2,000 kids may have no school bus Thursday. Carnival ends early.. New York Explained for September 7, 2026.

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September 7, 2026
The Front Page
New York City Public Schools has not lined up enough bus companies for the Sept. 10 first day, and roughly 2,000 students, most of them children with disabilities, may start the year without a route [24].
The NYPD will end Monday's Carnival parade on Eastern Parkway at 5:30 p.m., a half-hour earlier than past years, with screening at every viewing area, after shootings near the route's tail end in recent years [29].
A man was slashed in the face and abdomen near Seventh Avenue and West 50th Street on Saturday night, the third knife attack in Times Square in under a week, following last week's fatal stabbing of Bank of America vice president Erin Piacenti [11].
City Hall released its first racial equity plan, a 400-page document setting more than 200 goals across 45 agencies in housing, schools, jobs and transit, with the next progress report two years out [4].
Three rent-stabilized buildings on Eastern Parkway and Sterling Place in Crown Heights, carrying 991 open housing code violations between them, sold for $7.6 million at auction, clearing the way for a city-backed rehab of all 88 apartments [20].
This Morning in New York

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Running well, some planned work
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1Planned Work

In Upper Manhattan, no [1] between 137 St-City College and 168 St-Washington Hts

4Planned Work

No [4] between 149 St-Hostos and 125 St

7Planned Work

In Queens, Flushing-bound [7] skips 52 St and 69 St All trains at Woodside-61 St board from the Manhattan-bound platform

APlanned Work

In Queens, no [A] between Rockaway Blvd and Ozone Park-Lefferts Blvd Lefferts Blvd [A] trains are rerouted to Rockaway Park-Beach 116 St

DPlanned Work

In the Bronx and Upper Manhattan, downtown [D] skips 167 St, 161 St-Yankee Stadium and 155 St All trains board from the uptown platform at 145 St

FPlanned Work

In Brooklyn, Coney Island-bound [F] runs express from Smith-9 Sts to Kings Hwy

GPlanned Work

In Brooklyn, Church Av-bound [G] skips 4 Av-9 St, 15 St-Prospect Park and Fort Hamilton Pkwy

This Week

Free things to do
The school bus routes that don't exist yetPhoto: gothamist

The school bus routes that don't exist yet

School starts Thursday and the city cannot promise your kid a bus; the fallback is a prepaid car and a phone call from the principal.

EducationCitywide1 newsroomRead the story →
Carnival returns to Eastern Parkway on a shorter clockPhoto: abc7ny

Carnival returns to Eastern Parkway on a shorter clock

Culture, Food & NightlifeBrooklyn1 newsroom
 The housing court fast track lands, and landlords want their own laneAbhishek Navlakha (via Pexels)

The housing court fast track lands, and landlords want their own lane

Politics & GovernmentCitywide1 newsroom
Story: the day’s big ones, in their own words and numbers

The school bus routes that don't exist yet

School starts Thursday and the city cannot promise your kid a bus; the fallback is a prepaid car and a phone call from the principal.

The school bus routes that don't exist yet
Photo: gothamist

The Office of Pupil Transportation told principals last month it had not secured enough bus vendors for the coming year, in a letter Advocates for Children shared with Gothamist [24]. Education officials told the group that about 2,000 students, most or all of them children with disabilities, may have no vendor on the first day, and the department says it will cover them with prepaid rideshares until routes exist [24]. A bus route written into an IEP is a legally required related service, not a convenience, which is why the fallback is a car and not a MetroCard (NYC Public Schools). The letter did not say how long the gap lasts [24].

“We are deeply concerned about the thousands of students with disabilities at risk of not having bus service for the start of the school year.”
Randi Levine, policy director, Advocates for Children of New York · [24]
“we are working quickly to route every student as quickly as possible”
Dominique Ellison, education department spokesperson, who says a vast majority of students will be routed by the first day · [24]
By the numbers
  • 2,000students education officials say may lack a bus vendor on Sept. 10 [24]
  • 150,000students the yellow bus system carries, the vast majority of them children with disabilities headed to specialized programs [24]
WatchSept. 10, the first day: families still without a route are supposed to hear directly from their school [24].
FromGothamist

Carnival returns to Eastern Parkway on a shorter clock

The city's biggest street party keeps its route and loses its last half hour.

Carnival returns to Eastern Parkway on a shorter clock
Photo: abc7ny

The New York Carnival Parade steps off at 11 a.m. Monday on Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights and ends at 5:30 p.m., a half-hour earlier than in past years, with everyone entering a viewing area subject to security screening [29]. J'Ouvert, the pre-dawn celebration, begins at 6 a.m., though spectators start gathering around 2 a.m. [29]. Barricades went up over the weekend, after Junior Carnival near Eastern Parkway on Saturday and Youth Fest at the Brooklyn Museum [29]. Carnival has been on Eastern Parkway since 1969, when Trinidadian organizer Carlos Lezama secured the permit that moved it to Brooklyn, five years after the city revoked Harlem's Carnival street permit (Caribbean Life).

“We have seen shootings on and around the parade route endangering innocent people and overshadowing this incredible tradition.”
Jessica Tisch, NYPD commissioner · [29]
“I want to be very clear, this year there will be zero tolerance for violence of any kind.”
Jessica Tisch, NYPD commissioner · [29]
WatchWhether the earlier finish sticks for next year once the department reviews how Monday's crowd moved [29].
Fromabc7NY RSS Feed

The housing court fast track lands, and landlords want their own lane

Tenants with no heat get a judge in five days. Owners chasing rent still wait fifty.

The housing court fast track lands, and landlords want their own lane
Abhishek Navlakha (via Pexels)

City Hall's Housing Court Fast Track puts the repair cases the city files against building owners, the ones involving vacate orders and hazardous conditions, on a calendar with an appearance within five days of filing [2]. An HP action is the case type a tenant or the city brings to force a landlord to make repairs; it is a small slice of the docket, and the Post reports landlord-side unpaid-rent cases are nearly 80% of all housing court proceedings in the five boroughs [2]. Landlord lawyers say the directive speeds one side of a two-sided backlog, which Riegel traces to the pandemic eviction moratorium, when average waits stretched from about six months to 15 or more [2].

“This fast-track will accelerate the cases that are both the most egregious and the most complex”
Zohran Mamdani, mayor · [2]
“you've got an HOV lane for the tenants”
Deborah Riegel, landlord lawyer at Rosenberg & Estis · [2]
“Safety always comes first: the Unified Court System's fast track applies to buildings with immediately hazardous conditions.”
spokesperson, Department of Housing Preservation and Development · [2]
By the numbers
  • 10,000 to 15,000HP repair cases filed yearly, with a current 10- to 20-day wait for an appearance [2]
  • 120,000unpaid-rent cases landlords file yearly, waiting up to 50 days for a first appearance [2]
The thread
  1. Jul 2026Civil Court Administrative Judge Shahabuddeen Ally directs that tenants suing over building-wide emergencies get a judge the day they file, with landlords given five days to answer instead of weeks.
  2. TodayLandlord groups say the fast track ignores the rent side of the same docket [2].
WatchWhether the Unified Court System extends any piece of the fast track to the rent cases [2].
FromBreaking NYC News & Local Headlines | New York Post

Around the Boroughs

  • Queens (Jamaica): A 14-year-old was shot in the leg near 153rd Street and Jamaica Avenue, steps from the Rufus King Park playground; the gunman fled on foot and no arrests have been made [6].
  • Manhattan (Washington Heights): A 27-year-old woman was found beaten to death on West 156th Street near Amsterdam Avenue, a 5-year-old unharmed beside her; police are treating it as domestic and the suspect is at large [7][14].
  • Brooklyn (Flatbush): A 58-year-old man was killed when he stepped off the curb near Nostrand Avenue and Clarendon Road and was run over by the rear wheels of a departing B44 bus; the driver did not know she had hit him [9][12].
  • Brooklyn (East Flatbush): Dancehall artist Michael Davey's 25-year-old son Christopher was fatally stabbed on Albany Avenue around the corner from home; police are looking for two men who left in a black sedan [15].
  • Queens (Whitestone): A 19-year-old is in critical condition after a Camry botched a lane merge on the Cross Island Parkway near 154th Street and overturned, throwing two passengers onto the pavement [13].
  • Manhattan (Harlem): Beyonce gave $2 million to the Studio Museum in Harlem on her 45th birthday [30].
  • Statewide: A Siena poll found 29% of likely New York voters view AI favorably against 52% unfavorable, and both parties are building fall campaigns around data centers [1].
  • Brooklyn (Midwood): New renderings show a nine-story, 225-unit building at 1214-1238 East 14th Street with 57 income-restricted homes; it needs a rezoning from M1-1 and R5 to R7A before anyone digs [18].
  • Brooklyn (East New York): Permits were filed for a seven-story, 26-unit mixed-use building at 439 Liberty Avenue, near the C train's Liberty Avenue stop [21].
  • Citywide: English teachers across the state say novels have largely vanished from class in favor of test-shaped excerpts, with one Queens teacher saying her school's program leaves "literally no time" for a book [23].
  • Long Island (Northern State Parkway): A wrong-way driver killed one person in a head-on crash Sunday morning, shutting the westbound roadway until 10:15 a.m. on Labor Day weekend [8].
  • Upstate (Kingston): The Parkline, a 71-apartment nonprofit building at 25 Field Court for households earning 30 to 80 percent of AMI, is planned with a ground-floor grocery whose rent the developers say they will underwrite [19].
  • Queens (Flushing Meadows): The US Open has already set a record with three post-2 a.m. finishes in its first six days, and Venus Williams started her first-round match at 12:13 a.m., the latest start in tournament history [43].
  • Citywide: The Mets took the series from the Giants on Brett Baty's pinch-hit homer and Bo Bichette's three-run shot in the eighth, while the Yankees lost in San Diego after Gerrit Cole gave up home runs to the first three batters he faced [31][45].
  • Buffalo: Hundreds of decorated boats filled the Buffalo River for the fifth annual Bills Mafia Boat Parade, with proceeds going to the Firefighter Arno Memorial Fund [53].

Worth Doing

  • "IX XI," free: Sean Wilsey's 9/11 documentary screens in the Glade at Little Island on Sept. 8 at 8 p.m., then at Ellie Rines Gallery in Tribeca on Sept. 10, 11 and 12 at 6 p.m., and all day Sept. 11 at Labor Skateshop on Canal Street [26].
  • "Chicago" on Broadway: Reece Weaver makes her Broadway debut as Roxie Hart at the Ambassador Theatre starting Sept. 7 and running through Oct. 18, alongside NaTasha Yvette Williams as Matron "Mama" Morton [27].
  • The new Kenan Civic Arena: The just-opened arena at 433 Locust St. in Lockport runs 340 days a year on the Kenan Center's 25-acre campus, which also holds the 150-seat Taylor Theater and an art gallery in the Kenan House [22].
  • Good to know: An ice cream truck may play its jingle while moving, but not while parked, standing or stopped; a 311 complaint brings a DEP inspector, and a first violation costs the vendor $350 [5].

Only in New York

On Sunday morning nearly 200 people, firefighters, families of the dead, and rookies who were toddlers in 2001, pushed off from Boston on bicycles for a 343-mile ride to Ground Zero, one mile for each FDNY member killed on Sept. 11. They arrive Thursday. The ride is run by Friends of Firefighters, the nonprofit that gives the FDNY free mental-health counseling, and has raised $750,000 so far, half of it for counseling sessions that more than doubled to 5,000 last year. "Riding bikes for five days isn't too hard compared to what these guys went through," said Dan Reeves of Engine 80 in Harlem, who joined the department in 2022. [10]