The gathering threat.

The bill also includes language requiring bike parking in new buildings, mirroring a zoning amendment unveiled by the Department of City Planning earlier this week.

Yassky spokesman Jake Maguire stressed that the bill is about access. "It's a no-brainer that if you want people to stop driving and relieve crowding on subways, you need to allow people to bring their bikes to work," he said. "Hopefully this bill will have a speedy hearing and a speedy debate in the Council. With the support of 30 members we expect it to pass before the end of the year."

To review: The bill provides for bike access to existing buildings (which will constitute the vast majority of commuting destinations long into the future), and bike parking in new buildings. A few weeks ago transportation analyst Charles Komanoff gave us a quick-and-dirty estimate that bike commuting could rise up to 50 percent as a result of universal access to workplace buildings.

Crain's Insider has reported that the Real Estate Board of New York opposes the Bikes in Buildings Bill. REBNY President Steve Spinola sent a letter to Streetsblog Wednesday outlining his organization's stance, and confirmed his opposition to the new bill in a phone interview this morning. He questioned the city's legal authority to mandate bike access and cited concerns about liability, arguing that access should be expanded voluntarily by building managers. More on that exchange later.

Photo: kate at yr own risk/Flickr

With help from Transportation Alternatives, a group of mothers and families known as Mobilized Moms led a  car-free Central Park rally on Tuesday. Streetfilms' Robin Urban Smith says about 50 supporters, including Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and City Council Member Gale Brewer, came out in support of the Moms, who marched from Central Park West and 72nd Street to the Naumburg Bandshell.

The group plans to collect kids' artwork from the event, along with written correspondence, for a book to send to Mayor Bloomberg in hopes that a car-free trial period might finally be instituted. 

Yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg signed into law Intro 199, a bill requiring New York City's Department of Transportation to collect and monitor data specifically aimed at helping the city "to reduce automobile traffic and encourage more sustainable means of transportation vital to combating congestion, pollution and improving the City’s long term economic health." The new law could signal a significant change for a city agency that has typically measured its own performance based on how many potholes it fills, street lamps it fixes and how well it keeps motor vehicle traffic flowing through the city's over-burdened street grid. 

"You measure what you care about," said Transportation Alternatives executive director Paul Steely White, an architect of the new legislation. "Traditionally DOT has not cared enough about bus riders, cyclists, and pedestrians. The bill is really seeking to understand more about how much bicycling there is now, how much walking activity, and to look at bus ridership and bus speeds. Armed with this information, DOT can set targets for improving those modes."

Passed by the City Council in a 48-0 vote on May 15, Intro 199 creates a framework for DOT to set goals for traffic reduction and the growth of cycling and bus ridership. A version of the bill was first proposed in 2006, but was quashed early last year in the waning days of DOT Commissioner Iris Weinshall's administration. It was revived with the support of Council Member Gale Brewer, DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, and Transportation Alternatives.

Though the new legislation is light on detail and lays out no specific transportation policy goals, it codifies the emphasis on alternative modes of transportation seen in DOT's strategic plan, Sustainable Streets. "The new DOT regime has recognized that the bill is really an opportunity to lock in a lot of the change that they've been making happen," said White. "This is part and parcel to Commissioner Sadik-Khan's stated intent to change the DNA of the agency."

In a written statement, the mayor said:

Introductory Number 199-A advances the goals of PlaNYC by requiring the City's Department of Transportation to take a macro-view of traffic in our City. The Department will collect and make available performance indicators that are relevant to reducing traffic and promoting higher performance traffic modes. Such indicators will include, for example, information on bicycle usage, ferry ridership and vehicle speed data.

Streetsblog has a request in to DOT to find out if the new metrics will be incorporated into the Mayor's Management Report, the document released each year that tracks the performance of city agencies. In the past, the MMR has focused on output measures like fixing traffic signals and potholes. Metrics like pedestrian and cyclist fatalities are tracked in the report, but no targets are set. White believes that might change: "If you look at what's in 199 and Sustainable Streets, there are a lot of really good metrics in both documents that should be incorporated into the MMR."

In referring to "higher-performance traffic modes," the bill sets another precedent. "For the first time," said White, "the city is recognizing that biking and walking are not just good for the city's air quality, but make the most efficient use of our scarce street space." By acknowledging that there is a "spatial dividend" to these modes, he added, the city is setting the stage for quality-of-life improvements that result from a re-allocation of space, like wider sidewalks, which would help make PlaNYC and other green initiatives more palpable for New Yorkers.

City Council Member Rosie Mendez has introduced a bill to overturn the NYPD's parade permit rules, which require groups of over 50 to obtain a permit before assembling. Enacted a year ago, the rules were seen as a way for the city to subvert Critical Mass rides and have been the subject of civil rights action and at least one lawsuit.

Mendez, along with Alan Gerson and Gale Brewer, were to introduce the "First Amendment Assembly Act" yesterday. According to a media release, the bill [PDF] "decriminalizes parading without a permit and allows groups that need exceptions to various laws, such as traffic laws, to obtain such for their events."

Streetsblog has posted consistently on how the NYPD seems more intent on harassing cyclists than protecting them. And just last week Commissioner Ray Kelly got an earful from citizens who are fed up with unsafe conditions for cyclists and pedestrians.

The full press release from Mendez follows the jump.

COUNCIL MEMBER MENDEZ INTRODUCES BILL TO PROTECT THE FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHT TO ASSEMBLE

Wednesday March 26th 2008

At today's Stated City Council meeting, Council Member Rosie Mendez (District 2, Manhattan), along with Council Members Alan Gerson and Gale Brewer, will introduce a bill to balance the NYPD's duty to ensure public safety with citizens' right to free assembly. If enacted into law, the bill will override the parade permit rules adopted by the NYPD a year ago which were created without City Council oversight and require any group of 50 or more to obtain a permit. Currently, anyone in such a group without a permit is subject to arrest.

A copy of the legislation being introduced can be downloaded from the Assemble For Rights NYC website:
http://www.assembleforrightsnyc.org/files/a4r/legal/parade_bill_final_draft.doc

"Groups wishing to assemble and stay within the limits of the law should not be required to obtain a permit; the First Amendment is our permit" stated Council Member Mendez. "Larger assemblies that want the police to
assist in managing traffic along their route and ensure security should be able to apply for a permit through a fair and transparent process. This bill sets forth clear guidelines for each instance."

The First Amendment Assembly Act, based on legislation drafted by the civil rights advocacy group Assemble For Rights NYC, decriminalizes parading without a permit and allows groups that need exceptions to various laws, such as traffic laws, to obtain such for their events.

A parade permit will not be required when:
* A group believes their proposed assembly will not prevent other lawful uses of the same city public space and the expected attendance of the assembly will be less than 100, or
* The assembly is an immediate and spontaneous response to an event.

The Act also sets forth guidelines for the NYPD to facilitate peaceful assemblies even when a group should have obtained a permit but did not. Furthermore, the Act also encourages calmer resolutions to assemblies which become too difficult for the NYPD to facilitate: these guidelines include providing clearly communicated dispersal orders and reasonable opportunities to disperse before making any arrests.

The Act is similar to rules which were created to govern assemblies in Washington D.C. in the wake of mass arrests that eventually cost D.C. millions in civil penalties. D.C.'s laws have successfully reduced tensions between police and citizens there, and significantly reduced that city's legal liability to wrongful arrest civil suits, while ensuring public safety.

Assemble For Rights NYC (http://assembleforrightsnyc.org), is a coalition of over two dozen organizations dedicated to keeping free speech alive and well in New York City.

Photo: Doug Letterman/Flickr

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

This holiday season, users of Central and Prospect Parks got an unexpected and welcome gift after years of finding coal (and exhaust) in their stockings. Interestingly, the sources of that exhaust didn't seem to complain (or perhaps even notice) that things had changed.

For years, cars have been barred from most of the Parks' Loop Drives during weekday non-rush hours. But year after year, an exception has been made for the period between Thanksgiving and New Years when the city has temporarily lifted the weekday traffic ban. They called it "Holiday Hours." The reason, to quote a 2005 Department of Transportation press release, was "to provide additional capacity to help process the expected increase in vehicular trips during the holiday season" and, as former DOT Commissioner Iris Weinshall said in 2006, "to help make room for the many people that want to enjoy our City's attractions." In other words: Accommodating more motor vehicle traffic was the mitigation for too much motor vehicle traffic.

Whether there is any evidence that "additional capacity" is needed or does anything more than fuel traffic congestion was the subject of a post on this site in November 2006 (see "Sacrificing Central Park to Appease the Traffic Gods"). But there is no doubt that the sudden appearance of car traffic during times of day that have been car-free for the previous ten months has been an annual jolt to the park's thousands of recreational users.

This year, however, at the urging of Transportation Alternatives, DOT for the first time quietly failed to open the Parks' gates to the anticipated crush of Santas hurtling to Midtown to fill their SUVs with gifts. The suspension of car-free hours was itself suspended. What ensued is instructive: nothing.

DOT officials say that they didn't receive any calls or complaints through 311 and the Mayor's Community Assistance Unit heard nothing from motorists furious that they hadn't received their customary holiday handout. Traffic congestion around the Parks did not appear to be any worse than usual.

But while drivers may not have noticed or cared much, the Parks' recreational users certainly did. According to a DOT official, the agency received considerable feedback through e-mail and other means from people who noticed that weekday car-free hours in Central and Prospect Parks remained intact during the holidays and were pleased. T.A., too, heard from many delighted park users, some of whom could not believe their eyes (or their lungs).

"We're going to keep reviewing how it went, but certainly we'd look to do it again next holiday season," the DOT official said. "At this point we see no reason to make a change."

All this bodes well for the three-month trial closing of both parks to traffic this summer, a long-overdue measure being pushed by TA and numerous elected officials, including Upper West Side Council Member Gale A. Brewer, who introduced the car-free summer legislation two years ago. To be sure, drivers are more likely to notice when a privilege is taken away rather than simply not reinstated. But nearly every incremental restriction of car traffic in both parks has been preceded by dire predictions of traffic cataclysm. Time and time again, these fears have proved groundless.

The holiday hours story should embolden officials to take an extended holiday from traffic and make Central and Prospect Parks the refuges they were meant to be.

Photo: Swruler9284 / Flickr

Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan and Chinese Chamber of Commerce Chairman David J. Louie will distribute free NYC bicycle helmets to delivery workers on Tuesday, June 26th, 2007. The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene will also distribute reflective safety vests at the event. The helmet fitting and distribution will be held from 12:00 pm to 2:00 pm at the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, 62 Mott Street.

The event is intended to inform businesses and bicycle operators about two new laws that take effect on July 26th, 2007 and were sponsored by Council members Gale Brewer and Alan Gerson, both of whom attended today's announcement.

The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene has begun a pilot program to provide delivery workers with reflective vests that increase cyclists' visibility and allow for easy display of identifying information. Under city law, commercial cyclists must display a sign indicating their employer's name and a personal, three-digit identification number.

• New York City Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum
• Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stringer
• New York State Senator Liz Krueger (District 26)
• New York State Senator Eric T. Schneiderman (District 31)
• New York State Senator Jose Serrano Jr. (District 28)
• New York State Assembly Member Karim Camara (District 43)
• New York State Assembly Member Adriano Espaillat (District 72)
• New York State Assembly Member Richard N. Gottfried (District 75)
• New York State Assembly Member Brian Kavanagh (District 74)
• New York City Council Member Gale A. Brewer (District 6)
• New York City Council Member Simcha Felder (District 44)
• New York City Council Member Daniel R. Garodnick (District 4)
• New York City Council Member James Sanders Jr. (District 31)
• New York City Council Member Larry B. Seabrook (District 12)
• New York City Council Member James Vacca (District 13)
• New York City Council Member Melissa Mark Viverito (District 8 )
• New York City Council Member David Yassky (District 33)

And here are some quotes from the Campaign's press release: 

State Senator Jose M. Serrano said, "I proudly endorse the many great proposals in Mayor Bloomberg's PlaNYC, including his call for congestion pricing. I believe congestion pricing is one of the keys to reducing automobile traffic and carbon emissions throughout the city. As an elected official representing parts of Upper Manhattan and The Bronx, my support is based upon assurances of a robust commitment to enhancing mass transit, and addressing the localized concerns of neighborhoods outside of the Central Business District. I applaud the Mayor for his great vision, and I look forward to working with him to make sure that vision becomes a reality."

State Senator Liz Krueger said, "Traffic congestion is much more than just an annoyance for drivers who get stuck in their vehicles - it has far-reaching negative consequences to New Yorkers' health and quality of life. There are senior citizens, the mobility-impaired, and families with young children who are regularly afraid to even leave the block they live on. Traffic 'blocking the box' places pedestrian safety at risk, allows less personal time for people to spend with their families, and leads to auto emissions that increase pollution and the asthma rate. A system of congestion pricing, implemented after improving access to, and the reliability of, mass transit in all 5 boroughs, will greatly benefit the every-day lives of all New Yorkers."

State Senator Schneiderman said, "The genius and breath of vision embodied in the PlaNYC proposal reminds us that government can act as an engine for bold social and transformative progress. It's like a twenty-first century, kinder and gentler Robert Moses."

New York State Assembly Member Karim Camara said, "New York City is experiencing amazing growth, and we are anticipating even further population expansion in the coming years. We must act now if we are to have any hope of accommodating such growth while also ensuring a clean, healthy environment for all New Yorkers."

New York Assembly Member Richard Gottfried said, "As Chairman of the Assembly Health Committee, I have witnessed firsthand the devastating effects of pollution and harmful emissions on New York's residents, especially those in our most vulnerable communities. It is a moral imperative, as well as an economic necessity, that we get serious about safeguarding our environment and providing all New Yorkers with cleaner air and more open spaces. For this reason, I enthusiastically endorse PlaNYC."

Said Council Member Gale A. Brewer of Manhattan, "I fully support Mayor Bloomberg's efforts as well as the concept of charging commuters who enter Manhattan. I agree we should put significant resources into improvements for mass transit before congestion pricing is implemented, including Bus Rapid Transit, regular buses, faster subways and more comfortable stations. My office has been committed to improving public transportation for all New Yorkers and I look forward to working with the MTA and DOT in implementing more change."

Council Member Simcha Felder said, "I applaud Mayor Bloomberg for his initiative with PlaNYC and I thank the Campaign for New York's Future for holding this event. While I believe it is essential to improve public transportation in the outer boroughs before implementing any form of congestion pricing - the Mayor deserves tremendous credit for bringing the issues of long-term planning and sustainability to the forefront of his agenda and opening a necessary dialogue about the future of New York City and large cities throughout the world."

Said Council Member Dan Garodnick, "We must not stick our head in the sand about the future of this City. We need to think boldly about the many housing, transportation and infrastructure concerns that lay before us. That's what PlaNYC does, and I am pleased to support its principles."

City Councilman James Vacca said, "In the years ahead, we can expect New Yorkers to live longer. We must plan now for what I call 'senior friendly' communities, which include open green space, air quality improvement and traffic mitigation. Traffic congestion and parking issues are becoming more profound each day. Improving mass transit access and reducing car usage to Manhattan, in my community and across the city, will address the all-day back-ups we now witness on highways and service roads spilling into local outer-borough communities."

On Memorial Day, I had a chance to speak with Micah Kellner, the Democratic Party's candidate for the New York State Assembly seat left vacant by Pete Grannis who was such a strong environmental advocate Gov. Spitzer elevated him to the head of the Department of Environmental Conservation. I asked him to clarify the report in the New York Sun that he opposed Bloomberg's congestion pricing plan, despite supporting the plan "in concept." He said:

The purpose of congestion pricing is to reduce traffic and congestion, not just shift congestion to a different neighborhood. I believe having the border at 86th Street will be a disaster for the people living between 86th and 96th Streets. It will create gridlock there and turn the area into a parking lot. I think the border should be at 59th Street. I also want the mayor to commit to incentives for night deliveries and to support the cross-harbor freight tunnel, which he continually flip flops on.

When I challenged him on his vision of Carmmegedon in Yorkville and Carnegie Hill he responded with a few ancedotes of comments he's heard on the campaign trail: People looking for parking on 88th Street would not be able to look below 86th Street. People working near 86th street would exit the FDR at 96th street, park and walk the rest of the way.

I told Kellner that my greatest concern was that the bickering over where to draw the line would delay or sink the whole plan. He was not worried. "I think we will see congestion pricing of some type get implemented. There will be a vote and it will pass."

In recent years, urban planners have come to accept a somewhat counter-intuitive theory called "induced demand." The theory posits that when you build a new road or widen an existing one to try to ease traffic congestion, the roadway almost always fills to its maximum capacity and traffic congestion grows even worse than it was before. In the mid-1990's British researchers discovered that the opposite of "induced demand" is also true. When roads are narrowed or altogether eliminated, or when it is less convenient or more expensive to drive, traffic doesn't just pile up elsewhere. Rather, traffic disappears.

Traffic jams, it turns out, are the result of tens of thousands of individual human decisions. When it is no longer convenient to drive, especially in a big city with lots of other travel options, a number of commuters will decide to take a different mode of transportation, travel at a different time of day, car-pool, make fewer, more efficient trips, or simply stay at home. The corollary to "induced demand" is often called the theory of "disappearing traffic."  

Thanks to the work of UCLA urban planning professor Donald Shoup, city planners now have a significant body of evidence to show that the theories of induced demand and disappearing traffic also apply to parking. In his book, The High Cost of Free Parking, Shoup showed that the more cheap, abundant parking that cities build, the more traffic congestion and automobile dependence cities get.

Shoup's findings, however, do not yet appear to be influencing New York City's official approach to land use and transportation planning, particularly in the booming outer boroughs. While city regulations hamper the construction of new parking in Manhattan below 96th Street and Long Island City, the Department of City Planning still attaches off-street parking requirements to new construction projects in much of the rest of the city, even in areas as transit-rich as Downtown Brooklyn and Flushing, Queens. Remarkably, the Hudson Yards rezoning on the west side of Manhattan also included minimum parking requirements despite the fact that billions are being spent to extend the number 7 subway line to reach it.

In other parts of the city, including all of Staten Island, officials have established "low density growth management areas," that maintain a more suburban character (including all of Staten Island). Part of the mayor's plan to quell over-development includes strict limits on how dense development can be and higher levels of required parking attached to residential buildings. According to the city's zoning handbook, the city's goal is to "accommodate high auto ownership in these outlying areas distant from mass transit."

Matthew Roth of Transportation Alternatives finds all this exasperating. City officials "fail to acknowledge what their colleagues in the field have long recognized as indisputable truth: the demand for driving is elastic, dependent upon the amount of driving and parking space that is made available."

If City Hall is hedging its bets, the anti-parking argument is often a hard sell at community board meetings and local negotiations where new development projects are being discussed. It is virtually a rule: When a large new development is proposed, locals push for the construction of more parking.

Martha Bitterman, the district manager of Queens Community Board Seven, which includes downtown Flushing, said that she had heard the argument that more parking will lead to more traffic. But she believes that an outer-borough "mentality" means that people will drive at all costs. "You can't say there's not ample public transportation to get in and out of Flushing. But no matter what rules or regulations, or if you jack up the prices, people will still drive," she said.

The recurring debate is particularly strange because both sides appear to have the same goal -- less traffic congestion. Yet, one side argues that building more parking space will achieve that goal. The other side says building less parking space -- or, at least, charging more money for it -- is the way to convince people to get out of their cars.

Unfortunately, debates about big new development projects are not marked by their capacity to digest such nuanced thinking, says Gale Brewer. She has spent decades attending such meetings as a community board member and now as a member of the City Council (Brewer recently introduced a congestion relief bill, which does not directly address parking).

Brewer says that parking comes up at virtually every community meeting she attends, inevitably inspiring such vitriol that she regularly excuses herself "to go to the bathroom" when the issue arises.

"People almost get into fistfights over this," she says.

Photo: photogirl58/Flickr

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."

"You have to do something about the traffic," she says. "I think it's something worth considering." Brewer says her bill would at least prompt discussion. If congestion pricing were implemented, faster public transportation would have to be part of the package, she adds. Her bill is being drafted by the council staff.

Photo: A television camera films Brewer on the steps of City Hall at the Citywide Coalition for Traffic Relief rally on November 14.

"As this city is booming, it's not moving," lamented City Councilmember Gale Brewer outside City Hall yesterday. But with support from 125 civic groups in five boroughs, the Citywide Coalition for Traffic Relief assembled behind her and outlined an agenda that could change that condition. The coalition, which formed around a year ago, calls for a 15% reduction of traffic by 2009. The plan calls for a serious study of congestion pricing, strict enforcement of parking regulations, and more room on the sidewalks for bicyclists and pedestrians.

Upper West Side City Councilmember Gale Brewer announced that the council will hold hearings next year on Intro 199, legislation that she has introduced to compel DOT to put in place a more meaningful set of performance measures and specific targets for traffic reductions. She also said she would schedule hearings on a DOT study due in 2007 that will count vehicles, violations and pedestrians on Manhattan's west side, from Central Park to the Hudson River and between 57^th Street and 86^th Street.

Gorman Reilly of Civitas Citizens called for "more improved bus service." Sandra Garcia, a member of the community-based organization Sustainable South Bronx urged reducing truck traffic and reconceiving the little-used Sheridan Expressway as a waterfront greenway. Transportation Alternatives executive director Paul Steely White told the crowd that 22 percent of all car trips in the city last less than a mile and that one in ten drivers in Manhattan's core are cruising for parking space.

The coalition plans to work with elected officials and within its network to promote sensible reform. As Transportation Alternatives' Matthew Roth told the crowd, "New York is a city of pedestrians." With 125 members, the coalition is pressing the city's officials to bring the law into step with the facts.

Councilmember Gale Brewer joined Transportation Alternatives and representatives of community groups from all over the city at this morning's Citywide Coalition for Traffic Relief rally on the steps of City Hall. The Coalition currently includes 129 community organizations.

These organizations have signed on to a petition calling on the Bloomberg Administration to devlop "a comprehensive traffic relief plan to reduce citywide traffic volumes by 15% by the year 2009" by implementing the following five measures:

• Wider and more protected rights-of-way for transit, walking and bicycling
• Parking Reform
• Traffic Calming
• Reduce Truck Impacts
• Congestion Pricing

Council member Gale Brewer of Manhattan’s Upper West Side has introduced a new piece of legislation that would compel New York City’s Department of Transportation to completely re-conceive of the way it measures and evaluates its own performance and the performance of the city’s streets.

Currently, DOT’s metrics are set up mainly to measure the minutia of day-to-day operations. You get a good sense of this in the Mayor’s annual Management Report (PDF document), where DOT accounts for things like the percentage of "traffic signal defects responded to within 48 hours of notification" and "on-street parking meters that are operable."

The city, of course, needs its traffic signals and parking meters to function. But is that all we need from our transportation agency? DOT’s operations-oriented goals start to look profoundly lame when you see the kinds of goals that other world cities are setting for themselves. In London, England, for example, the city’s transportation agency has set aggressive ten year targets for reducing overall traffic congestion, improving air quality, increasing bus and bike ridership, creating 100 new public spaces, and even reducing the greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming. Once the goals are in place, the city then creates policies to help achieve them.

Can you imagine New York City’s transportation agency functioning as though it actually had a responsibility to do something about global climate change? It’s hard enough just to get them to install a speed bump in your neighborhood. Intro. 199, conceived with the help of Transportation Alternatives, would finally rectify this situation and, hopefully, in the process, force New York City’s government to establish a real set of citywide transportation and public space policies. The new bill would force DOT to establish and meet specific "performance targets and indicators" that work "towards the goal of reducing traffic congestion citywide."

Brewer’s legislation would mandate that DOT put in place targets and indicators with the aim of "reducing commute time citywide, reducing household exposure to roadway emissions, reducing the proportion of driving to the central business districts, and increasing the proportion of walking, biking, and the use of mass transit to the central business districts." There are still some rough spots in the language of the bill and only a few Council members are signed on, but this looks like a really great piece of legislation. New York City needs a transportation agency that measures its success by more than just the number of pot holes it fills and traffic signals it fixes each year.