Money, Power, Politics, by Joyce Purnick: on Environment

Mike Bloomberg: Containerize 12,000 tons of daily trash & export to landfill

(He finally settled on the less exotic if politically sensitive solution of containerizing the waste and exporting it to landfills by rail or in covered barges.)

Mike Bloomberg: Congestion pricing: fee for driving into Manhattan

Albany being Albany, the Speaker wielded his favorite passive-aggressive tool, a handy device to bury hot issues. Saying there were not enough votes to pass congestion pricing, he never brought the bill to the assembly floor.

The mayor did not hide his fury. "It takes a special type of cowardice for elected officials to refuse to stand up and vote their conscience on an issue that has been debated, and amended significantly to resolve many outstanding issues, for more than a year. Every New Yorker has a right to know if the person they send to Albany was for or against better transit and cleaner air."

Mike Bloomberg: PlaNYC 2030: 25-year plan for pollution & infrastructure

"If we don't act now, when?" Bloomberg asked, making his announcement on Earth Day.

Most chief executives do not spend much time planning for the future, when they will no longer be in office to claim credit. That's why bridges fall down--from neglect by politicians worried about their today, not a successor's tomorrow.

But PlaNYC's 127 projects, regulations and innovations--an agenda so ambitious that Bloomberg likened it to the designs for Central Park and the construction of Rockefeller Center--rely heavily on political cooperation, public funds and a strong economy.

Rudy Giuliani: Reclaimed Times Square from decades of filth

But the mayor remained a factor. He had tamed crime and welfare payments. Even Times Square shed its filth after decades of futile reclamation projects. Its comeback spanning 3 mayoral administrations and 2 decades was hardly Giuliani's doing, but he was in charge when it arrived and got considerable credit. The "ungovernable" city was turning downright genteel--a stunning transformation from the decaying late 1970s and 1980s.