True, the NYPD has a long way to go to make traveling on our city streets safer, but  I don’t get the problem here. The cop made sure it was safe to proceed through the intersection with lights and sirens going, only sped up enough to catch up to the cyclist, and was careful not to knock him off his bike once there. If the cyclist ran the light then he deserves a ticket. To suggest the officer is in the wrong only takes away from your legitimate complaints and coverage of traffic enforcement in the city. 

Totally agree with what Mixed Message said.

I think the officers were totally correct to assign that ticket.

What baffles us is why THAT is the violation that gets the attention, when there are so many other violations which endanger the public more than that kind of violation, and for which the public would be better served if the police pursued with the same zeal.

I would love to see the cops make an effort to nail all of the offenders who disregard traffic lights, including those who floor the gas at a yellow light coming up on a very wide intersection.  If a few errant cyclists get caught up in that, sucks to be them. 

(Note that red light cameras may have some deterrent effect, but the tickets assigned on camera-recorded violations come with lesser penalties than the officer-assigned tickets. And they do nothing to reduce the accident risks of a wild driver who’s ripping down the street.) 

But as far as we know, the cops are focused on the cyclists and are letting automobile drivers get away with similar violations with regularity. And the extensive abuse of the speed limit and of right-of-way violations is maddening. The police aren’t keeping the streets safe. And going after little nonsense like this – technically illegal, but not a public menace – is the wrong approach. It’s not politically disputable or legally misguided. It’s just wrong.

If I was the cop here and saw a cyclist go through a red in front of me on Sixth Avenue in the Village, I would not pull this move and accelerate at such speed. What if the pedestrian standing on the corner there decides to start crossing Sixth Ave? 

This isn’t as dangerous as the multi-block high-speed chases we’ve written about, and maybe 999 times out of a thousand no one would get hurt, but to my eyes it looks riskier than warranted by the offense.

The other cool part about this video is how the cop just blocks the cyclist’s path, or tries to push him into parked cars. 

A car driver presumably would have been afforded the luxury of getting pulled over like a normal human being, but i guess all bikers are terrorists or axe murderers or something, so it’s necessary to cut them off because you have to assume they’re going to try and outrun a car police cruiser.Maybe the biker was riding down the street, assassinating people with a sawed-off water gun or something. Maybe he just had to be stopped immediately.Or something.

I’m a daily bike commuter and streetsblog reader who thinks cyclists as well as motorists need to be consistently ticketed when we break laws.  Can’t tell anything from this video, unless you posted it as sort of rorschach to get a sense of your audience.  I’ve been ticketed as a cyclist and motorist, deservedly in each instance (and as a pedestrian for that matter jaywalking in LA, not that I suggest ticketing pads today in NYC).  Consistency of law enforcement will in the end make bikers safer.  Would love love love to see red light cameras and enforcement of the 30 mph city speed limit.  Not to mention getting car services, ambulettes, passing cars, taxis, street vendors, and, well, maybe in the >10,000 bikeshare bikes future, peds, ticketed for blocking bike lanes.

Since we didn’t see the cyclist committing the infraction its hard to take a stance on it. The officer gets the benefit of the doubt. 

As for how the officers pulled over the cyclist, I’ve been pulled over in exactly the same manner as a pedestrian. I’m not sure there is value in debating the finer points on technique.

Is the cyclist being unfairly targeted? Possibly so, but this video simply isn’t proof of it.

Just doing his job, yes.  But why all the drama and hostility?  Why not be on the far side of the intersection observing for violators doing reckless shit that endanger others?  Its clear they are just out to fill quotas as quickly as possible and have no sense of decorum to boot.  That’s what this video says anyway.  

I personally wouldn’t stop for an unmarked car. That could be anyone, including bike thieves posing as police. Granted, the options for an escape in this case are limited but normally whenever I hear sirens behind me I turn off at the next intersection and make a few quick random turns to get lost on the assumption they’re after me, even if I haven’t broken any laws. It’s just the state of mind I’ve been in ever since getting a sidewalk cycling ticket back in 1999.

@shmooth:disqus Agreed 100% that red lights shouldn’t apply to either cyclists or pedestrians. Changing the law to that effect is the best short term answer to end this quota-driven nonsense. Long term the best answer is to get rid of most of the traffic lights.

@bdccb23d062e811922ea9e07e83dedb7:disqus Enforcement assumes there’s nothing wrong with the laws and infrastructure in the first place. That’s hardly the case here. It’s actually safer most of the time to cross on red as either a cyclist or a pedestrian, provided you ascertain if it’s clear first. Moreover, in NYC with it’s 12,000+ signalized intersections timed for car speeds, a cyclist or pedestrian following the law will take 2 or 3 times as long to get where they’re going. Normal transportation planning considers even a 50% delay unacceptable to motor vehicles, so why is a 200% or 300% delay for other modes OK? Moreover, it’s incumbent upon the state to ensure road safety in the least intrusive way possible. That means you shouldn’t get a red light if nothing is crossing. We can do that with pedestrian and vehicle detectors. Since we refuse to use those in NYC, then you shouldn’t be forced to wait at red when nothing is crossing. You gain nothing at all in safety by doing so.

Riding crosstown in the Village tonight I was almost hit twice — by cop cars.  The first time, at 9th St. and Sixth, the bike lane on 9th changes from the left to the right side, but the cop car waiting at the light to my right refused to let me make the traverse in front of him, even though I had the head start.  A few blocks west, on Christopher, a different cruiser a few cars behind me suddenly put on that infernal new “low whoop” siren they now have, whipped around traffic and made a fast right, nearly taking me out as I crossed the intersection as fast as I could to get out of the way.  In hot pursuit of a lawbreaking killer cyclist, no doubt.   

I don’t think the cop drove out of control. Not sure why you’re defending illegal behavior.

We need to document more of this type of interaction, but MORE importantly, WE NEED TO CHANGE THE LAW.

For people on bicycle ( a vehicle that likely weighs <20% of even their ideal body weight, ~30lbs) should the same laws apply to them as to vehicles that are MUCH larger weigh some 3,000-12,000 pounds and of course MUCH slower to stop? In Idaho, the answer is NO. for nearly 30 years cyclists can legally enjoy the right to YIELD at a STOP sign. Since 2006 people on bikes can also treat a RED signal light as a STOP sign.  Has this resulted in more total chaos and cyclists being run over/running over pedestrians? Nope. Getting the person on the bicycle ahead and away from the intersection prior to the cars leaving a) will encourage time (and energy) efficient bicycle travel b) is often much SAFER, since they are then able to make that L turn—and/or just be more visible to motorists.

When will New York State follow suit and allow this to be law??

I think I have to agree with a lot of people here. The cyclist ran a red light. The cop saw it, nosed their way through an intersection, caught up with the cyclist in one block, and gave him a ticket. The cop only accelerated once he got through the intersection, and that block that he sped down to catch the cyclist was completely empty. This was not a drawn out high speed pursuit, weaving through traffic, blasting through intersection. It doesn’t appear to be high-speed or reckless at all. Yes, I think high speed pursuits on city streets are atrocious and should be called out, but I don’t think this is one of them. 

I also think that when we complain about every little instance of even mildly aggressive policing of cycling, it makes bike advocates look bad, like we’re somehow justified in breaking the law. Sure, it’s easy to feel that way, given the dearth of safe bike facilities and utter lack of protection from police; but from an advocacy perspective, that line of thinking is untenable. The cyclist broke the law, and the cop gave him a ticket; end of story.

It’s hard to see this as a proportional response. At the same time, I think the current traffic laws as enforced (or not) inhere this sort of behavior on the part of cops. And our incomplete infrastructure and ridiculous categorization of bikes as “vehicles” makes it hard for cyclists to know how to behave. This video is a perfect example of this insanity and I am not surprised to see people having two kinds of reactions. I’m not surprised to find myself agreeing with both. This is our problem and it needs to be fixed. 

Even though I have had plenty of positive interactions with individual officers, my emotional response to the video, and to situations like this that I witness in person, comes 100% from my reptilian brain. I am scared of the NYPD as an entity and of men in groups, especially when they’re wearing uniforms. And they don’t do much to allay my fears. 

I don’t think the chase was particularly reckless and we don’t know exactly what the cyclist was stopped for.

That said, there is a problem with the argument that “if you run a red light, you get a ticket”, and that is that the police exercise a *huge* amount of discretion when it comes to choosing which people to stop, and there is reasonable concern that the attention given to cyclists may be disproportionately high (even without considering the relative risk of cyclist’s violations when compared to those of motor vehicles).

The NYPD boasts that they issue almost 1 million summonses per year for moving violations. But how many moving violations actually happen on the streets? I’d say a very conservative estimate would be 10 million per day. That would mean that only about 0.03% of violations get a summons. Is that 0.03% distributed fairly, not to mention in a way that actually improves safety?

I remember reading a quote from an officer who basically said “we prefer to ticket cyclists because they are easier/safer to chase”.

I got stopped by a similar car on sixth ave in soho about a year ago, got and paid my 190 buck ticket. (car rate)  What can I say, end of the month quota maybe.  I def. think twice now about running red lights, but still do after peeking about. (hard to see the unmarked cars).   my two cents.  The chase part does not bother me too much.

With the adoption of all of the new bike lanes, bicyclists have become a greater menace to pedestrians than automobiles and trucks.

Bicyclists continue to exhibit no heed for direction markings on one-way lanes; traffic signals, especially when red; and crossing pedestrians. 

This is even worse for the food delivery persons on electrified bicycles, whose mass and speed is tantamount to a small motorcycle.

Thank you NYPD.