New York City in brief

Manhattan’s median rent scaled a record $5,000 in February, with vacancy barely brushing 2% and listings down 26% year-on-year, according to The Corcoran Group. Critics say Mayor Mamdani’s proposed rent freeze, along with well-meaning state laws like FARE, have squeezed supply further, as owners leave flats idle rather than lose money. Here, even putting up a wall for cheaper rent now costs a small fortune—or at least $5,000.

With American bombers dispatched to Iran at Donald Trump’s behest—Mar-a-Lago, ball cap, and all—we are asked to trust hasty preëmption over just-struck Geneva peace hopes, and to ignore shifting White House claims and tragic tallying in Minab (including a girls’ school). Precision gets more airtime than accuracy, and, as ever, truth seems resigned to a back seat—possibly in Palm Beach.

Fresh data from the Department of Housing and Urban Development suggest that the typical American renter should earn at least three times their rent—over $9,000 monthly in New York—to dodge the dreaded “cost-burdened” label. With many families now spending more than half their income on housing, particularly in cities that never sleep, it appears the rent really is too damn high, at least for now.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul now seeks to delay the state’s aggressive 2019 climate targets, pledging pragmatism over green ambition after finding voters less keen when bills arrive. Hochul wants lawmakers to push major emissions rules off till 2030, change how progress is measured, and hold firm on distant 2050 goals—prompting lawsuits from Earthjustice and barbed remarks from environmentalists. Political weather, it seems, shifts faster than climate.

New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority will replace a remarkable 36% of its ageing subway fleet—some veterans clocking 50 years—with up to 2,390 new carriages, as part of a $68bn capital programme endorsed by Governor Kathy Hochul. First deliveries, set for lines 1, 3, and 6, may arrive by early 2030, promising modern gadgets and “open-gangway” designs—though straphangers may yet prefer punctuality over panoramic corridors.