Media Watch

Probably the dumbest part of a stupendously dumb Post story about double-parking tickets and the Columbus Avenue bike lane is this:

It used to be that the tabloids would focus on any mistake by an injured or deceased pedestrian while ignoring what a motorist did, or didn't do, to cause a crash. Now, in the absence of actual evidence that a pedestrian was in any way at fault, the Post has taken to spreading innuendo.

Update: NYPD identified the victim as Martha Tibillin-Guamug, 25, according to the Times Ledger.

The headline in today's Daily News, "Jaywalker in critical condition after being struck by car in Midtown," sets the tone for a particularly heinous example of tabloid victim-blaming.

Earlier this year, the NYPD adopted a policy to stop using the term "accident" to describe traffic collisions. The San Francisco police department made similar changes a few months later. The problem with the term "accident," of course, is that it implies no one was at fault -- that traffic injuries and deaths are just random, unpreventable occurrences. It's part of a cultural permissiveness toward dangerous driving, which in turn contributes to the loss of life.

Today, New Yorkers got a blast from the past in the pages of the New York Post. Less than a week ago, Community Board 7 voted unanimously to ask DOT to study complete streets measures including a protected bike lane on Amsterdam Avenue. For today's paper, the Post sent two reporters to the Columbus Avenue protected bike lane to get some quotes from die-hard bike lane opponents and catch wrong-way cyclists on camera.

Last Friday WNYC ran a piece in which Bronx vehicular crimes chief Joe McCormack explained why he thought Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance failed to file charges against the cab driver who drove onto a Midtown sidewalk and severed the leg of tourist Sian Green. The story offers valuable insight into the mindset of prosecutors, but key questions about the case remain unanswered.

The Observer asked people they deemed to be "influential" New Yorkers for a short piece of advice for Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio. Of the 57 members of what the Observer calls "the peanut gallery," 14 had something to say about transportation.