Anatomy of an Operation: How Cops Target Cyclists for New Criminal Summonses

NYPD officers have been deployed all over the city in a weeklong crackdown against allegedly reckless cycling.

Streetsblog encountered one such operation on Sixth Avenue and 24th Street in Chelsea on Tuesday afternoon and watched as a single officer — perhaps working with a plainclothes officer who was not visible — handed out three tickets in rapid succession.

Is this enforcement of dangerous roadway conditions or overzealous policing? You decide:

When this reporter arrived, the cop had just begun writing a ticket, and the suspect, a delivery worker, was standing next to the squad car with his bike. The cop entered and exited the car several times. After 15 minutes, the delivery worker was given a criminal summons.

Before that cyclist had even left the scene, the officer pointed to another rider in the bike lane and instructed him to pull over. Streetsblog had not seen the biker break any traffic rules before being stopped. It is also unclear how the officer could have observed any alleged infraction; he was standing at the corner of Sixth Avenue and 24th, with his back to that intersection, looking southward down Sixth Avenue towards the intersection of 23rd Street, where the infraction, if there was one, would have occurred.

It’s almost a full block away.

The cop who stopped the worker addressed him in Spanish, an indication that the NYPD is aware of the population it is targeting for the new criminal summonses. The majority of Manhattan cyclists are delivery workers.

After giving that delivery worker a ticket, the cop ran across the street to a cyclist who was in the car lane (which is not illegal). That delivery worker, who spoke French, was given a ticket, though it is unclear why. He looked quite disgruntled, likely because he will now have to go to criminal court, which could cost him a day’s wages, on top of whatever fine a judge imposes. There is also a risk of a criminal record. 

After the third worker got his ticket, the officer asked this reporter what he was doing. The reporter replied honestly and the cop did not stop anyone else. A few minutes later, the cop was gone.

The operation was just one of dozens that are and continue to be going on all over the city. It’s been just over one week since the new policy started, and cops have given out criminal summons to cyclists for wearing headphones and stopping just ahead of a painted stop line at intersections — even entirely ginning up offenses on the spot, as Streetsblog has reported.

The criminal summons for operating a bike while wearing headphones is not even eligible for such a charge, but Streetsblog has seen the ticket and can vouch that it is a criminal summons, not a regular traffic ticket.

The NYPD has said it has ramped up criminal summonses in categories such as “reckless” cycling or passing through a red light or riding the wrong way on a one-way street as a way of cracking down on “rogue” electric bike riders, though regular cyclists are being caught in the dragnet.

Transportation Alternatives has created a petition demanding that the NYPD decriminalize the violations and return them to regular traffic violations.

“Everyone who shares our streets needs to follow the law, but targeting people on bikes with criminal summonses for minor traffic violations is not the way to do it,” the petition reads. “This extreme escalation is disproportionate, unequal, and ineffective at addressing safety on our streets.”

Have you received a criminal summons while riding a bike? Streetsblog is collecting riders’ stories. Please email us at tips@streetsblog.org. All identities will be withheld on request.