From the first (and only) town-hall meeting of the Manhattan Borough President’s Planning for Pedestrians Council in 1987, to Manhattan Community Board 8’s “Bicycle Forum” this week, I’ve sat through innumerable gatherings on cyclist-pedestrian conflicts.

Cycling and pedestrian advocates, with Charles Komanoff at left, gather on the UES in 2007. Photo: Jonathan Barkey

The CB 8 forum on Tuesday evening did have hopeful elements, however. Local residents wanting more bike and pedestrian infrastructure and fewer cars outnumbered those who wanted cyclists put in their place. None of the five elected officials in attendance played the anti-bike card; all seemed receptive to the livable streets agenda. And one or two attendees who professed to be terrified by bicycles even took pains to support bike lanes.

Some highlights:

• Deputy Borough President Rosemonde Pierre-Louis “commend[ing] City DOT and Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan for their visionary work to make New York City more walkable and bikeable.” (City Council Member Jessica Lappin had a more guarded version of the same message.)
• Council Member Daniel Garodnick deflecting criticism from a pro-congestion pricing audience member by insisting he had been a “strong, outspoken supporter” of Mayor Bloomberg’s toll plan and, by implication, could be counted on to champion traffic pricing in the future.
  
• A diverse collection of Upper East Siders — a 50-something male attorney who has cycled to work for decades, a young woman who recently took up bike-commuting, a female African-American community board member, and a husky pedestrian who pronounced himself too un-coordinated to ride a bike — passionately and eloquently speaking up for cycling and cycle facilities. Here are some of their remarks:

“Cycling makes me healthy.”
“After biking to work, I feel good all day.”
“Cycling is saving my life.”
“Broadway is really great, Second Avenue is awful.”
“Summer Streets was fabulous.”
“There’s been nothing to teach people how to use these new streets.”
“A message should be sent by the community board to the District Attorney and the NYPD that there needs to be a re-evaluation of our priorities to protect cyclists and pedestrians.”

Okay, it wasn’t all a lovefest. There were these complaints from several women of a certain age, CB 8 members all:

“Transit is a priority, cars are a priority, bikes are not a priority.”
“The thought of having double, triple, quadruple the number of cyclists terrifies me.”
“The bicyclists have become the darlings of the [Bloomberg] administration, even though the number of bicyclists is a rounding error compared to the number of fire engines, buses and taxis.”
“One day we woke up to find all these circles and lines on our streets.”
“You’re afraid to go outside … You can’t be sure you’re not going to be killed [by a bicyclist].”
“I’d like to see bicycles registered and bicyclists licensed.”

None of the electeds took up the call for registering bikes. NYS Assembly Member Jonathan Bing and NYS Senator Liz Krueger did call on Albany to stiffen penalties for restaurants whose delivery cyclists flout laws against riding on sidewalks. Lappin has a local law in the works to allow the city to penalize the owners of restaurants and other businesses whose delivery staff ride on sidewalks or violate one-way rules or red lights. A hearing on her Intro. 624 is set for 10 a.m. next Thursday.

Garodnick has a bill pending, Intro. 813, to require the NYPD to post delivery-bicycle violations on line “to help send a message and give restaurants a reason to improve their practices.” Garodnick is also drafting legislation to increase penalties for operating motorized bicycles, which in his view are becoming more common (I agree), on sidewalks.

My verdict on the forum? The pervasive tonedeafness toward bikes (e.g., transportation committee co-chair Jonathan Horn categorizing all cyclists as either recreational or delivery) would have dumbfounded a visitor from Portland or Copenhagen. Any practitioner of risk management or harm reduction would have been appalled by the electeds’ indifference to motorized mayhem. And it’s still possible that the make-the-bikes-go-away ladies will carry the day at the October 7 CB 8 Transportation Committee meeting, when issues raised at the forum get turned into resolutions.

There was also a disconnect between the officials’ insistence that “pedestrians’ grievances about bikes is one of our top complaints” (Garodnick) and the sparse turnout (around 50, many of whom were pro-bike). Still, I came away feeling that, unlike 22 years ago, the embattled minority isn’t cyclists but the anti-bikes. We may never get them to turn against autos, but we might, finally, be outnumbering and out-organizing them.

The Daily Politics got hold of the letter [PDF], which appears below in full, including the names of its 20 signatories -- some of whom, like David Yassky and Melissa Mark-Viverito, are pricing supporters.

Dear Mayor Bloomberg:

We are writing to urge you to correct an unfairness in the "congestion pricing" policy proposed by the Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission, prior to the upcoming votes in the City Council and the State Legislature.

We are concerned that the burden of paying for congestion pricing will fall too heavily on New York City residents - and in particular on residents of Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx and Staten Island - while commuters from outside the City will remain unaffected.

Under the current proposal, bridge and tunnel toll payments would be credited against the $8 congestion charge. This means that commuters who currently pay tolls to use the Port Authority and Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority river crossings will pay no additional congestion fee. The bulk of these drivers live outside of New York City. At the same time, drivers who enter Manhattan via the Brooklyn Bridge, the Manhattan Bridge or the Williamsburg Bridge will pay the full $8 congestion charge. Most of these drivers do live within New York City.

This is blatantly unfair.

Indeed, the Final Report of the Congestion Pricing Commission itself appears to recognize the unfairness when it states: "The Commission recommends that the State Legislature consider the concerns raised by some Commissioners regarding the contribution of commuters from west of the Hudson River to the MTA Capital Plan."

We ask you, as the primary architect of the congestion pricing plan, to act to remedy the unfairness, either by amending the plan to require commuters from outside New York City to pay a congestion fee in addition to bridge and tunnel tolls, or by forcing the Port Authority to agree to devote a significant portion of their revenue from Hudson River crossings to funding mass transit in New York City (as suggested in the sentence quoted above from the Commission Report).

One proposal for addressing the unfairness would be to give drivers a full credit for bridge and tunnel tolls only if they reside in one of the five boroughs; under this proposal, drivers from outside the City would be given partial credit for toll payments but would still be required to pay some fee for entering the congestion zone. This would improve the existing plan in three ways. First, it would treat New York City residents more equitably in comparison to New Jersey commuters; while City residents would still bear the brunt of the new charges, the unfairness would be lessened. Second, it would raise substantially more revenue than the current proposal, with no additional cost; this revenue would enable more significant expansions in mass transit service than are envisioned in the Commission proposal. Third, it would make the policy more effective in reducing congestion by giving New Jersey commuters an incentive to choose mass transit.

We have been told by members of your Administration that a concern has been raised as to the constitutionality of a plan that provides a different toll credit to City residents than is provided to non-residents. After consulting with constitutional law scholars, we are confident that our proposal is constitutionally valid - just like, for example, the current practice of allowing Staten Island residents to pay a reduced fare for using the Verrazano Bridge.

As an alternative to adjusting the toll credit, another way to address the unfair burden on City residents would be to require the Port Authority to contribute a significant portion of its revenue from tolls on the Holland Tunnel, the Lincoln Tunnel and the George Washington Bridge to the Metropolitan Transit Authority, for use in funding system improvements within the City. We note that in expectation of the congestion pricing policy, the Port Authority cynically raised the tolls on the crossings it controls, so that those tolls will be exactly the same as the $8 congestion fee - thus ensuring that revenue generated from drivers who use those crossings will be spent by the Port Authority rather than on mass transit. Either of the two proposals discussed in this letter - capping the toll credit, or requiring a Port Authority contribution to the MTA - would ensure that more of the revenue generated from driving commuters goes to mass transit, and would help force the Port Authority to be a more responsible partner in planning and implementing the region's transportation network.

Finally, we note that some of the signatories to the letter support the idea of congestion pricing; others do not, or have concerns beyond the unfairness of the plan's burden on City residents in comparison to non-resident commuters. All of us, however, believe strongly that this unfairness must be corrected.

Sincerely,

Council Members,

Yassky
James
Mark-Viverito
Garodnick
Brewer
Koppell
Jackson
Gioia
Seabrook
Felder
Vacca
White
Mendez
Liu
Gentile
Lappin
Stewart
Vallone
Rivera
Dilan

Only three days remain until 20 percent of government parking placards must be surrendered, but as Gridlock Sam wrote here last month, that should be just the beginning of placard reform. Case in point: Uncivil Servants featured a story last week of an Upper East Side synagogue that manufactures its own bogus placards while the 19th Precinct turns a blind eye and infamous Community Board 8 lends a hand. Uncivil Servants reports that employees of the Park East Synagogue on East 68th Street have been getting away with the printing of homemade placards since the attacks of September 11, 2001:

The original baloney excuse for their parking was terrorism following 911 but the truth is they have used the tragedy of 911 as an excuse to get a free parking perk at the expense of the community. The signage by the way is either NO STANDING or NO PARKING 7AM - 7 PM. The location of this abuse is East 68th Street between Lexington and Third Avenues on both the South and North side of the street where typically you will find 8 to 10 of Park East employees' personal vehicles parked all day using bogus xeroxed placards.

Post columnist David Seifman picked up the story on Sunday, writing that the synagogue has agreed to gradually reduce -- but not eliminate -- its use of false permits, in a scheme brokered by Community Board 8:

"After a very lengthy and detailed discussion, [Park East] agreed to the recommendation that they reduce the number of placards to eight by the end of June 2008, then decrease by four by June 2009, and two the following year, until the number of placards in use is reduced to two by June 2010," said the e-mail from Assistant District Manager Latha Thompson.

City Councilman Dan Garodnick (D-Manhattan) told The Post the community board was way out of bounds. "It's unacceptable for individuals to be generating their own parking placards," he said.

Seifman also reports that Park East director Joel Baum offered an alternative explanation for the placards. Baum says they are used by teachers at the synagogue who are following the example set by the city's public school teachers. More proof that once one group claims a special privilege, the circle of entitlement tends to widen.

Photo: Dick Tracy / Uncivil Servants

The City's plan to stripe a bike lane across the Upper East Side continues to generate "controversy." I put that word in quotes because, well, check out the video above and see for yourself what all the fuss is all about. The video was filmed on a beautiful Saturday afternoon at about 2:00 pm, theoretically, prime time for a neighborhood "play street." Yet, you'll see almost no one using the street except two cyclists, one of them a 9-year-old boy, slowly making their way up the pedestrianized street. They are clearly a danger... to no one.

Conflict over the City's bike plan centers around the car-free block of 91st Street between 2nd and 3rd Avenues, pictured above. What is most remarkable about this conflict is the fact that the City isn't planning to make a single design change to the neighborhood's beloved pedestrian mall. DOT's plan is to end the bike lane on either side of the car-free block. Central Park-bound, uphill-traveling cyclists will be able to use the street as part of their bike route. Pedestrians will still have priority.

DOT representatives, elected officials and community members held a site visit a few weeks ago. Word has it, bike lane opponents assembled a Potemkin playground complete with about a dozen children playing in the middle of the street. According to one participant, no more than five minutes after the meeting ended, all of the children picked up their toys and returned to a small park area south of the neighborhood's "play street" where they normally play when not being used as props.

As was the case during the 9th Street bike lane controversy in Park Slope, Brooklyn, it would be hard to take these vociferous opponents of white stripes on asphalt seriously, except that local elected officials do take them seriously. The Upper East Side opposition even has a City Council member from outside the district fighting against the new bike route. After the jump you'll find a letter from Daniel Garodnick, someone you might think of as one of City Council's smart, progressive bright lights and a good potential choice as New York City's next Council Speaker.

Question for Mr. Garodnick: If a Council member can't stand the neighborhood-level political heat over a mere bike lane, what kind of leadership is he likely to show when it comes time to help New Yorkers understand and accept the array of changes that have to be made in response to climate change, fossil fuel depletion and other large scale environmental challenges now impending?

In the past, my group, the Upper Greenside, has worked with Lappin to bring new greenmarkets to our neighborhood as well as other environmental issues. Based on our conversations about traffic, she seemed very positive about the idea of congestion pricing. She once wrote a letter to former DOT commissioner Iris Weinshall at our request about the dangerous traffic congestion around the Queensboro Bridge.

Last Friday, while Mayor Bloomberg was testifying in front of the State Assembly about congestion pricing, I accompanied Ann Seligman from Environmental Defense on a visit to Lappin's legislative office to advocate for the mayor's plan. Lappin jumped in immediately, saying, "I support congestion pricing, I just have some tough questions about the details." She described her position as close to Governor Spitzer's. She wants to see something happen but has some concerns over the plan's details.

 
I was glad to hear that her position was generally pro-congestion pricing, but I'm still disappointed in her lack of leadership on this issue, especially when compared to Council Member Dan Garodnick who shares much of the Upper East Side with Lappin.

If you live in Lappin's district, consider calling her office at (212) 535-5554 to give her a push in the right direction. Better yet, she's hosting a town hall meeting this Thursday. I strongly encourage Livable Streets advocates to show up and and ask her and other elected officials about their positions on congestion pricing, bicycling and and other urban environmental issues.

Anticipating a vote in the City Council this afternoon to override the mayor's veto of Intro 331-A, a bill to regulate pedicabs, a group of pedicab operators was demonstrating outside the American Museum of Natural History after Bloomberg's big Earth Day speech.

Handing out leaflets with the numbers of swing councilmembers like Daniel Garodnick, the pedicabbers came up to members of the press leaving the museum and asked for help with media coverage of their issue. Periodically the demonstrators chanted: "We're not in the way, we are the way!"

Members of the group said they fit perfectly with the sustainability plan the mayor had just outlined inside.

"I am zero emissions, that's what I do," said Jesse White, a pedicabber who was leading chants. "Intro 331-A will shut us down."

Photo: Sarah Goodyear 

Left to right: New York City Department of Transportation Deputy Commissioner/Senior Policy Advisor David Woloch, Commissioner Iris Weinshall, a procurement and technical servicea aide and City Councilmembers John Liu and Gale Brewer.

As I saw it, the three big bullet points to come out of yesterday's City Council Transportation Committee hearing on Intro. 199, the Traffic Information & Relief Bill were as follows:

• DOT Commissioner Iris Weinshall expressed unequivocal opposition to Intro. 199. See below for her reasons. She also told a Newsday reporter that New York City's traffic congestion is more an issue of public perception than a transportation policy and management problem. New York City traffic congestion, the Commissioner says, only seems worse than it ever has been. 
• Councilmember Daniel Garodnick announced mid-hearing that he would sign on as a co-sponsor of the bill. Garodnick's support tips the balance of the Transportation Committee in favor of Intro. 199 and ensures that the bill can move to a full Council vote. With 24 co-sponsors, the bill is two votes shy of passage and 11 votes short of a veto-proof majority. Still, it is hard to imagine that Mayor Bloomberg will allow City Council to pass this kind of legislation. Expect some sort of pre-emptive action from the other side of City Hall. 
• DOT Deputy Commissioner Michael Primeggia provided the day's highlight when he used the traffic engineering term "pedestrian interference" in describing how a street's "Level of Service" is calculated. What a priceless glimpse in to the profession of traffic engineering and the mind of the man who, essentially, owns and operates New York City's streets. The next time you're almost hit by an aggressive SUV driver while crossing the street, think of yourself not as a victim but as "pedestrian interference" impeding that motorist's Level of Service. As for all of the activities that Danish urban designer Jan Gehl refers to as "public life?" Turns out it's actually "pedestrian interference." 

Yesterday's hearing kicked off with Committee Chair John Liu's assertion that New York City is experiencing "unprecedented traffic congestion of epic proportions." Intro. 199, he said, is aimed at helping the city manage its traffic congestion by collecting data in a new way. "We need to pro-actively manage traffic. In order to manage it we have to be able to measure it."

Intro. 199, in short, compels the City to "develop and monitor performance targets with the aim of assessing and reducing the amount of traffic citywide and within each borough." Rather than focusing on "output measures" like the number of traffic lights repaired and potholes filled as DOT currently does in the annual Mayor's Management Report, the new legislation would mandate that DOT evaluate itself based on "targets" built around specific transportation policy objectives such as reducing congestion and pollution and increasing the percentage of trips taken on buses, bike and by foot. This is similar to the kind of data collection now being done in London (see the bottom of this Transport for London press release to access TfL's massive, detailed, annual traffic congestion monitoring report).

Flanked by two aides, Commissioner Weinshall was first to testify. "Under the Bloomberg Administration, DOT has made reducing vehicular congestion and bolstering alternative modes one of our primary goals," she said. She cited the ongoing Bus Rapid Transit study, the Thru Streets program, Muni Meters and the recent bike lane expansion as examples.

Weinshall then cited five reasons for her opposition to Intro. 199 (her full testimony can be found here). First, the City Charter already requires that DOT submit data to the annual Mayor's Management Report so "any legislation to require additional reporting seems redundant." Second, DOT "is already, in fact, collecting and making available much of the data the bill contemplates." Third, DOT is about two years away from having "new advancing technology as a means to collect data" so it would be premature to make the agency set policy targets now. Fourth, collecting all of this data would be burdensome and expensive. Finally, transportation issues are regional. "Intro. 199 seems to ignore the multi agency nature of our transportation systems," she said. Weinshall also reported that DOT is planning to increase its data collection contract from $600,000 over two years to $3 million.

After her testimony, Liu asked the Commissioner if she thought New York City has a traffic congestion problem. "We would not characterize it as a crisis. We'd characterize it as a challenge," she said. Deputy Commissioner Primeggia added that Central Business District traffic counts were one to two percent higher than their pre-9/11 all-time highs. Weinshall said the increase in traffic is "an indication of the vitality and the growth of the city of New York." This particular rationale for not doing anything to change the dysfunctional status quo of New York City's streets is also used by Weinshall's boss, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the MTA.

Weinshall frequently pointed to the reams of data that the agency already collects and repeated her willingness to share that data with Councilmembers. During his testimony, Chad Marlow, president of the Public Advocacy Group, said that that particular point "warrants further examination." 

"I find it peculiar that, so often, when an individual Councilmember needs something done involving traffic or transportation, say, the installation of a new traffic signal or traffic calming measure, DOT's response is, 'We don't have data to back that up,'" Marlow said.

"Yet in their testimony, all the DOT could talk about was how much data they already have and how happy they are to share it. I'm more persuaded by DOT's day-to-day responses to Councilmember's real world problems than by the claims they made at this hearing."