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FOR almost three decades after Westchester County opened the Kingsland Point Park bathhouse here in 1929, visitors descended to this riverfront park, logging 80,000 visits a season, according to county records. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

FOR years, Andrew Bernstein and his neighbors could never find seats together on crowded Long Island Rail Road trains. During the last year, however, those seats have become easier to find. As the number of L.I.R.R. commuters has fallen, Mr. Bernstein, 49, can sit with friends when he makes the trip from his home in Hicksville to his accounting job in Manhattan. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

AS transportation officials continue to pursue replacing the Tappan Zee Bridge, construction crews have embarked on the final phase of repairing the existing bridge, which will remain in use in the near-term future. Officials of the New York Thruway Authority, however, said they expected construction-related traffic conditions to be ''much improved'' over last year, when lengthy delays occurred. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

NEARLY 57 years ago, John Acropolis, the Westchester Teamsters boss who contemporaries said took on the mob, was shot twice in the head as he entered his Yonkers apartment, killed in one of the most notorious crimes in the city's history. The case has never been solved. Despite being more than a half-century old, however, it is technically still under investigation by the Yonkers Police Department's cold-case unit, assigned to work on cases that remain on the books despite the passage of significant time, said Frank J. Rubino, the Yonkers corporation counsel. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

LESS than a year ago, New Rochelle leaders were banking their city's future on a new wave of development, a multitude of projects designed to restore vibrancy to downtown. The plans included apartment towers with brand names like Trump and a Long Island Sound shoreline with high-end housing and canals for small boats. Across the county in Yonkers -- where much of the riverfront has been developed only for industry -- local leaders had their hopes pegged to big-name builders' proposals to overhaul the downtown and waterfront, creating neighborhoods with perks like water taxi service to New York City and a minor league baseball park. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

VATS of grease may make health advocates cringe, but Westchester County officials see excess cooking oil from the county's 3,500 restaurants as a means of cleaner, cheaper fuel. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

AS part of its continuing effort to reduce the Westchester County Airport's toll on the environment, the county has replaced all of the airport's motorized ground service equipment, like aircraft tractors, water trucks and baggage loaders, with electric versions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A WASTEWATER treatment project may not pique public interest the way building a new Tappan Zee Bridge would, but backers of the sewage project are already lobbying for it to be a priority in Westchester when federal economic stimulus money comes through. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

FACING a $16 million budget gap, the City of Yonkers is expected to lay off 151 full- and part-time employees, including police officers and firefighters, by Jan. 1. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

AFTER years of losing money, Whitby Castle, the city-owned and -operated restaurant at Rye Golf Club, is expected to wind up out of the red this year, officials said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

WITH hopes of building a multipurpose village for military veterans, Westchester County officials say they will submit a plan to develop the Veterans Affairs campus in Montrose to the federal government, which will put the county in competition with private developers. After an informational meeting Tuesday with representatives of the Department of Veterans Affairs and more than a dozen developers, county leaders said they would answer the V.A.'s call for proposals for the 189-acre riverside campus, confirming their commitment to creating the village. It would include housing, medical services and a commercial center with service-oriented businesses like small grocery shops or dry cleaners. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

SMACK in the middle of a commuting nightmare -- including higher gas prices, traffic jams and environmental woes -- kissing the car keys goodbye in favor of buses and trains might seem to be an increasingly attractive option for Westchester drivers. But doing so is often not easy for those whose travels are more complex than hopping a Metro-North train to Grand Central and who must rely on local bus service, transportation experts, public officials and commuters say. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

THE Westchester County district attorney has dropped criminal charges filed against Metro-North and a railroad supervisor for their handling of a March fuel spill at the Croton-Harmon railyard. Lucian Chalfen, spokesman for the district attorney, Janet DiFiore, said that Ms. DiFiore dismissed the charges of endangering public health, safety or environment, a fourth-degree misdemeanor, against Metro-North and Kenneth McHale, its assistant director of environmental services and compliances, after the railroad did extensive cleanup and remediation of the spill site. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

THE east bank of the Hudson River where Tarrytown meets Sleepy Hollow offers a snapshot of the riverfront's modern history. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

RECONSTRUCTION of a heavily traveled two-lane bridge in Chappaqua is scheduled to start late this summer, but State Department of Transportation officials say commuters should not be worried about traffic tie-ups. Concerns about the work on the Route 120 bridge, set to begin in mid-August, were recently heightened by news reports of the bridge possibly being narrowed to one lane during the project, which is expected to take at least a year. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

FIVE years into a study exploring options for the aging and congested Tappan Zee Bridge, project leaders say they are ready to start making major decisions about the bridge's future that could allow construction to start by 2012. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

RECYCLABLES, particularly cardboard, have become such hot commodities that Westchester County officials want to protect them by making their theft for resale a crime. Inspired by a New York City law, county legislators are considering a proposal that would make systematic or large-scale theft of material put out for recycling punishable by up to 90 days in jail, fines that range from $1,000 to $2,000 -- or both. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

EAGER to preserve their majority in the State Senate, Republican leaders are beefing up efforts to capture the two Westchester seats held by Democrats, including that of the longtime Senator Suzi Oppenheimer. For Ms. Oppenheimer's 37th District seat, which represents Westchester's eastern half, Republican leaders, including Joseph L. Bruno, the Senate majority leader, are pinning their hopes on Elizabeth N. Feld, the Larchmont mayor. She said she was ''very seriously'' considering a run and is expected to make a decision in the next two weeks. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

WHEN fuel-pumping equipment at the Croton-Harmon Metro-North rail yard ruptured in late March, about 17,000 gallons of diesel fuel spilled into the ground -- a potential environmental hazard. Since then, the bulk of the fuel has been recovered, and efforts to clean up the rest continue. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

WHEN New Roc City, the huge youth-oriented entertainment complex here, opened in 1999, city officials viewed it as a catalyst to help revive downtown. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

WESTCHESTER public schools, including those in affluent districts, will receive an unexpected infusion of cash next year under the newly approved state budget. Though local schools would have been hit hard by cuts proposed in former Gov. Eliot Spitzer's original budget, a range of changes in eligibility requirements for various types of aid -- including basic assistance and high tax aid for wealthier districts, whose taxpayers bear the brunt of educational costs -- wound up being a boon to Westchester schools, said Assemblywoman Amy Paulin, a Scarsdale Democrat. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

ALEXANDER HOWARD's job as a city sanitation worker here has never been particularly easy. But the premise of trash collection was more basic when he signed up for it 23 years ago. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

WITH a history of using alternative-fuel vehicles long before it became chic, White Plains now is the Northeast hub -- and one of three cities nationwide -- for a model program designed to put hydrogen-powered cars in consumers' hands. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]