Today’s Headlines

  • Clinton Ave Bike Lane Not Happening in Any Form (Bklyn Paper)
  • Maybe If Cuomo Reduced Crowding, Fewer Sex Crimes Would Be Committed on the Subway (News, Post)
  • Red Light-Running Green Cab Driver Rams Another Car Onto Rego Park Sidewalk, Injuring 2 Peds (DNA)
  • The Daily News Can Declare Victory in Its War on Elmo and Painted Breasts (NYT, Crain’s, DNA)
  • Brooklyn Heights Residents Fancy the Notion of a Streetcar But Don’t Want to Pay for It (DNA)
  • City Council Votes to Allow Retail in Water Street Arcades (Crain’s)
  • Survivor Recounts Sudden Violence of High-Speed Crash in East Village Three Years Ago (News)
  • Video: Sociopaths With Cars on the LIE (News)
  • All You Need to Do to Keep Cars Out of a Lincoln Tunnel Traffic Lane Is Move a Few Cones (Post)
  • Frequent Service Matters (Gothamist)

More headlines at Streetsblog USA

  • Snidely Bikelash

    1962 bike trips were counted on Vanderbilt Avenue between Flushing and Fulton in a 12 hour period (http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/clinton-ave-may2016.pdf). A lot fewer people than that park their cars along that stretch. Why are people given disproportionate street space to park their cars? It’s time for cyclepaths on Vanderbilt, which is the direct route people are already taking anyway.

  • Joe R.

    Best solution for the Clinton Avenue bike lane, really for any bike lane, is to just build it. If we wait for community approval for these things we’ll be waiting until most readers here are senior citizens. Build it and when the residents complain just tell them you know where the door is. I’m tired of people with no real problems in life trying to keep this city frozen in a time they see with rose-colored glasses. All we ever hear is the same nonsense. It’ll create traffic jams, we’ll lose parking, businesses will fold, untold numbers of people and pets will be killed by speeding bikes. The fact none of these things ever happen doesn’t seem to stop the same complaints from surfacing over and over again. We don’t need community approval to reconfigure thoroughfares in ways which benefit people other than drivers.

  • vnm

    I couldn’t tell if the audio on the L.I.E. sociopath link was from the video of the sociopaths or from the car ad that was playing at the same time!

  • stairbob

    Cause a traffic jam by blocking off a tunnel with cones: Cuomo seethes with anger.

    Cause a traffic jam by failing to adequately price scarce roadway space: Cuomo shrugs.

  • Danny

    Agreed. The DOT’s presentation even shows that Vanderbilt is the most-used north-south bike route in the entire area. It may well be the better move to upgrade Vanderbilt to a greenway.

  • Kevin Love

    The beliefs and attitudes of these people are accurately described by the Marxist analysis of this situation. See:

  • Simon Phearson

    Does anyone know if the two-way bike lane on 20th Ave. in Queens is “done?” Tried using it this morning, and it was borderline unusable: several points where road work had torn up the asphalt, creating uneven patches surrounded by large gravel and parked cars periodically positioned in the lane.

    I’d been riding in the main traffic lanes, but if the bike lane there is now officially “open,” I am just going to have to find a different route, before I get a ticket for not using the lane.

  • Jonathan R

    What did the 311 operator say when you called?

  • Simon Phearson

    He said, “Ask Streetsblog.”

  • new yorker

    You don’t have to use the bike lane. Cyclists are allowed to take any lane.

  • On a street with a bike lane, we have to use that bIke lane. We can leave the bike lane in order to avoid obstructions or unsafe conditions, or else in order to go into a turn. But we may not simply elect to ignore a bike lane on a street; thus, it is incorrect to say that “cyclists are allowed to take any lane”.

  • Joe R.

    I think the poor pavement Simon mentioned qualifies as an unsafe condition. By me they’re replacing water mains. The 73rd Avenue bike lane has metal plates over it in spots. In my mind that constitutes an unsafe condition which merits leaving the bike lane.

  • Simon Phearson

    The problem is that the 20th Ave. lane is almost impossible to leave, in order to avoid obstructions. Never mind that I was EB, and the bidirectional lane is on the north side (meaning that I’d have to leave the lane while riding into traffic).

    I won’t be surprised if it ends up being an underutilized bike lane. Not every edge street through an industrial area is Kent Avenue. Kent Avenue actually can take you places! But the lanes they’re installing along the perimeter of northwest Queens just seem pointless. I might see a handful of people using the Vernon/Shore/20th Avenue stretch on a typical ride through those areas.

  • BBnet3000

    I don’t know if that’s a bad thing, other than making them vulnerable to the Empty Lanes Attack. They seem like an ideal recreational path and I’d consider using them if I lived up there.

    That said, if it’s using up the quota of Protected Lane miles without serving a lot of riders, the opportunity cost is a problem.