Lobby Bar – May 29: Spirit Animals, Cars Made of Glass, and Affectionate Biting Habits

by Jeremy Del Nero

Lobby Bar – A Truth-Defying Summary of FBT News and Views
Free plus tax.  There may not be such a thing as a free lunch, but FBT safety experts have concluded that wearing your seatbelt in the back of a taxicab is free and could save your life.  (Disclaimer: seatbelt is free only with the purchase of a ride valued at $2.50 or greater, seatbelt cannot be removed from cab, batteries …

Broadway Theaters Set Record for Sales and Attendance

by Jesse Sokolow
Broadway Theaters Set Record for Sales and Attendance

The 2014-15 Broadway season that just ended was the highest grossing in history and broke a record for attendance.
The Broadway League, the trade association that represents Broadway theater owners and operators as well as show producers, said that sales of tickets at the 40 Broadway theaters had totaled a record $1.365 billion and that over 13 million people had attended shows. Attendance rose 13.3% over the past two years, the …

2015 Buick Regal GS – Review and Test Drive

by Paul Riegler
2015 Buick Regal GS – Review and Test Drive

My parents often spoke wistfully of an Opel they had owned when I was a child. It was an Opel Commodore sedan, a larger and more luxurious version of the Rekord. It had gotten them out of trouble more than once (apparently my father made a wrong turn and drove up a goat path once) and achieved a kind of mythic status in their eyes.
Why didn’t we have Opels available …

The Goring Hotel, Belgravia, London, England – Review

by Jonathan Spira
The Goring Hotel, Belgravia, London, England – Review

If you want to understand the character of a hotel, look first at how it portrays its founder. In the case of the Goring, opened in 1910 by Otto Richard Goring, he is depicted in a painting as a bejeweled walrus. As if that were not enough, the property’s current managing director, David Morgan-Hewitt, is shown as a gorilla in a judge’s wig. Then there are the hotel’s sheep in …

Dear Reader: Please Wear a Seatbelt in the Back of a Taxi

by Paul Riegler
Dear Reader: Please Wear a Seatbelt in the Back of a Taxi

The crash that killed mathematician John F. Nash Jr. and his wife, Alicia, highlighted a largely overlooked safety issue in travel: many people do not wear a seatbelt when in the back seat of a car.  The Nashes, who were ejected from the back seat of their taxi while returning from Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey to their home, were not wearing seatbelts.
While almost all states in the …

Lobby Bar – May 22: Royal Flushes, Cuddle Service, and Crowd-Powered Aircraft

by Jeremy Del Nero

Lobby Bar – A Tantalizingly Untrue Summary of FBT News and Views 
Royal spoons. Jonathan Spira checks into the Ritz-Carlton in New Orleans, where Club Level guests are treated like royalty. These elite members receive complimentary pressing of two garments each day, free Wi-Fi access in the lounge, and a cuddle buddy for those cold New Orleans nights.
Time killer. Paul Riegler pokes around Flushing Meadows Park, which once played host to …

Photo Essay: Flushing Meadows-Corona Park

by Paul Riegler
Photo Essay: Flushing Meadows-Corona Park

The home of both the 1939/1940 and 1964/1965 New York World’s Fairs, Flushing Meadows Corona Park, often referred to merely as Flushing Meadows Park, was created on top of a former dumping ground, one which F. Scott Fitzgerald called a “valley of ashes” in The Great Gatsby.
Each of the two New York World’s Fairs held here covered the 1,216 acres (492 hectares) of the park. Over 44 million people attended the …