So will the NYPD stop enforcing jaywalking in its ham-handed, racially biased way?
Well, we thought the City Council was planning to order cops to holster that summons book when a pedestrian crossed mid-block or against a light, thanks to a bill by Council Member Mercedes Narcisse that was supposed to decriminalize jaywalking.
Or, as she put it on the Council website, "This bill would permit pedestrians to legally cross a roadway at any point, including outside of a marked or unmarked crosswalk, and allow for crossing against traffic signals. It would legalize the activity commonly referred to as 'jaywalking' and specify that crossing against a traffic signal or crossing at any point outside of a crosswalk will not be a violation of the administrative code and therefore can no longer be the subject of a summons."
We covered the bill intensely. And we also have repeatedly documented the NYPD's racial bias in jaywalking ticketing — which Narcisse called "racial injustice." And we also covered the Department of Transportation's objection to the bill at a hearing earlier this year.
Well, something's up because on Tuesday, a City Council committee passed a watered-down version of the bill — and now we're not sure what the NYPD will do.
The original bill said, "Pedestrians may cross any roadway at any point, including points outside of a marked or unmarked crosswalk. Pedestrians are advised to yield the right of way to all vehicles."
The amended bill says, "Pedestrians may cross any roadway ... at any point, including points outside of a marked or unmarked crosswalk, but shall yield to other traffic that has the right of way."
And when pedestrians are confronted with a steady red hand signal, the original bill said, they "are advised that vehicle traffic has the right of way and pedestrians entering the roadway while this signal is displayed will be at risk of injury."
But the amended bill says that pedestrians "do not have the right of way. Pedestrians entering the roadway in the direction of such signal will be at risk of injury. ... Pedestrians may proceed across the roadway in the direction of a steady upraised hand, but shall yield to other traffic that has the right of way."
The amended bill is expected to pass the full Council on Thursday, so we're going to spend today talking to a few lawyers to figure out if, indeed, jaywalking has been decriminalized.
In other news:
- The Post finally got around to its take on Gov. Hochul's bizarre legal filing in her attempt to defend her congestion pricing "pause."
- Meanwhile, it turns out that New Jersey's anti-congestion pricing lawyer won't become New York City's corporation counsel. (NY Post, NY Times)
- Ridership on the NYC Ferry is up, but expansion, which the City Council wants, is not in the cards. (amNY, Crain's)
- There were more power problems for Amtrak and NJ Transit. (NYDN, NY Post, NY Times, amNY)
- Like Streetsblog, Gothamist was excited about the DOT's plans to actually build the Bedford Avenue bike lane.
- Mathew Bianchi, the cop who said he was demoted for giving a parking ticket to a friend of then-Chief of Patrol Jeffrey Maddrey, just won a $175,000 settlement in the case. (NY Times)
- Speaking of the NYPD, wow, it's increasingly combative, Gothamist reports. Ya think?! Even Mayor Adams sometimes admits it, as Hell Gate showed in its coverage of Hizzoner's virtual press conference yesterday.
- More OMNY machines are coming. (amNY)
- And more weight-in-motion sensors are coming to the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. (Brooklyn Paper)
