Cycle of Rage: Horrific Williamsburg Crash Is A Wake-Up Call To Fix Bedford

It happened at night, but it was a real wake-up call.

A car driver who was already maneuvering around illegally parked cars on both sides of Bedford Avenue on Sunday night was struck and had his car overturned when the driver of another double-parked vehicle nudged into him — a crash that underscores anew how dangerous the roadway has become since the city removed a protected bike lane at the behest of local leaders.

The above footage of the 11:12 p.m. crash comes from dashboard camera obtained by Williamsburg News, the seminal neighborhood website. The crash occurred on Bedford Avenue between Myrtle and Park avenues, which is part of the segment of Bedford where the city removed a protected bike lane in late July 2025 — one that it had only finished installing along a much-longer stretch of the roadway in late 2024.

Williamsburg News called Sunday’s crash an “accident,” but it was anything but a random event without cause; indeed, it is the result of choices made by government, law enforcement, and drivers.

For instance, the drivers of double-parked cars on either side of the roadway — one in the painted bike lane on the left, the other in one travel lane on the right behind a double-parked school bus — made a choice to ignore city law. And the driver of the black sedan made a choice to nudge into traffic without care.

Additionally, the NYPD has made a choice not to properly crack down on double-parking on this dangerous stretch, as Streetsblog has reported.

Nor has any agency of government cracked down on drivers with excessive speed-camera violations; the driver of the car that flipped, a Mazda, has been nabbed by cameras 20 times for speeding and twice for running red lights in less than a year and a half, yet has faced no recriminations because the $50 tickets have been paid.

And the Mamdani administration has chosen not to restore the bike lane between Willoughby and Flushing avenues as candidate Zohran Mamdani promised during his campaign. Without the protection of parked cars, cyclists are often laid waste in crashes such as this or the one that claimed the life of cyclist Jose Alzorriz.

The Mamdani administration’s inaction on Bedford is a particularly odd choice, given that after the bike lane between Atlantic and Flushing avenues was completed in late 2024, the Department of Transportation said that total injuries on the stretch had dropped by “more than 12 percent” and “by more than 38 percent for pedestrians.” Notably, total injuries in the stretch between DeKalb and Flushing were down 47 percent, the agency said.

Since removing the protected portion of the bike lane between Willoughby and Flushing avenues, safety has declined. As city statistics reveal, in the seven months when there was a full, uninterrupted protected bike lane on Bedford from just north of Atlantic Avenue to Flushing Avenue, there were 31 reported crashes, injuring nine cyclists. But in the seven months after the protection was removed on the northernmost three blocks, there were 34 reported crashes on the stretch, injuring 13 cyclists — an 85-percent increase in cyclist injuries, albeit a small sample size.

Still, advocates for safety are furious at what the video depicts.

“This crash is a wake-up call because double-parked cars on Bedford Avenue create dangerous conditions that put everyone at risk,” said Baruch Herzfeld, who, with his son, had unsuccessfully sued the city to prevent the removal of the lane. “The mayor promised during the campaign that he would fix this, and six months later nothing has changed. I’m furious because this could literally be fixed overnight with paint: restore the protected bike lane that the Adams DOT removed and stop treating this ‘bike lane’ like a parking lot.”

The crash also comes as Williamsburg’s Hasidic community has emphasized personal responsibility of pedestrians to avoid being struck by the neighborhood’s notorious drivers. A new public service campaign has popped up at corners, urging young children to find an adult to “cross” them — meaning that children are being told wait for an adult and have that adult accompany the child across the street.

The neighborhood and its media outlets have consistently blamed children and their parents when they are struck or almost struck by drivers, but has also blamed cyclists and the protected bike lane when children are struck or almost struck by cyclists.

It is as if Williamsburg community leaders see children who jump into the roadway as perpetrators of their own demise if they jump in front of car drivers, but can see those same children as victims if they jump into the portion of the roadway set aside for cyclists.

For example, after a child on a scooter was struck by a car driver after scootering into the roadway, Williamsburg News reported, “Parents are asked to teach their kids the importance of safety while riding a bike or scooter especially while crossing the street.” (The outlet often tweets this advice.)

But after a cyclist grazed a child who had crossed the protected bike lane, Williamsburg News didn’t mention the child’s act or his parent’s apathy, but blamed “the dangerous bike lane.” (The outlet tweets this often.)

Such coverage was instrumental in convincing the Adams administration to remove part of the just-installed bike lane in order to appease community leaders in Williamsburg, where voting is typically by bloc.

During the same election campaign, then-Assembly Member Mamdani pledged to complete and restore projects either canceled or undone by the corrupt mayor.

“We need a politics where the decision is not determined by the last person who calls you, and just how much money they have,” he told reporters, speaking more generally about the shortcomings of the then-mayor. “Working people can and must be safe. … And we will make decisions with safety as the imperative.”

The DOT did not respond to a request for comment on the Bedford crash. The NYPD initially said it had no information on the injuries from Sunday’s crash or whether anyone was ticketed, but later said that the 30-year-old Mazda driver and her 9-year-old passenger were taken to an area hospital with minor injuries. The driver of the car that nudged the Mazda fled on foot, cops said.