Skip to Content
Streetsblog New York City home
Streetsblog New York City home
Log In
Bicycling

It’s Bike Month, So NYC Closed the Busiest Bike Route in the Country With No Notice. Again.

Continuing what's become an annual tradition, the Parks Department has set up a bike dismount zone on the Hudson River Greenway for Fleet Week. Adhering to past practice, Parks posted no notice of the detour on its website or Twitter.

The reader who sent the above photo says people are being directed to walk their bikes between 46th and 48th streets. Motor vehicle lanes on the West Side Highway are unaffected.

"Once again no accommodation for cyclists using the busiest bike path in nation on one of the busiest bike weekends," says our tipster.

After last year's surprise shutdown, Parks said the dismount zone was about "[e]nsuring the safety of all." But the dismount zone doesn't address the most severe threat to Fleet Week crowds -- all the lanes of zooming motorized traffic nearby. In 2011 a motorist killed Marine Steve Jorgenson as he and his shipmates exited a cab on the West Side Highway at W. 49th Street during Fleet Week. (This is also the area where a driver fatally struck Jack Koval in a crosswalk last year.)

In the past, the city figured out how to accommodate this event without disrupting bike travel so much. NYPD repurposed a lane of the West Side Highway for greenway users during Fleet Week in 2003. While cycling in the city has only increased since then, today Parks and NYPD apparently give less consideration to cycling as a mode of travel.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog New York City

Friday Video: Meet the Subway’s Straphanger-Free Trains

We've all seen them. Now, thanks to YouTube's "Half as Interesting," we can tell you the purpose of each one.

October 3, 2025

The MTA Is Headed To The Lab To Design The Ridgewood Busway

A filthy private road underneath the elevated M tracks could become a gleaming bus-first corridor.

October 3, 2025

Friday’s Headlines: Good News Edition

The Department of Transportation reports that traffic deaths are way down through the first three quarters of 2025. Plus other news.

October 3, 2025

‘Bean-Counting Street Safety’: Advocates Blast Gale Brewer’s Daylighting Flip-Flop

The Upper West Side pol's inconsistent safety record is getting a second look from activists who once supported her.

October 2, 2025

There’s Good Science Behind the Human Craving for Livable Streets

It's time to understand the science of pedestrian-friendly cities. Or, why streets should be designed like gardens.

October 2, 2025

Thursday’s Headlines: Mourning Becomes Enforcement Edition

Why were cops ticketing cyclists at the very intersection where a bike rider was killed by a driver on Saturday? Plus other news.

October 2, 2025
See all posts