WPCNR MAIN STREET JOURNAL. April 29, 2004: They look like the underground subway  tubes appearing in the old Buck Rogers serial from the 30s that whisked the dashing Buster Crabbe from one peril to another with Wilma Deering. Instead the new mini-electric vehicles are whisking dashing DPW sewer and parks troubleshooters where conventional vehicles dare not go. They are the "Mayor Mobiles," as dubbed by a quipping Paul Wood of the Mayor's Office. The two 21st century beauties have been donated by the New York Power Authority to the Department of Public Works, and have just gone into service. WPCNR got its first look at the Ford Motor Company manufactured vehicle yesterday, parked illegally on the side of the Renaissance Plaza Fountain.

WAITING FOR BUCK ROGERS: One of two new electric "Mayor Mobiles" donated to the city by The New York Power Authority. electric  Commissioner of Public Works, Joseph Nicoletti, in a City Hall-sponsored interview said the vehicles if purchased from the Ford Motor Company subsidiary that manufactured them, would cost  $15,000 each, but the city got them free. He said they are "limited use" vehicles for driving on streets where the speed limit is under 35 miles an hour (which, he noted, is every street within White Plains city limits). Nicoletti said the city has done much work with the Power Authority on fuel-efficiency vehicles, and as a result, the Power Authority donated the two vehicles  know as Think Cars to the Department. He said they had a 30-mile range, charge up out of a 110-volt socket, and cost 4 cents a mile to run. Nicoletti said they would be used on park paths, and areas inaccessible by standard vehicle. Photo by WPCNR News