It's hard to bike in a snowstorm, but people do it.
We know because we saw it on the news. The TV news, to be exact. Saturday night at 11 p.m. on NBC4. The reporter on the scene in Manhattan remarked that the car lanes to her right were relatively cleared of snow, but the bike lanes to her left weren't. The Sanitation Department in 2023 pledged to blow bike lanes on the same timeline as car lanes, but that did not seem to be the case on Saturday night.
But people do bike: Several cyclists came by during the brief TV segment — as you can see below — two in the bike lane and one in general traffic. All three appeared to be delivery workers. Streetsblog reporter Kevin Duggan sent in the above photo from the peak of the storm, also of an apparent deliveryman.
Fortunately the city managed to plow at least some bike lanes — including Prospect Park West, which was cleared of snow by the middle of the next day.
But on residential streets, Sanitation crews tend to plow a car-width-wide travel lane — which cyclists often have to take in order to avoid the accumulated snow and slush on the side of the road (often from drivers who dump the snow from their cars into the roadway). As late as Sunday night, many streets were dangerous in that way, and even painted lanes were still full of slush:
In other news:
- During our December Donation Drive, we like to start our headlines with a tribute to all our donors from the previous day. But on Monday, that means three days. So let’s start: Thanks, Randy! Thanks, Silvia! Thanks, Richard! Thanks, Robert! Thanks Neil! Thanks, Sam! Thanks, AM! Thanks, Albert! Thanks, Adrian! And one lucky donor is going home with our special gift of 2025. You know how to get yours!
- Congrats and jeers to the latest Streetsies winners: For advocate of the year, Baruch and Rafe Herzfeld. For failure of the year, DOT's flawed daylighting study. For project of the year, congestion pricing. Check out all our Streetsies features here to vote in the polls that remain open.
- With less than three days until Zohran Mamdani becomes mayor, people are coming from across the globe to see it. (NY Times)
- Street homelessness is among the city's top issues as Mamdani takes office, Gothamist reported.
- Municipal Art Society President Keri Butler on "The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces." (The City)
- Meet the MetroCard-inspired artists devastated and "in denial" about the end of the fare payment system ... (NY Post)
- ... and the newspaper ginning up concerns about the fare card's upcoming demise. (NY Post)
- What were amNY's transit headlines of 2025?
