Manhattan

Imagine if your neighborhood's streets were used as an employee parking lot for a nearby office building, and the people in charge of enforcing the rules turned a blind eye, day in and day out, as they ticketed members of the public but ignored lawbreaking by their colleagues.

The day after a commercial van driver killed an elderly woman in a Manhattan crosswalk, no charges have been filed, though NYPD implied but failed to confirm that the victim had the right of way. The company that employs the driver, meanwhile, refused to say if he will face any disciplinary action, and he could be back behind the wheel tomorrow.

The next time someone tries to tell you that complete street designs with pedestrian islands and protected bike lanes are controversial, point them to what's happening on Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Avenues in Manhattan, where a united coalition of parents, business owners, elected officials, and community boards are begging DOT to design streets in the image of the already-remade First, Second, Eighth, and Ninth Avenues.

Tonight's a big night for livable streets events, with community board meetings on proposals for Greenwich Village, the Lower East Side, and Long Island City. Plus, join Streetsblog at ARTCRANK if you're looking for some fun.

At its annual outdoor meeting in Diversity Plaza last night, Queens Community Board 3 voted to support two traffic safety projects: a new neighborhood Slow Zone in Jackson Heights and nine additional pedestrian refuge islands on Northern Boulevard, one of the borough's most dangerous arterial streets.

Six years ago, when Summer Streets was introduced, the New York Times asked: Will it work? This year, the question is: Why isn't the city doing more of it?

The speed limit will be lowered to 25 miles per hour on eight miles of upper Broadway this summer, DOT announced today.

The Vision Zero town hall roadshow returned to Manhattan last night with a well-attended forum at John Jay College. Elected officials, agency representatives and the public gathered to discuss the city's plan to eliminate traffic fatalities and to offer suggestions for the initiative. Like last week's forum in Astoria, some new details came out over the course of the evening about the city's next steps for Vision Zero -- including hints from NYPD about opening more data to the public. Another highlight: Livery drivers offered their own suggestions to stop the carnage on city streets.