Photograph by Joe Holmes on Flickr Documenting the city in the snow apparently has its limits. Gowanus Lounge noticed this photograph of the Gowanus Canal, taken yesterday, by photoblogger Joe Holmes. Holmes wrote on his Flickr page it was "taken seconds before I was told that photography is prohibited on the 9th Street bridge because of 9-11 concerns." Oh, man, that should be a problem for the Toll Bros. marketing department. And what if......

Earlier this afternoon, we watched Scholastic transform Mercer Street between Prince and Spring Streets in "Harry Potter Place" in anticipation of the 12:01AM release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - early reviews be damned! Not only was the Whomping Willow ready, there were owls (stuffed), messages on the Muggle Message Board, and a copy of the book signed by JK Rowling. There were also already people on line to buy the book.......

Di Fara's pizza still isn't open, a week after it closed by health inspectors. Maybe all the mouse droppings have something to do with that? And to top off a very bad week for the De Marco clan, their other pizzaria, recently the scene of the Greenwich Village shooting, announced that it will be closing for good. Still no answer on the cause of the mysterious, high-pitched ringing noise in Brooklyn Heights. Our theory......

Should non-citizen legal immigrants be allowed to vote in City Council races? After all, they do pay local taxes. Sad: Colors, the restaurant founded by workers from the WTC's Windows on the World is foundering, and may shut down. Some people want to add a compass rose to Columbus Circle-- maybe that will help all the tourists get where they need to go. The voice caught up this week with Claw, one of New......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: jumper down on the Triboro, an actor injured on the I Am Legend Set, and "white powder" at a High School on the West Side. Hide your wife: Prince Charles is in town this weekend! A documentary about young African-American kids and their preference for white dolls is stirring up some controversy. Why does the Brooklyn Critical Mass get police cooperation, while the Manhattan ride gets nothing but trouble?......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: pedestrian struck by vehicle on 34th Street and 11th Ave, a school hazmat condition at 103rd and CPW, and an all hands fire in Soho on Thompson Street. Soho residents and shoppers want to trade parking spaces for wider sidewalks. If you've ever been on Prince Street on a Saturday, you know why. Chase Bank has agreed to turn off those annoying sidewalk projection ads-- about two dozen branches......

This must be what happens when the Euro is strong and the U.S. dollar is weak. It turns out that 70% of elaborate subway car graffiti is created by Europeans. The Daily News puts this on the cover, noting that many taggers from "from Germany, Italy, France, Spain, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway to spray-paint their murals and elaborate tags - called "pieces" - on trains, fully aware that the Transit Authority will scrub them......

The Post interviews some of Michael Richards' friends, and surprise surprise-- they said he's pretty tightly wound. Ed Bradley was remembered at his memorial service as "cooler than cool." Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: an "unusual trauma" in Astoria, a car fire on the West Side Highway, and a homicide in the Bronx. Hevesi slaps back at Pataki: he says the outgoing Governor is pushing through billions of dollars in wasteful spending during his......

Starting on November 3 Times Square is going to be doing a shuffle. In an attempt to clean up the mess of tourists, cars, vendors, cowboys and other obstacles the Department of Transportation and the Times Square Alliance are going to run a six-month test of a new traffic pattern. The biggest change in the new plan is the shutting down of the traffic lane which allows cars to stay on Seventh Avenue at......

Today at 2PM until dusk, artist Fynn Sloyan will be at the Fulton Ferry Landing handing out transparencies of pre-September 11 skyline so people can see where the World Trade Center's Twin Towers once were. He also has a PDF that you can print out to make your own transparency at the WTC Outline Project. You can see a city skyline circa 1985 from Joe Holmes. And Fynn will also be at the ferry......

The American Museum of Natural History has long been the best diorama spot in the city-- and a mecca for fans of this peculiar art form. This month, the museum published "Windows on Nature", which tells the story of the dioramas and contains pictures of more than forty of them. Better yet, the museum has built a special website containing pictures and 360-views of a whole bunch of the exhibits-- including two of our......

Yesterday, students at John Jay High School on Seventh Avenue in Brooklyn walked out to protest the cell phone ban - and slow security. Cell phones have been banned at public schools since 1987, which is surprising to us, since we know they are sneaked in; students say they are prevented from using them in emergencies. While Gothamist understands the "emergency" argument, we went to high school when they were no cellphones - and calls......

Ever hear the one about one thief accidently shooting the other during a bungled robbery and then running away to leave his friend to die? Now you have. Two 13 year old kids (!) got arrested for Saturday's Bronx stabbing of a 15 year-old kid. Motive was to steal a cell-phone, and it looks like both will be charged as adults. Not depressed enough yet? Murders are up 11% and rapes are up 20%......

"If you can't beat 'em, psych 'em out" seems to be the tactic of the Brooklyn bagel shop that incited the ire of the MTA when it used MTA symbols. The shop, the former "F Line Bagels," was hit with a cease and desist from the MTA last March and eight month laters, fined and forced to remove the various subway signage the owners bought from the MTA. Deciding that a new sign would only......

After numerous delays, including a lawsuit, the Hunts Point Fish Market finally opened yesterday. The 430,000 square foot, $85 million facility was met with praise from some, while others knitpicked about some details (aww, too cold!). Mayor Bloomberg claimed that Hunts Point would bring $1 billion in economic activity a year in The Bronx, but some fishmongers said that business was down 40% on the first day. There is some concern about the shared......

The city and the Department of Transportation announced an $18 million plan to improve over 2 miles of Atlantic Avenue for traffic flow and pedestrian safety. At Atlantic Avenue from Pennsylvania Avenue and Logan Street and from Euclid Avenue to Rockaway Boulevard, one of the three lanes of traffic will be removed and a traffic median will get larger. While this project is to prevent accidents like the 2003 incident where two mothers pushing......

The New York City Photobloggers are opening their first gallery show tonight at the Chrystie Street Gallery (167 Chrystie, between Rivington and Kenmare). Word to the wise: bring sunglasses, because there's going to be a lot of crazed photobloggers running around with giant flashes. Some of our favorite photobloggers are in the show, including Eliot Shepard, Rion Nakaya, David Gallagher, and Joe Holmes (disclosure: one of us has a couple of prints in the......

If you are looking for something to do before tonight's Movable Hype (8pm, Knitting Factory), you should swing by the opening of the autumn edition of Hey Hot Shot, the great photography series at Jen Bekman's Gallery (6pm, 6 Spring Street.) One of our favorite NYC photobloggers, Joe Holmes, has some beatiful pictures in the show-- silhouettes taken at the American Natural History Musuem. And if you are in the mood for more great......

Photobloggers are Gothamist's eyes on the street- so for the next four days, we're going to feature a wrapup of all the RNC photoblog posts we can find. If you want to send us a link, leave it in the comments or email Jake. Today's amazing photography from the march: Joe Holmes, Citying, more Citying, Erin's pix at fshk, and Buzznet's NoRNC. Good shots of the dragon burning at IndyMedia. And since we didn't......