The expected new home of Major League Baseball's television network is being chopped down in size because of financial concerns. Vornado Realty Trust is having trouble securing the financing to erect a high-rise tower on 125th St. and Park Ave., and is currently renegotiating with MLB about its lease. The tower may only rise 14 stories, down from 21 stories--apparently lack of interest from other potential tenants is also hamstringing the initial architectural plans. It's......

Tired of wasting their talents on such frivolities as Wii tennis tournaments and water gun wars, equities lawyer Franz Aliquo and Thrillist editor Steve Bryant have gotten serious with an ambitious “Rental Car Rally,” which will pit 60 teams of drivers in a road race from New York City to Montreal this August. Because with gas costing over $4.50 a gallon and global warming leaving civilization almost certainly doomed, what could be more amusing than......

Hometown post-punk heroes Sonic Youth played a free show for approximately 7,000 fans in Battery Park on July 4th as part of the River to River Festival. The decades-old band started the set with a spellbinding, spacey rendition of “She is Not Alone,” followed by the Kim Gordon-led classic “Bull in the Heather.” By the third song, a blistering “Silver Rocket,” 50-year-old frontman Thurston Moore seemed to have had enough of the photographers separating his......

It’s almost that time of year when the NYC Fringe Festival dominates the theater scene with hundreds of new shows of wildly varying quality. But before the Fringe sucks the air out of the room in August, it’s worth noting that July is packed with a number of smaller, more manageable and generally more-reliable theater festivals. For starters: The Summer Play Festival: Now in its fifth season, this festival of new plays is being hosted......

While the Unfancy Food Show held its humble affair in Williamsburg this past Sunday, the Fancy Food Show (yes, actual names) has been holding court this week with its annual massive event over at the Jacob Javits Center. Over 6,000 vendors from around the world will give out close to 200,000 samples in what is North America's largest specialty food event. Out of that cast of thousands, the weirdest specimen we spotted was Jelly Belly's......

“You could be a transgendered elephant walking in here and as long as you pay your check, you’re fine,” diner Lars Hoel told the Times yesterday during his last breakfast at Florent, the 24-hour French bistro that’s been a Meatpacking District institution for 23 years. The transgendered elephant refuge closed last night after the gay pride parade and a private party for staff and friends of owner Florent Morellet....

One upside to yesterday's torrential downpour: A few people captured photographs of rainbows around the city. Here's hoping anyone caught after today's rains see rainbows, too.......

Mayor Bloomberg and other city officials joined artist Olafur Eliasson and Susan K. Freedman of the Public Art Fund at a press conference this morning at the South Street Seaport, where all four of Eliasson's waterfalls can be seen at once. An aide to the mayor noted that there was more press attending this event than when he announced he was switching his party to become independent. The mayor estimated that the waterfalls, which will......

Here we go again with another Restaurant Week, which actually occurs over two weeks (minus weekends): July 21st through the 25th and July 28th through August 1st. Over 200 restaurants around Manhattan – many of them fancy places like Bar Boulud and Anthos – will be offering prix-fixe lunch specials for $24.07 and prix-fixe dinners for $35.00. Food snobs will tell you you’re a chump for signing up for this because chefs just dump their......

Chef Marco Canora is having a good morning; Times restaurant critic Frank Bruni says “there may not be any dish I’ve enjoyed more in recent months than the pork blade steak” at Terroir (pictured). His column this week looks at how chefs at wine bars like Terroir and Gottino have transcended the “glorified snacks” that used to be de rigueur, to “exemplify a wine-bar evolution so thorough that nomenclature can’t keep up.” Less criticism than......

And then there were four. A tipster just sent us this shot of Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson's Brooklyn Bridge waterfall, being tested this afternoon. This completes the teaser set for all the NYC Waterfall aficionados out there. Also seen below are the Governors Island test, the Pier 35 test in Manhattan, and the other Brooklyn waterfall between Piers 4 and 5. The NYC Waterfalls – which are not being paid for with city money, but......

Delayed spoiler alert: The photo here from Curbed reveals what Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson’s waterfall looks like on Governor’s Island. One of four on the East River, it’s not supposed to be “officially” turned on until next Thursday. Oh well, now we know. For those keeping score, we've now seen the Manhattan-side Pier 35 waterfall test, and yesterday's test of the Brooklyn waterfall between Piers 4 and 5. That leaves just the waterfall under the......

After Health Department's announcement that one in four New Yorkers has genital herpes (compared with the national average of one in five Americans), condom maker Trojan is distributing condoms in all five boroughs today. Per the press release titled, "TROJAN GIVES OUT THOUSANDS OF FREE CONDOMS TO STOP BLISTERING NEW YORK 'HEAT' OF ANOTHER KIND," here are the locations and times of where and when you can get free condoms: Friday, June 13: 7:00 AM......

Delayed spoiler alert: This photo reveals what the upcoming East River waterfalls will most likely look like. Although artist Olafur Eliasson’s ambitious art project doesn't officially start until June 26th, apparently they do need practice turning the spigot. One eagle-eyed Curbed reader caught them in the act late last night and snapped this photo, which depicts the waterfall at Pier 35 by the Manhattan Bridge. Now some may be inclined to look at the photo......

The NY Yankees has reportedly asked city for $350 million more in public financing for its new stadium. The $1.3 billion project is currently under construction, and the urgency for additional funds in the form of tax-free bonds ranges from Assemblyman Richard Brodsky saying "the Yankees said they couldn't complete the Stadium without additional financing" to the NYC Economic Development Corporation president saying the Yankees are just making "informal inquiries." An NYC EDC spokesperson......

Today the Times’s Frank Bruni destroys Ago (pictured), the new Italian restaurant in Tribeca’s Greenwich Hotel owned by Robert De Niro. It’s a savage burn, and way more entertaining than any movie De Niro’s been involved with during the last decade. Things go sideways immediately when the bartender unleashes “the Poseidon Adventure of wine spills” on Bruni’s lady friend and his party of four has to wait almost an hour for their table, which is......

After the NY Times reported that Mayor Bloomberg had commissioned a poll which included questions about how voters felt about term limits, Bloomberg admitted he's interested in public service. At City Hall, during a news conference, he said, "I plan to, I think, stay on in public service in some ways or other — I don’t know how. The Times noted he seemed reflective, stopping himself at one point and "looking off in the distance."......

According to its press release, the mood and décor at Yerba Buena, which opens tonight, “takes its inspiration from old-time Havana.” There’s nothing over-the-top about it; the place thankfully does not look like a movie set. A small, bright white neon sign is planted in the restaurant’s window, and the room is breezy and dark. Diners can check in on the kitchen, which is separated from the dining room with a large glass window. Yerba......

traffickin', by jonfeinstein at flickr The common rule of thumb is that there are eight or nine rats for every human being in New York City, which means a scurrying verminous population of 64-72 million lurking in walls, below streets, in trash cans, and sometimes in plain sight. Being a rat catcher or, better yet, a rat exterminator is a profession that will never end, and the NY Times spoke to some exterminators about......

Photoby Raymond Haddad at flickr Figuring that the best legal defense is to be offensive, ConEd is suing NYC for the 2007 midtown Manhattan steam pipe explosion that killed one woman and horribly burned two other people. Dozens more were injured in the blast that made 41st and Lexington Ave. look like an erupting volcano, as a plume of steam shot high into the air. ConEd is on the receiving end of dozens of......

A gang of five trailed a pair of off-duty cops in Washington Heights around midnight last night and jumped them in an attempted robbery that did not go well. Things went sideways for the assailants almost immediately when one of them initiated the attack by picking up a wooden folding chair from the trash and hitting one of the officers on the back of the head with it. The approach has been known to work......

View Larger Map It may almost be midnight, but some people are smelling eau de breakfast--there's a whiff of maple syrup in the air! We just received three smellings: "I think I've been getting that nasty maple syrup smell up here at 137th & b'way for the last couple of hours. Thought it was my neighbor spraying for bugs for a while, then I went outside to dump the garbage and still smelled it outside.......

When we first noted this incoming Brazilian restaurant/bar back at the beginning of January, we incorrectly referred to it as Favela. Turns out it's Miss Favela to you (and us); the South Williamsburg "Brazilian Botequim" is currently in soft opening mode. Co-owner Alain Denneulin (of Soho's French Bistro Felix) tells us they're shooting for an official opening June 2nd. And once Miss Favela is in full swing, they'll be serving lunch and dinner until midnight......

Mayor Bloomberg and the rest of New York City will have to wait for the director's cut to see him in the new Sex and the City movie. CityRoom noticed that he's been griping (jokingly, not red-faced-ly) about being left in the cold. While giving a commencement speech at the University of Pennsylvania, Bloomberg discussed all the hype for him to enter the presidential race:I have to admit: All the buzz was very exciting —......

A 55-year-old man fell onto the subway tracks at Delancey Street yesterday just as the F train was pulling into the station – and survived by lying down in the disgusting shallow trough between the rails. The unidentified man became suddenly ill and fell onto the tracks at 1:34 p.m, but this time there was no hero to jump in and pull him out. The motorman on the incoming train hit the emergency brakes when......

Today the Times’s Frank Bruni reviews The Harrison (pictured) in Tribeca; the paper gave it two stars in 2001 and Bruni maintains status quo with two stars today. There’s a different chef in the kitchen, Amanda Freitag, and Bruni digs the restaurant’s “populist bent, its awareness that breaded or fried objects are a sure path to many a diner’s heart.” But don’t get him started on the ambiance: “The Harrison’s visual evocation of a country......

Yesterday, the city was filled with parades and events paying tribute to the members of military who have given their lives or continue to fight on our behalf. At a wreath laying ceremony at the Soliders' and Sailors' Monument in Riverside Park, Mayor Bloomberg said, "These brave soldiers and so many others will be lovingly remembered and deeply missed by family and friends. Today their losses echo throughout our entire city." There were protesters present......

Just in time for summer, the Times has brought the fear to the park, where an army of infectious organisms await anyone reckless enough to let the grass touch their bare feet. According to a number of very uptight dermatologists, taking off your shoes in the park is pretty much akin to soaking them in a bucket of bacteria. Dermatologist Judith Hellman gave the paper ten good reasons why Richard Gere should have used a......

Photograph of old Yankee Stadium and new Yankee Stadium (taken in June 2007) by Urch on Flickr While many people are excited about the opening of the new Yankee Stadium, many residents who live near the stadium have been unhappy about the delays in replacing the park land used for the new venue. According to the NY Times, costs to reate eight smaller parks have escalated to almost twice the $95 million budget to......

The NY Times treats us to a trend piece, sounding off the alarms of a newsflash: ambitious young people subsist on low incomes in NYC! Some choice quotes are sprinkled throughout:“For a little while I only ate grapefruits for my lunch because they have a lot of nutrients and they got me through the day.”“If I shop, I can’t have a social life and I can’t eat.”Before moving from San Francisco last fall, Ms. Werkheiser......