I’m here in the Millenium Hilton directly across from the World Trade Center site. I went out about 9:30 pm and there were more than 50 police cars parked alongside the road. Some had flashers on. Police were walking around and standing around. I walked through the area to see what was up; eventually it seemed that they were staging for something else. After about 30 minutes they peeled off in heats of 5 to 20, every few minutes, with lights flashing, and sires whooping. They went in the same direction, but then turned off different side streets.

Why? What was this about? There was one TV crew there; I’ll see if anything is on the news about this.

Update: the waiter in the restaurant says that the police do this every morning, staging before their morning assignments. Maybe this was the evening version? Seems awfully dramatic.

These two signs were on adjacent buildings, mere feet apart and somehow the combination amused me; both seemed to have too many words and create a level of officialdom and importance that seemed out of scale for the idea itself, let alone the physical unimposingness of the locations.

Looks like I’ll be back in NYC later this week. My second trip in 2 (or 3?) weeks – sometimes it’s years between opportunities to visit New York, now my cup runneth over. I’m pretty excited!

The New York Times reports on a grassroots taxi redesign effort: A nonprofit group called the Design Trust for Public Space plans to ‘define the ideal taxi and taxi system of the future.’ At a workshop on May 24, designers, architects, city officials and representatives of taxi owners and drivers sketched out an array of ideas. Matthew W. Daus, the chairman of the Taxi and Limousine Commission, has given cautious support to the effort. “This is a good exercise to get the perspectives of consumers and passengers, and also of architects and designers who are not involved in the day-to-day business of cabs.”

Yet the perspective of consumers and passengers is not included in the process! This seems like a fantastic opportunity to try to understand the needs of the users of the system from another point of view, rather than as users of the system who presumably arrive at these workshops already ready to solve the problems they’ve defined. Let’s take a step back and try to understand what isn’t working for someone else. Ethnographic study of the cab-riding experience, anyone?

The worst kind, isn’t it?

Gorgeous new bakery on 9th ave in Manhattan, with an example of what I guess is a food trend – the Fwinkie, as they call it, an example of what a Twinkie would be if it was made by a baker and not a processed synthetic food shmechhghh company. They had regular, and chocolate (dipped in chocolate) – which is what this is. It was pretty good. Not freak-out good, but pretty good. Looked better than it tasted, I’d say.

Haven’t we had 1-hour photo service for a very very long time? How is this a useful name? Or a useful offering? Now, slower than ever!

I’m off to New Jersey/New York this week. I’ll be doing some meetings in NJ to kick off an exciting new project, and then hanging for a couple of days in NYC (staying at the W Hotel) to see some friends. It’s been nearly a year since I’ve been out there; looking forward to it!