Nikon 40mm 2.8 or 35mm 1.8?

I'm thinking of buying my first prime lens to go alongside my 18-55 kit lens and 55-200 lens. I do a lot of urban photography and I'm also doing a project for the next few months on photography in a city and will need a good lens for taking photos. I'm torn on whether to take Nikon's 35mm 1.8 DX or the new Nikon 40mm 2.8 DX micro/macro lens. I shoot with a Nikon d3000 which only accepts DX lenses for autofocusing. Which lens would be best for me?

Wrong premise - FX lenses can work perfectly on a D3000.It doesn't matter if it's a DX or FX lens, what matters is if the lens has an autofocus motor. That is indicated by AF-S in its name if it's a Nikon lens, third party ones use different designations.

So… Feel free to consider the 50mm primes or even the 60mm macro prime. The AF-S versions will work perfectly on your camera.

Myself, i'd get one of the latter, but those might be too long lenses for your purposes. If you mostly shoot at 30-40mm, and don't care much about low light use, then the 40mm micro nikkor would be my choice. If you don't need macro that much and want the ability to shoot in very low light, then the 35mm/1.8.

No, it only accepts AF-S lenses…

The 40mm is a lot more expensive and only goes to f2.8

Personally on an APS-C sensor for street/candid stuff I'd prefer something wider in the 20-30mm range.