A old black and white photo is mounted slightly off kilter to benefit the viewer. There are five men and one woman in the foreground seen from the back, poised to cross the street. A trolly care with "third ave railway" written across the side. Two men in uniform stand in the street, on next to the trolly car and the other in the intersection. A old school motor vehicle is beside the rail car with a large crowd facing the viewer on the opposite corner under a store front that reads "Aschulte" Cigars.
Northeast corner of 42nd street and Fifth Avenue from 1936. Credit: NYPL Digital Collections

Nicole Gelinas, the author of Movement: New York’s Long War to Take Back Its Streets from the Car, explains why she opens her epic with the mayors who fought against the street-car system that once transported New Yorkers a billion times a year.

From there, Gelinas talks with editors Ben Max of New York Law School and Harry Siegel of THE CITY about the promise of congestion pricing, the challenges to getting big things fixed let alone built here, the ghost of Robert Moses, and much more.