New York
How Mino Lora, Co-Founder of the People’s Theatre, Spends Her Sundays
As the co-founder and executive artistic director of the People’s Theatre, Mino Lora sets the stage to spotlight the voices of the immigrant communities in Upper Manhattan.
She started the People’s Theatre to serve Washington Heights and Inwood 16 years ago, but her interest in community building and social justice can be traced to her childhood in the Dominican Republic.
“I always thought I would be a teacher, and that’s what I was studying in college,” said Ms. Lora, 44, who was born and raised in the capital city of Santo Domingo. “But after I attended the International Theatre Festival of Santo Domingo 1999, I dropped out of school.”
She received a scholarship to study theater in Purchase, N.Y., at Manhattanville College (which recently changed its name to Manhattanville University). After graduating, she moved to New York City and found her footing as a director. She later co-founded the People’s Theatre with Bob Braswell, her roommate-turned-husband.
“For me, the creative process is the most interesting part,” she said.
In 2026, the theater will get its first permanent home: a $40 million multidisciplinary performing arts center at Miramar, a new mixed-income residential building in Inwood.
“I dreamed of this for 10 years,” Ms. Lora said, adding that she saw the center as a model for similar spaces around the country.
Ms. Lora lives in an apartment in the Spuyten Duyvil neighborhood of the Bronx with Mr. Braswell, 42, who is the theater’s managing director, and their children, Emma Lucia, 11, and Marcos, 8.
FEEDING THE EARLY RISERS I try to sleep in, so I don’t get up until 8:30. But Emma Lucia and Marcos generally are up by 7 and are starving, so we have our first breakfast of the day. I make myself a cup of coffee and then make them eggs and cheese or waffles; they’re frozen. Emma has just gotten old enough to help me.
We have our second breakfast around 10 a.m. at the Johnson, which is the closest diner to our apartment. The kids like it — Marcos, a proud Bronx kid, loves the Bronx-themed décor. They usually get waffles or pancakes. I always eat the same thing: an egg-white Greek omelet with extra crispy home fries in hot sauce, multigrain toast and an oat latte.
DANCING FOR JOY Some Sundays, I run in the gym in our apartment building, but on others, I drive Emma Lucia to Alvin Ailey in Midtown Manhattan for dance class, which starts at noon. I used to drop her off and wait for her, but when I realized there were also classes for adults, I signed up. I had been doing West African dance, but I just started the contemporary class. I’ve always liked to dance and danced a lot when I was in college, but then I got too busy and stopped. I love to keep moving because it’s a way of harnessing my own personal joy.
PIZZA BREAK By 1:30, we’re pretty hungry, so we go to lunch in Midtown. We don’t have any particular place. We always look for new spots. Often, we have pizza — white pieces with broccoli.
THE PLAY’S THE THING When we’re prepping plays for production, I generally skip lunch and have business meetings. Right now, we’re working on “Domino Effect” by Marco Antonio Rodriguez, which takes place during an evening in Washington Heights, where a game of dominoes becomes a bridge between generations, touching on themes of identity, resilience and connection. It runs from April 4 to April 20, so I’m meeting regularly with Rodriguez, the creative producer, Jiawen Hu, and the assistant director, Catalina Beltran.
PUTTING ON MY HARD HAT Afterward, I take the subway up to Inwood to the construction site of the People’s Theatre: Centro Cultural Inmigrante. I generally go there two to three times a month with Allison Robin, principal and co-owner of Envoie Projects, our owners’ reps for the project. Three of the theater’s board members, Cindy Caplan, Zahira Perez and Mel Wuong, who are all immigrant women, join me. The elevator just went in, and the shell will be done in February, and then we’ll get to go in and make it look like a real theater.
TIME FOR CHARADES Then I head home for the night. I love to cook, so I start prepping dinner as well as the meals for the week while my husband cooks pasta for the kids’ lunchboxes. After dinner, we play board games. Our current favorites are Ticket to Ride, the card game Uno and Rummikub. We also play charades, which I have been doing since I was growing up.
Emma Lucia and Marcos are theater kids. They go to public schools, and they’ve both been in class plays. Emma Lucia’s in the People’s Theatre Academy, and she told me she wants to sing and dance on Broadway. I am thrilled that she wants a career in the arts; she’s talented and so joyful when she performs that it makes my heart swell. Marcos, however, has said he wants to be an inventor and recently informed me that theater is merely his hobby.
GETTING THE KIDS SETTLED Around 8 or 8:15, Bob and I start getting the kids ready for bed. We used to read to them, but they are too old for that now, which I find kind of sad. They’re bilingual, so they read books in English and in Spanish. I’m proud of that, even though it makes it harder for them, but it’s important to me and my Dominican culture.
A GLASS OF WINE AND A BOOK BEFORE BED Once the kids are in bed, which is around 8:30 p.m., Bob and I watch TV to wind down. I particularly like “The Great British Baking Show” on Netflix. Then I read in bed.
Right now, I have several library books, including “A Caribbean Heiress in Paris” by Adriana Herrera, which I’m reading in English, and “El Principio del Corazón” by Helen Hoang, which I got in Spanish.
This also is a time for Bob and me to talk about the logistics of the upcoming week. I have to balance producing and directing with raising a family, so we decide who’s picking the kids up from school and taking them to soccer practice. I end the night with a glass of rosé or white wine or even a vodka tonic, a favorite of my dad’s. He was an artist and painter, and a lot of what I am comes from him. He passed away last year at age 86, so drinking it is a way to honor him.
new video loaded: Hochul and Mamdani Announce Plan for Universal Child Care
transcript
transcript
Hochul and Mamdani Announce Plan for Universal Child Care
Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced a plan on Thursday to vastly expand free and low-cost child care for families across the state in the coming years and add programs for 2-year-olds.
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“Today, we’re working together with the mayor at this incredible place to announce the first major steps to make child care universal — truly universal — here in New York City, transforming the lives of children and parents all across the state.” “We will build on the city’s existing three-K program, and say, no longer will a family in Flatbush be offered a seat, but have to find out that seat is in Astoria. We will add seats in the neighborhoods where demand has not been met. This will be felt by expanded subsidies for tens of thousands of additional families. It will be felt when parents look at their bank accounts at the end of the year, and see that they have saved more than $20,000 per child.” “And today, I’m proud to announce that New York State is paying the full cost to launch 2-care. For the first time — universal daycare for 2-year-olds, as proposed by Mayor Mamdani. We’re not just paying for one year of the program. We don’t usually go one year out in our budget, but just to let you know how serious we are, we’re taking the unprecedented step to not just commit for the 2027 budget, which I’m working on right now, but also the following year as well to show you we’re in this for the long haul.”
By Meg Felling
January 8, 2026
A new mayor, a fresh start — you know the drill. There are as many ideas out there for how Zohran Mamdani can now improve New York’s urban environment as there are New Yorkers.
I canvassed a few dozen planners, architects, academics, community leaders, neighborhood organizers, developers, housing and transit experts and former city government officials. I gave them no budgets or time lines. They gave me a mayoral to-do list of ideas big, small, familiar, deep in the weeds, fanciful and timely.
What follows is a small selection, with some kibitzing by me. You can vote “love it” or “skip it” below and help determine the ranking of priorities. Feel free to leave eye rolls and alternative proposals in the comments section.
Check back in the coming days to see how the ranking has changed and we will let you know the ultimate results on Jan. 13.
1
Create many thousands more affordable housing units by converting some of the city’s public golf courses into mixed income developments, with garden allotments and wetlands.
2
Deck over Robert Moses’s Cross Bronx Expressway and create a spectacular new park.
3
Devise a network of dedicated lanes for e-bikes and electric scooters so they will endanger fewer bicyclists and pedestrians.
4
Pedestrianize Lower Manhattan. Not even 10 percent of people there arrive by car.
5
Build more mental health crisis centers citywide.
6
Provide more clean, safe public pay toilets that don’t cost taxpayers $1 million apiece.
7
Convert more coastline into spongy marshes, akin to what exists at Hunter’s Point South Park in Queens, to mitigate rising seas and floods.
8
Dedicate more of the city budget to public libraries and parks, the lifeblood of many neighborhoods, crucial to public health and climate resilience. The city devotes barely 2 percent of its funds to them now.
9
Follow through on the Adams administration’s $400 million makeover of once-glamorous Fifth Avenue from Central Park South to Bryant Park, with wider sidewalks, reduced lanes of traffic, and more trees, restaurants, bikes and pedestrian-friendly stretches.
10
Do away with free street parking and enforce parking placard rules. New York’s curbside real estate is priceless public land, and only a small fraction of residents own cars.
11
Open the soaring vaults under the Brooklyn Bridge to create shops, restaurants, a farmers’ market and public library in nascent Gotham Park.
13
Persuade Google, JPMorgan or some other city-vested megacorporation to help improve the acoustics as well as Wi-Fi in subways, along the lines of Citibank sponsoring Citi Bikes.
14
Overhaul freight deliveries to get more 18-wheelers off city streets, free up traffic, reduce noise, improve public safety and streamline supply chains.
15
Rein in City Hall bureaucracy around new construction. The city’s Department of Design and Construction is full of good people but a longtime hot mess at completing public projects.
16
Convert more streets and intersections into public plazas and pocket parks. Like the pedestrianization of parts of Broadway, this Bloomberg-era initiative has proved to be good for businesses and neighborhoods.
17
Stop playing Russian roulette with a crumbling highway and repair the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway before it collapses.
“There’s less traffic and more parking.”
“I only drive if I have to move something large or heavy.”
“Sometimes I skip lunch at work to make up for the driving tax.” “I visit my elderly parents less often.”
“I complain to myself every time I have to pay the fee and I’m STILL 100% in favor of it.”
“I am returning my leased car six months before the lease expires.”
One year after the start of congestion pricing, traffic jams are less severe, streets are safer, and commute times are improving for travelers from well beyond Manhattan. Though these changes aren’t noticeable to many, and others feel the tolls are a financial burden, the fees have generated hundreds of millions of dollars for public transportation projects. And it has probably contributed to rising transit ridership.
The program, which on Jan. 5, 2025, began charging most drivers $9 during peak travel times to enter Manhattan below 60th Street, has quickly left its mark.
To assess its impact, The New York Times reviewed city and state data, outside research, and the feedback of more than 600 readers with vastly different views of the toll.
Some groused about high travel costs. Others cheered for a higher toll. Many shared snapshots from their lives: quieter streets, easier parking, costlier trips to the doctor.
Many findings from a Times analysis a few months into the experiment have held up. The program so far has met nearly all of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s goals, although more evidence is needed on some measures. And one question remains unresolved: whether a federal judge will decisively shield the program from efforts by the Trump administration to end it.
“Despite the threats to shut it down,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said in an interview, “the cameras are still on, and business is still up, and traffic is still down. So it’s working.”
Here’s the evidence one year in:
1. Fewer vehicles
About 73,000 fewer vehicles are entering the central business district each day, a number that has added up in the first year to about 27 million fewer entries. The decline, compared with traffic trends before the toll, has been remarkably stable across the year:
Average daily entries to the central business district
All other consequences of congestion pricing flow from this one — that fewer people are choosing to enter the area by private vehicle.
“I never drive into the city anymore. I only take the subway. It’s a relief.”
Philip Zalon Brooklyn
“I’m much more aware of driving into Manhattan and avoid it unless I have to haul a lot of stuff like a car load of Girl Scout cookies.”
Jacob White Queens
By influencing that one decision, the policy can also affect commute times, transit reliability, road safety, street life and more (as we’ll get to below).
One clear sign that behaviors are changing: Every weekday, there is now a spike in vehicles entering the zone right before the toll kicks up to $9 at 5 a.m., and right after it declines to $2.25 at 9 p.m.
Personal vehicle entries into the central business district
“I’ve decided to get up earlier to get the lower price.”
Eric Nehs Manhattan
“It is exhausting to plan the trip to cross the line at 9 p.m.”
Paul S. Morrill Manhattan
2. Faster traffic
The first consequence of those fewer vehicles is that traffic is now moving faster for the drivers who remain, and for the buses that travel those same roads. And this turns out to be true inside the congestion zone, near the congestion zone, and even much farther away.
Change in vehicle speeds, 2024-25
“Taking my kid to [doctor’s] visits in 2024 was a nightmare, every time. … After congestion pricing, it’s been noticeably less aggravating.”
Josh Hadro Brooklyn
Many readers, however, told us they didn’t believe they could see the benefits; the changes aren’t always easy to perceive by the naked eye. Readers also frequently said they believed the gains from congestion pricing were more apparent in the first months of the year and had waned since. The city’s speed data generally suggests that these improvements have been sustained, although some of the largest gains were recorded in the spring.
Average vehicle speeds in the congestion zone
But for some travelers, the speed gains have been much larger, particularly those who cross through the bridge and tunnel chokepoints into and out of Manhattan:
“Traffic approaching the [Holland] tunnel has saved me 15-30 minutes on the rides back to New York and given me hours of my time back.”
Salvatore Franchino Brooklyn
“On a typical 8 a.m. commute, there is so little traffic into the [Lincoln] tunnel that it looks like a weekend.”
Lisa Davenport Weehawken, N.J.
“I haven’t used the Lincoln Tunnel all year, probably will never use it again.”
Steven Lerner Manhattan
Improvements have also been more notable for commuters who take longer-distance trips ending in the congestion zone. That’s because those 73,000 vehicles a day that are no longer entering the zone have disappeared from surrounding roads and highways, too.
Commuters from farther out are seeing accumulating benefits from all these sources: faster speeds outside the congestion zone, much faster speeds through the tunnels and bridges, and then the improvements inside Manhattan. And people who travel roads outside the congestion zone without ever entering it get some of these benefits, too.
An analysis by researchers at Stanford, Yale and Google confirmed this through the program’s first six months. Using anonymized data from trips taken with Google Maps, they found that speeds improved after congestion pricing more on roads around the region commonly traveled by drivers heading into the central business district. That’s a subtle point, but one many readers observed themselves:
“Noticeably fewer cars driving, even way out in Bensonhurst!”
Charles Haeussler Brooklyn
“Even across the river in Bergen County, I feel that we benefit.”
Michelle Carvell Englewood Cliffs, N.J.
“I supercommute weekly from Kingston by bus. Each week, my bus round trip is 30-60 minutes faster than it was before congestion pricing.”
Rob Bellinger Kingston, N.Y.
3. More transit riders
Public transit will benefit from congestion pricing as its proceeds are invested in infrastructure upgrades; in the first year, the toll is projected to raise about $550 million after accounting for expenses, $50 million more than the M.T.A. originally predicted. But transit also stands to benefit as bus speeds improve on decongested roads and as more commuters shift to transit.
On bus routes that cross through the congestion zone, speeds increased this year, in notable contrast to the rest of the city. These improvements follow years of declining bus speeds in the central business district coming out of the pandemic.
Local bus routes
Express bus routes
Change in bus speeds, 2024-2025
“The crosstown buses are faster than they used to be, even during peak commuting times.”
Marc Wieman Manhattan
“Have gratefully noticed that they’re more on-time.”
Sue Ann Todhunter Manhattan
“It has significantly improved my bus trips from N.J., cutting about 20 minutes of traffic each way.”
John Ruppert New Jersey
Paid transit ridership is up this year compared with 2024 across the subway, M.T.A. buses, Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North Railroad as transit has continued its recovery from pandemic declines. About 300,000 more people are riding the subway each day — far more than the 70,000 cars that have been taken off the road in the congestion zone. So while congestion pricing is probably contributing to rising transit ridership, it’s not the main driver of it.
All of these added transit riders do, however, help explain why congestion pricing has not dampened activity in the busiest parts of the city, as critics feared. People are still coming, just not necessarily by private car.
“I finally taught myself to use the subway. Between the tunnel toll, congestion pricing and parking, I’m saving an enormous amount of money, time and inconvenience.”
Daniel Ludwig Weehawken, N.J.
“It’s made using the bus for short trips a more appealing option.”
John Buckholz Brooklyn
In fact, overall visits to the business district aren’t down — they were up by about 2.4 percent over the previous year, according to the city’s Economic Development Corporation. And restaurant reservations on the platform OpenTable were up inside the zone as well, by the same amount as the increase citywide.
Tom Harris, the president of the Times Square Alliance, which represents 2,600 businesses, said he had initially received complaints from some businesses. But he was pleasantly surprised that they soon stopped.
“We’re thrilled we have not seen negative impacts to local businesses,” he said. “It seems like it has been absorbed.”
4. Better quality of life
These primary shifts — fewer cars, less congested roads, more transit riders — have in turn produced a number of other effects that might more broadly be thought of as changes to qualify of life. Readers described experiencing safer crosswalks, less stressful bike rides and what feels like cleaner air.
In city data, the number of complaints to 311 for vehicle noises like car honking has declined significantly inside the congestion zone, compared with the rest of Manhattan.
Change in vehicle noise complaints, 2024-25
“Sometimes it’s almost — dare I say it? — quiet.”
Daniel Scott Manhattan
“Midtown is so much quieter now.”
Melanie DuPuis Manhattan/Hudson Valley
“It turns out that mostly when people say ‘New York is noisy’ they really mean ‘cars are noisy.’”
Grant Louis Manhattan
And the perception that roads have gotten safer is also borne out by crash data. The number of people who were seriously injured in a car crash decreased citywide, but the improvement was more pronounced in the congestion relief zone.
Change in number of people seriously injured in a crash, 2024-25
“Nobody’s trying to run me over.”
Alice Baruch Manhattan
“Fewer cars honking, fewer cars running red lights, fewer cars blocking crosswalks.”
Charlie Rokosny Brooklyn
“The number of blocked crosswalks have gone down significantly!”
Samir Lavingia Manhattan
Amid these positive changes, however, other readers described distinct declines in their quality of life, often stemming from the cost of the toll. These deeply personal observations have no corresponding measures in public data. But they make clear that some of those 27 million fewer driving trips weren’t simply replaced by transit or forgone as unnecessary — they’re missed.
“Sadly Manhattan is no longer an option for many things we once enjoyed.”
Linda Fisher Queens
“Congestion pricing has made my world much smaller.”
Justine Cuccia Manhattan
“I’m more careful about choosing events to attend, so I go to fewer of them.”
Karen Hoppe Queens
“I will not use doctors in Manhattan, limiting my health care choices.”
David Pecoraro Queens
One final aim of congestion pricing — improved air quality — has the potential to benefit everyone in the region. But the data remains inconclusive so far. A recent study from researchers at Cornell found a 22 percent improvement in one air quality measure over six months. But another analysis, by the Stanford and Yale authors, found little to no effect on air quality using local community sensors and comparing New York with other cities. And the M.T.A.’s own analysis of the program’s first year found no significant change in measured concentrations of vehicle-related air pollutants.
That doesn’t mean benefits won’t become clearer with more time and data. But the open questions about air quality underscore that even one year in, even with all the evidence gathered, there are still some effects we don’t fully understand.
“As an asthmatic, I can also palpably feel improvements in the air quality.”
Rob Hult Brooklyn
“It’s allowed me to believe that perhaps America can change for the better.”
Hanna Horvath Brooklyn
“As a car owner myself, I think it’s fair that the cost of driving is now being passed from city residents onto the drivers.”
Vincent Lee The Bronx
“I don’t like the cost but I also can’t deny its effectiveness.”
Jon Keese Queens
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