Today’s Headlines

  • Kids in Low-Income Neighborhoods Most at Risk of Traffic Injuries (Gotham Gazette)
  • After Neighbors Worry About Parking and Cars, Medgar Evers Scraps Plaza Plan (Bklyn Brief)
  • 2nd Avenue Sagas and Gothamist Make the Case Against the QueensWay, for Rail Reactivation
  • MTA Data Shows Most Brooklyn Subway Lines Could Handle More Riders (YIMBY)
  • Most of SL Green’s Grand Central Upgrades Will Focus on Lexington Ave Subways (CapNY, Crain’s)
  • Adam Forman: City Hall Must Increase Its Contribution to MTA (Gotham Gazette)
  • More Coverage of City’s Countdown to 25 MPH from WCBS, WNYC, NY1, Advance
  • Staten Island CB 1 Asks City for Sidewalks, Traffic Lights, Greenway Study for NY Wheel (DNA)
  • M86 SBS Would Rely Mostly on Off-Board Fare Collection, Maybe Signal Priority (DNA)
  • Painting a Citi Bike Purple Is a Terrible Way to Hide The Fact That It’s Stolen (DNA)

More headlines at Streetsblog USA

  • Eddie

    Nothing about cycling deaths double in comparison to last year?

    http://gothamist.com/2014/10/15/there_have_now_been_200_traffic_fat.php

  • qrt145

    Maybe the guy painted the bike purple after reading Delia Ephron’s piece in the NYT…

  • Hilda

    Seems that the Medgar Evers Lane issue could be one of Brooklyn’s first shared space, right after Brooklyn Boro Hall where the plaza is used in the same way. You could reduce the number of parking spaces of 45 and add paving treatments, plantings and trees and it will function as a shared space.
    Provide the technology that shows there are no empty spaces, and you will have people using it only when they know they can find a space.
    DOT needs to open up their toolkit. This is basic stuff that is done all over; outside of the U.S. that is.

  • Kevin Love

    From the Gotham Gazette article:

    “Police Officer Ari Dubitsky, who works in the area’s 70th precinct, replied that the officers who patrol the area are part of a crime unit called Project Impact, and are usually patrolling on foot. That means they don’t have a car to enforce traffic violations, he said. ‘You’re asking those cops to chase down a car,’ said Dubitsky. ‘They can’t do that without their own vehicle.'”

    Kevin’s comment:

    That statement is complete and utter bovine excrement. Let me count the ways…

    1. The cars used by violent and dangerous car drivers tend to have things called “licence plates.” This enables the police officer to follow up by going to where the car driver lives in order to catch the car driver.

    2. Police officers tend to have things called “radios.” This enables them to alert other police officers who actually do have police cars.

    3. Between congestion and red traffic lights, quite often it is indeed easily possible for police officers on foot to catch up with a car driver.

    4. If it was a drive-by shooting would we get the same flimsy excuse for doing nothing? Why the discrimination?

  • 1ifbyrain2ifbytrain

    Exactly, If I can walk up to a car on Broadway, tap on the window and ask the driver if they were aware of the fact that they had run a red light at the last intersection I bet a police officer could do something similar.

  • HamTech87

    re: 86th Street Manhattan Crosstown SBS.

    “However, the route is too narrow for the bus to have its own dedicated lane, said Chiarmonte.”

    How did this whopper of an assertion not get challenged?

  • Kevin Love

    Let’s not forget the cars with out-of-state plates that seem to live in NYC. A police officer visiting the address on the licence plate has a fairly high chance of uncovering car insurance fraud.

    Because the sort of person who commits insurance fraud is probably not all that good at respecting other traffic laws.

  • lop

    Traffic moves well enough on the transverse, so skip the dedicated lane there. Either side of the park you would only have to stop accommodating double parking to make room. So kill some parking spots during the day for truck loading zones. If stores need people to be able to double park then 15 minute (or fewer) parking spots could be added. The main losers are people who park on the street all day for free. 25k daily riders on the M86 would benefit.

  • walks bikes drives

    Traffic backs up on the transverse constantly during rush hour. It is part of my daily commute. But there is no way to fix it. Even if they removed the traffic light, which serves little purpose, there will be limitted effect. Traffic on w86 and e86 move, typically, smoother than the transverse. With the added efficiency of SBS, there probably would be not enough benefit to the cost of changes to adding the bus lanes. With or without the parking issue.