Good morning. It’s Wednesday. We’ll look at the City Council speaker’s decision to support a ban on carriage horses in Central Park. We’ll also get details on President Trump’s $5.6 million payment to the writer E. Jean Carroll, the conclusion of the sexual abuse and defamation trial that he lost in 2023.
First, a timeline of false starts on a perennial issue in New York City — and in the volatile cauldron of New York City politics:
And that’s only a quick sampling. Now the City Council speaker, Julie Menin, is supporting the latest bill to ban horse-drawn carriages in Central Park. It would make the park, the domain of horses and carriages since the days when Currier and Ives were hand-tinting their lithographs, off limits to them by June 2028. As my colleagues Sally Goldenberg and Ed Shanahan note, that would point animal rights advocates toward a victory that had long seemed elusive, if not impossible. The bill, like similar measures before it, faces opposition from Transport Workers Union Local 100, which represents carriage owners and drivers. Menin made her position known in time for a hearing today before the Council’s Health Committee. The bill already has 21 sponsors, not counting Menin. It will need another five Council members to pass, assuming the committee sends it along for a full vote. But Menin’s imprimatur gives it a big push. It also raises a question: Is a changing city ready to let a tradition go? Menin said she had concluded that it was time after the death last month of Romanch Mahajan, an 18-year-old carriage passenger who was visiting from India. The carriage had stopped and the driver had stepped out to take a photograph of Mahajan’s family when the horse bolted. Mahajan’s mother tumbled out, and when he leaped from the carriage to help her, he fell and hit his head. Mayor Zohran Mamdani has said he that favors a ban and is looking to work with all interested parties “to deliver a just transition that protects workers.” He said on Tuesday that he supports “the spirit of the bill” but was critical of what he sees as its “insufficiencies of the worker protections” for drivers and stable employees. The Central Park Conservancy, the nonprofit that manages the park, called for a ban last year, the first time it had tackled the issue. It commissioned a poll last month, after Mahajan’s death, and found significant support among New Yorkers: Nearly 70 percent of those surveyed favored legislation to prohibit carriage operations in the city, while 20 percent opposed it. Zenith Research, the conservancy’s polling firm, broke the respondents into demographic subgroups. Some examples: 72 percent of respondents who visit Central Park at least a few times a year supported doing away with horse-drawn carriages there. So did 72 percent of what they survey classified as “younger adults,” respondents between 18 and 44. And 69 percent of union households supported a ban. But Local 100 is resolute. Alexander Kemp, a Local 100 official, said in a letter to the Council that a ban would be “the wrong move.” Acknowledging the tragedy of Mahajan’s death, Kemp noted that it was the first fatality in the industry’s 167-year history. Kemp wrote that oversight, not a ban, was the answer. He said the city should send inspectors to the park to see whether carriage drivers are keeping their horses from breaking away. He also said the city should install hitching posts and other infrastructure for tethering horses when they are idle. “We aren’t running from government scrutiny,” he wrote. “We welcome it.” WEATHER Expect hazy sunshine today as patchy smoke from Canadian wildfires drifts our way. The high will be near 99; a heat advisory remains in effect. Tonight will be mostly cloudy, with a chance of showers and thunderstorms and a low around 78. A heat advisory is in effect. ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING In effect until July 23 (Tisha B’Av). QUOTE OF THE DAY “The businesses that build technology capable of changing civilization with A.I. are also capable of working with us to protect our power grid, to protect our water supplies and our communities.” — Gov. Kathy Hochul, who is signing an executive order placing a one-year hold on the construction of so-called hyperscale data centers. The latest New York news
We hope you’ve enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times. Trump pays E. Jean Carroll $5.6 million
President Trump has paid the writer E. Jean Carroll the $5.6 million he owed her, three years after a federal jury in Manhattan found that he was liable for sexually abusing and defaming her. Trump had appealed the verdict, but last month the Supreme Court let it stand. That prompted Judge Lewis Kaplan, who had overseen the case, to order that she be paid promptly. The money was paid last week, according to a note added on Tuesday to the online record of the case. Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, confirmed that Carroll had received the payment. Aaron Harison, a spokesman for the legal team representing Trump in the matter, said in a statement that “the American people stand with President Trump as they demand an immediate end to all of the witch hunts, including the Democrat-funded travesty of the Carroll hoaxes.” The judgment against the president stemmed from a lawsuit filed in federal court in Manhattan in which Carroll accused the president of sexual abuse and of defaming her by calling the accusation “a Hoax and a lie” on social media. The jury unanimously awarded her $5 million, which with interest had grown to to $5.625 million as of last week. METROPOLITAN DIARY Tasty burgers
Dear Diary: The first rule of the Bed-Stuy Racquetball Club is: You do not stop talking about the Bed-Stuy Racquetball Club. Three years ago, my friend David asked if I wanted to try racquetball. I pictured a cramped, noisy gym, and men flailing at a tiny ball. But he explained this was classic Brooklyn handball (with rackets), played outdoors in Herbert Von King Park, two blocks from my house. A few days later, at 8 a.m., we met five other guys on a freezing, cracked concrete court in front of a chipped concrete backboard. Some were sweeping away shattered glass, leaves and garbage, speaking in a rapid-fire banter I didn’t understand. I remember asking: “Why does he keep saying ‘tasty burger’?” (A great serve.) The group formed during the pandemic, when Richard, a painter from Boston, and Jonah, a whiskey writer from upstate, started playing for exercise and just to hang out. Ambrus, a Hungarian artist and bodybuilder working out with his crew beside the court, introduced himself, picked up his first racket and quickly became the best player. Vadim, a Lithuanian American filmmaker from Flatbush who was walking in the park, asked what the game was, and instantly had the best serve. Jonah recruited his next-door neighbor Josh, an Australian event planner. David, a perfumer from Massachusetts, had been hitting with his son on the adjacent backboard. He joined, and then asked me. Others came and went. Now we play three or four times a week — in rain, snow, even after dark by the light of our phones. We come for the exercise, the hang, the rhythm of the park, and the jokes. Recently, a 79-year-old man stopped to say he hadn’t played in decades and wanted in. Of course! The more the merrier. — Hamilton Leithauser Mr. Leithauser is a musician. His most recent album is “This Side of the Island.” Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Tell us your New York story here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.
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