Sunset Park members paint mural to honor neighborhood’s history
A group of Sunset Park residents helped paint a new mural on the Citibank building on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 54th Street during a block party on Saturday. “... We have a rich tradition of bringing neighbors together across different backgrounds, languages and cultures,” said Katie Walsh, 54th Street resident and mural co-organizer. “My family has had the opportunity to participate in over forty decades of mural making on this wall,” she continued, “from the first one painted in the 1970s.” Photo: Katherine Walsh
TGIF in NYC, where the hardest part of running a marathon is getting to the starting line.
It was once considered a folly bordering on insanity to attempt to climb Mount Everest, and only a few people in the world ever dared to attempt it. Now, there are so many willing climbers that the government of Nepal had to raise their permitting costs to $15,000, ban solo climbs and is pushing to grant access only to climbers who have demonstrated a mandatory minimum experience level. Otherwise, the mountain gets dangerously overcrowded.
A similar kind of endurance-inflation is happening with the New York City marathon. Once a relatively specialized event with only a few hundred participants, there are now so many applicants to run in the world-famous race that the New York Road Runners, which organizes the event, has had to devise increasingly elaborate ways to ration entry.
The first intervention came in 2000, when New York Road Runners created a program called 9+1 to help manage demand and reward dedicated local runners. The program requires participants to compete in nine local races and volunteer at one, completion of which guarantees access to the Marathon.
Since its inception, demand to compete in the 9+1 program has skyrocketed. Aspiring marathoners swarm the registration as soon as it opens every year, crowding out more casual runners and creating a mad dash for spots.
So New York Road Runners have had to limit access to the program designed to limit access to the Marathon. Starting this year, the organization announced, there will be a cap on how many runners can participate in 9+1, to be decided by a lottery. Approximately 15,000 lucky winners will earn the privilege of paying $99 to participate in the 10 races, which earns them a chance to run the 26.3 iconic miles of the New York City Marathon.
“This was the solution that we thought was most equitable, that was most manageable and that continued to keep the tradition of 9+1, which is a great tradition, alive,” Rob Simmelkjaer, the chief executive of New York Road Runners, told The New York Times.
Brooklyn-based theater company Molière in the Park returns to Prospect Park’s LeFrak Center in September with a production of “Don Juan.”
Assembly District 57 offers a series on community organizing.
Hochul announces $9M to beef up water system cyberattack defenses.
Property owners within CB2 have until Sept. 7 to team up with neighbors and apply for a pilot program allowing groups to share on-street Empire Bins.
Alloy Development announced two new businesses joining Alloy Block (at Flatbush Avenue at State Street) in Downtown Brooklyn: MUJI and Winner.
NYCDepartment of Finance failed to reimburse more than $460K due to owners of seized vehicles that were auctioned off.
NYCHA tenants sue to block covert NYPD surveillance operation.
An off-duty youth development specialist with NYC’s ACS was arrested and charged with assault, menacing and criminal possession of a weapon.
NYC ramps up West Nile virus efforts as the number of infected mosquitoes jumps.
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Photo: Aurelien Morissard/AP
PARIS — High divers into the Seine juxtaposed against the famous Eiffel Tower: Germany's Iris Corinna Schmidbauer competes during round 1 of the Women's 20m Platform as the Eiffel Tower is seen in the background at the European Aquatics Championships in Paris, Friday, Aug. 7, 2026.
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Tech on Deck: The male loneliness economy
Male loneliness triptych. Image generated using Nano Banana
Consider the modern male bedroom. On the desk: a laptop open to an OnlyFans page. On the nightstand: a Bluetooth-connected sex toy synced to a creator’s live feed. On the phone: an AI companion named Mia who remembers everything about him and never, ever loses interest.
He is paying for all three. He is utterly alone.
This is the Male Loneliness Economy: a multi-hundred-billion-dollar industrial complex that has become one of the most profitable sectors in tech. It doesn’t sell sex, exactly. It sells something more valuable and more vulnerable: the feeling of being wanted.
Nearly half of American adults report measurable loneliness, but the crisis is especially acute among young men.
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Cartoon Sketchbook
By Emad Hajjaj
For the Road
Happy Birthday Reason editor-at-large Nick Gillespie, who was born in Brooklyn!
On this day in 1947, the Eagle reported, “Mrs. Caroline Coates, widow of James Coates and one of the oldest residents of Brooklyn, died yesterday in her home. She would have been 96 on Sept. 1. Born in a suburb of London, England, Mrs. Coates was brought to this country at the age of 2 and lived in Brooklyn for about 70 years …”
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