US News

BIG APPLE OF MIKE’S EYE

All New Yorkers will live within 10 minutes of a park:

* Added 300 acres of new parks and wants to create 2,000 more

* Planting 1 million trees around city by 2017

* Creating 800 more green triangles at street inter-sections; 80 a year for 10 years

* Reclaiming 7,600 acres of toxic brownfields citywide; $15 million budgeted for cleanup

* Rehabilitating 290 schoolyards

* Turning the closed Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island into a 2,200-acre park

* Opening 90 percent of city’s canals and waterways for recreation

* Developing Governors Island into a 90-acre park

NYC will have the cleanest air of any large US city:

* Waived city’s sales tax on hybrid and fuel-efficient vehicles

* Added 1,700 hybrids to city fleet in five years; will add six hydrogen vehicles in 2008

* Creating two $820,000 hydrogen gas stations

* Retrofitting 800 diesel city trucks for biodiesel fuel; plans to retrofit all buses, ferries

* Working with the Port Authority to bring clean technology to airports, marine vessels and ports

* Targeting 100 city schools with boilers that burn oil

Reduce global warming:

* Wants drivers entering Manhattan during peak hours to pay a fee

* Creating an 1,800-mile network of bicycle routes; 400 miles already in place

* Distributed 5,000 free NYC biking helmets last year

* Installed 700 bicycle racks citywide; 200 more expected

* Two rapid bus lanes installed; plans to build hundreds more

* Wants greenhouse-gas emissions cut by 30 percent by 2017; pledged $80 million for energy upgrades in city-owned buildings

* Planning an anti-idling test project for for-hire vehicles

Wants New Yorkers healthier:

* Approved citywide ban on trans fats in restaurants

* Extended city law prohibiting smoking in bars

* Enrolled 1,400 low-income families in privately funded pilot project that pays them for good behavior

* Distributed 3 million free NYC condoms monthly

* Put $600,000 toward counseling teens and young women about STDs, HIV and pregnancy prevention, including the Plan B pill, in 2007

* Issuing 1,500 new permits for fruit and vegetable carts in low-income neighborhoods

* Gave $2 million to city-run hospitals to encourage moms to breast-feed

Wants a growing New York:

* Backed Atlantic Yards in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, with at least $205 million in city subsidies

* Rezoning Coney Island into a park with 4,500 low- and middle-income apartments and some commercial use

* Developing the West Side rail yards as mixed-use residential and commercial area

* Rezoning Harlem’s 125th St. for high-rise and commercial development

* Backing Columbia University’s expansion in West Harlem

* Invested $110 million in the Hunts Point Fish and Produce Markets

* Gave $135 million for a new Yankee stadium

* Gave $160 million for a new Met stadium

* Supported the creation of the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. to oversee construction at Ground Zero

* Announced plan for 5,500 units of mixed-income housing, office space, a hotel, a park and a bridge at Willets Point, Queens

ants more housing for poor and middle class:

* Announced a 10-year plan to create or preserve 165,000 units of affordable housing at a cost of $7.5 billion; has financed 39 percent, or 64,408 units, to date

* Changed the 421A tax credit law to spur developers to build more low-income housing

* Rezoned Downtown Brooklyn in 2004 for more residential and commercial development

* Rezoned Williamsburg and Greenpoint in 2004, allowing for high-rise development along the waterfront

Wants to revolutionize NYC’s public school system:

* Tied teacher bonuses to increased student achievement through a performance pay program at 205 schools

* Redirected $350 million from administration costs to schools since 2002

* Created 3,700 new classroom seats in 2007

* Increased number of 10th- and 11th-graders taking the PSAT by 200 percent over last three years