ceilings, portraits of James Dean and pops of neon amp up the vintage Bangkok vibes. 

Check out snaps of some of the dishes and drinks at Sappe, as well as the bright and cheery new outdoor dining patio below:

* This article was originally published here