SEPTEMBER 26, 2019

Why Doesn't It Feel Like Fall Yet in N.Y.C.?

By Andrea Salcedo

metro reporter

It's Thursday.

Weather: Sunny with showers possible in the afternoon. Expect highs in the low 80s.

Alternate-side parking: In effect until Monday (Rosh Hashana).

Ali Kate Cherkis for The New York Times

On Monday, the first day of fall, temperatures reached the high 80s. Since then, it has gotten cooler — and yet it still does not feel like autumn.

The weather has not been cool enough to wear that scarf you've taken out of the closet or to grab that hot chocolate you've been dreaming about. (Full disclaimer: I still am sleeping with my air-conditioning on.)

Part of it is probably because you might remember that it was in the 60s last year at this time. But the actual explanation is that a mass of warm air has come in from the south, said Faye Morrone, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

This is supposed to last at least through the beginning of next week. So it's not going to feel like fall for probably at least another seven days. But at least you can start putting out those Halloween decorations.

Fall weather is coming. It's just not here yet.

New Yorkers should remember that fall is "a season of transition," Ms. Morrone said.

It is not unusual for New York to experience periods of warm and cool weather during the beginning of the fall, she said.

"Those wide swings are fairly typical of this time of the year," Ms. Morrone said. "We are not on record territory."

(The record high in New York City for September was 102 degrees, on Sept. 2, 1953, according to the National Weather Service.)

These fall weather swings are not particular to New York, either. Other regions across the country can expect to have temperatures fluctuate from warm to chilly and vice versa, she said.

New Yorkers notice warmer periods because our seasons, just like those in the Midwest, are pretty defined, Ms. Morrone said.

And although a couple of months ago the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declared July as the hottest month ever recorded for the planet, it is not entirely clear that this has anything to do with the warm start to fall.

Ms. Morrone said multiple factors could affect what each season feels like.

"You can't correlate a warm summer will mean a specific thing three months down the road," Ms. Morrone said.

So while you shouldn't yet break out those scarves, just remember that in no time you'll probably be complaining about winter.

FROM THE TIMES

Explore news from New York and around the region

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What does it mean to be a parent? One man hopes his case will change how a decades-old New York law treats unwed fathers.

by eli hager

Want more news? Check out our full coverage.

The Mini Crossword: Here is today's puzzle.

What we're reading

Empty retail spaces have doubled over the last 10 years. "We have a crisis and this crisis needs to be managed." [New York Post]

There is beauty in the subway. A group of architects and designers released a map with 45 "eye-catching" subway stations. [Curbed NY]

Measles no more. Health officials declared an end to a measles outbreak that infected more than 300 people in Rockland County. [The Associated Press]

Coming up today

Join the curator and some of the artists of "Look Both Ways: The Illicit Liaison Between Image and Information" for a discussion at the Type Directors Club in Manhattan. 6:30 p.m. [$30]

"Eternos Indocumentados: Central American Refugees in the United States" screens at the Living Artist Gallery Space in Queens. 7 p.m. [Free with R.S.V.P.]

See more than 70 local, national and international exhibitors at the Affordable Art Fair at the Metropolitan Pavilion in Manhattan. Noon. [$20]

— Melissa Guerrero

Events are subject to change, so double-check before heading out. For more events, see the going-out guides from The Times's culture pages.

And finally: The motorcycle whisperer

Hugh Mackie owns one of the last motorcycle garages in Manhattan.Daniel Weiss for The New York Times

The Times's Austin Considine writes:

To call Hugh Mackie a dying breed might be an exaggeration, but maybe not here. Nestled between Avenues C and D in the East Village of Manhattan, his motorcycle garage, Sixth Street Specials, is among the last in the borough, a vestige of a neighborhood that scarcely resembles its past.

Mr. Mackie, who is Scottish, opened the garage at this location in 1986, about five years after moving to New York, and he is still here, servicing, tearing down, building, rebuilding and customizing British bikes. The sign whispering the shop's existence is so inconspicuous that you would never notice it if you didn't already know it was there.

Inside, one glimpses an East Village that teemed not only with painters and beat poets but also with sidewalk mechanics and motorcycle gangs.

[Read more about Mr. Mackie, who represents a dying breed in the city: bikers.]

A garage like Mr. Mackie's, which sits on a residentially zoned block, is allowed because its certificate of occupancy was grandfathered in from before the 1961 Zoning Resolution, which put in place much of the city's current zoning. If someone tried to open a garage next door today, the New York City Department of Buildings wouldn't issue a certificate because the block isn't zoned for it.

Xavier Bessez, 30, recently rolled up to Sixth Street on a 1964 Triumph because a pin had fallen out of his brake caliper while he was riding. That's dangerous.

Mr. Bessez said he was intimidated the first time he went to Sixth Street. "This place was too cool for me to come in," he said. "I felt nervous, you know? And then I got to know the guys, and I've been coming ever since."

On Fridays, Mr. Mackie said, the place often fills with guys like Mr. Bessez: fellow enthusiasts for British bikes who gather just to hang out.

It's Thursday — roll with it.

Metropolitan Diary: TV shopping

Dear Diary:

It was August and we were in Union Square buying our first television. We went into a dingy store that was part of a local electronics chain.

We had joked whenever we passed it that the store was haunted. Maybe the $400 or so that we had to spend would slow its seemingly inevitable demise.

After a bit of deliberation — I wanted small and restrained; he wanted something appropriate for a sports bar — we found one we could agree on.

Just then, a salesman rushed down the empty aisle to applaud our Goldilocks-style compromise. He excused himself to get some paperwork, accidentally leaving a small, well-worn notebook flopped open on the counter in front of us.

I stole a glance, taking in some names and numbers under the glare of my well-mannered boyfriend's judgmental eye.

I was just about to look away when I noticed a phrase toward the bottom: NEVER GIVE UP ON YOURSELF. All capital letters, and it had been traced over and over and underlined several times in heavy ballpoint pen.

At that moment, I would have ordered 10 big screens and a surround-sound system to match. But I did not.

The store closed eight years later, and the boyfriend is now my husband. I don't know where the salesman is, but I think about him often. I hope he moved on to bigger and better things.

— Erin Bradley

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