We can apportion the blame later in the day, but the greatest walkable city in North America is completely impassible to people on foot or in wheelchairs as the workweek begins.
There's no way to sugar-coat this, so we'll just say it: This is an outrage and must be fixed.
It is well known that building owners are responsible for clearing the sidewalks in front of their buildings (and there's no weekend reprieve). But it is also well known that the city and Metropolitan Transportation Authority are responsible for streets, bus stops and corners.
No one is doing his job right now. The reasons are many, but they boil down to our central outrage about the city's decades-old prioritization of the needs of car drivers over everyone else.
(Update: According to the Department of Sanitation, the storm ended at 8:30 a.m. on Monday, a very generous definition of "ended." Summonsing for unshoveled sidewalks will begin at 12:30 p.m. today. The agency said it has 551 Emergency Snow Shovelers employed alongside the Sanitation workers to keep working on bus stops bike lanes and corners today.)
Here's a sidewalk on White Street in Tribeca that had clearly not seen a shovel since the storm started on Sunday night (no landowners don't get a free pass because the storm started on a weekend):
Here's what pedestrians face as they try to cross Church Street — with speeding drivers heading their way. An Everest:
How is anyone supposed to get across this street when both curb-cuts are blocked by snow?
And what about this person pushing a stroller in the middle of the street because the sidewalk (while seemingly all right for a single walker) isn't cleared enough for families?
Cyclists don't have it any better. Here is the Sixth Avenue "bike lane" on Monday morning (notice how pristine the lane for drivers is):
Here's a set of steps leading from Seeley Street to Prospect Avenue in Brooklyn. Typically, this is shoveled out promptly by the Department of Transportation. But it wasn't at 9 a.m. on Monday:
And here's South Fourth Street in Williamsburg. Passable for cars. Not for pedestrians.
And here's what it looks like to get off a bus right now:
Now, it would be easy to call this column just the rant of an old guy who had a tricky commute into town. And it is.
But multiply that by eight million New Yorkers, all of whom are being encouraged right now by city officials to get around in the safest possible manner after a big storm: by walking.
But it's not safe.
And it's not passable.
And it ain't right.
This is a breaking story and will be updated with more rage later. Send us your stories here or tag us on the socials.
