Streetsblog New York City

The City Council Transportation Committee held a hearing yesterday on four bills that would release new information about traffic crashes and how the Department of Transportation decides whether to install traffic calming measures and traffic control devices like stop lights and stop signs. All together, the bills would cover a wide spectrum of information, but committee chair Jimmy Vacca said the goal of each is “empowering citizens who want to fight for traffic calming measures in their own community.” The measures drew opposition from DOT representatives, however, who seemed to bristle at the prospect of Council-imposed mandates even while pledging support for the intent of the bills.

The first two bills, Jessica Lappin’s Intro 370 and Rosie Mendez’s Intro 374, would both open up data about traffic crashes to the public. Intro 370, an amended version of Lappin’s “Saving Lives Through Better Information Bill,” would require DOT to publish on its website weekly information about all traffic crashes and traffic fatalities in the city, searchable by intersection. Intro 370 would also mandate the creation of an interagency traffic safety plan, developed and implemented jointly by all the relevant city departments.

Lappin’s original bill would have placed the responsibility for publishing crash data on the NYPD. The police came out against that bill and effectively killed it earlier this year, even though a former NYPD traffic chief said the agency could have easily complied. During today’s hearing, Lappin said that she amended the bill “based on feedback we’ve received from the Administration.”

Intro 374 would fill a big hole in the city’s crash data, requiring DOT to gather information on all bike crashes that get reported to the city. Currently, no data are reported about collisions between cyclists and pedestrians or other cyclists.

These bills each got a lot of support from the committee and those testifying. “Think about it,” said Transportation Alternatives Executive Director Paul Steely White, explaining the need for Intro 370. “Right now, community groups and elected officials like yourselves are often forced to make decisions that directly affect life and death, based on information from 2008, at best.” White also said he believed it would be more appropriate for the NYPD to be in charge of releasing crash information, as that department already collects and compiles it.

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Legislation that would compel the NYPD to open some of its traffic safety data to the public got a big boost today, when City Council public safety committee chair Peter Vallone Jr. announced his support at a hearing on the bill. The hearing was marked by a tense confrontation between council members and police officials who refused to concede that New Yorkers have a right to such information. 

Sponsored by Council Member Jessica Lappin, Intro 120, the "Saving Lives Through Better Information Bill," would require the NYPD to post data on crashes and summonses as frequently as it releases CompStat data on violent crimes. It also stipulates that the NYPD convey where crashes occurred, who was involved, any contributing factors such as cell phone use or drunk driving, and what kinds of summonses were issued. That data, which the department already compiles, would equip New Yorkers with better information to push for safety improvements in their neighborhoods and hold the NYPD accountable for the effectiveness of its enforcement tactics.

Before the hearing, transportation committee chair Jimmy Vacca was already one of 16 co-sponsors of Intro 120. Today public safety chair Vallone, whose committee has jurisdiction over the bill, signed on. "I support this," said Vallone near the end of the hearing, "and I think the committee will too."

The police department, however, came out strongly against Intro 120, arguing that it would require too much personnel at a time when the department is already facing a manpower shortage. More importantly, police officials made it clear that they fundamentally do not believe that releasing traffic data would promote street safety. 

The police's objections stemmed primarily from what was repeatedly characterized as a "philosophical difference" between the department and council members, on the question of whether traffic data is even useful to the public. "The information sought by the bill does not provide meaningful information which can illuminate the reasons for a vehicle accident or the mechanisms used to enhance traffic safety," said NYPD Chief of Transportation James Tuller. "This information is only valuable to those with the training, knowledge and experience to understand its context and interpret it correctly... That is the role of the police commander." 

Council members vehemently disagreed with the department's assessment that only the police can interpret data on collisions and summonses. Vacca characterized the NYPD's position as "'Leave us alone. We know what's best.'" "I will not leave you alone," he continued. "I have a right to know." 

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Electeds and other officials gathered with representatives from AARP today to pledge support for street improvements and to call on Albany to pass complete streets legislation.

Kicking off a day of street surveys across the state, the group met at the corner of Ninth Avenue and 23rd Street, an intersection that had been particularly hazardous for the older residents of the nearby Penn South co-op.

One Penn South resident recounted her memories of living above the intersection before a redesign of the corridor brought refuge islands along Ninth to protect both pedestrians and cyclists. "Every time I heard a siren on Ninth Avenue," she said, "I ran out to see if it was one of our seniors."

Council Speaker Christine Quinn praised "the success we've had at 23rd and Ninth," and promised that the city would "replicate" it. "I'm looking forward to more safely strolling across intersections across the city," Quinn said. Quinn also noted the development of Age-Friendly NYC, a set of 59 initiatives to help New York City become more hospitable to a growing senior population. Traffic calming and street redesigns were an important piece of that document.

AARP's top pedestrian safety priority is complete streets legislation working its way through the state legislature. That bill, which has the support of the chairs of the transportation and aging committees in both the Assembly and Senate, would ensure that all streets statewide are designed with the needs of pedestrians, cyclists, people with disabilities, and transit riders in mind.

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Lappin imagines the office creating a citywide response to unsafe streets, combining design improvements with better enforcement, education and research. The Office of Road Safety would host monthly meetings with all the relevant government agencies: DOT, NYPD, the Health Department, and the vehicular crimes unit of all five district attorneys' offices. Family members of victims would be present at every session to meet with officials.

"By working together and making road safety a priority," Lappin said, "our city agencies can save lives."

The idea comes from Transportation Alternatives' report "Executive Order," and TA has endorsed the bill. "Every time these agencies have sat around the same table, it has yielded huge gains for street safety," said TA Executive Director Paul Steely White. "We need to institute and formalize this coordination."  

Other council members have also signaled their support. Although they haven't yet signed on as co-sponsors, council members Jimmy Van Bramer, Daniel Dromm, Gale Brewer and Robert Jackson have issued strong statements in favor of the Office of Road Safety. As for hearings and moving the bill forward in committee, Council Member Lappin is expected to meet with transportation committee chair Jimmy Vacca soon.

What resources the Office of Road Safety would have at its disposal is an open question. According to a Lappin spokesperson, details like funding and staffing will be hashed out once the bill gets a committee hearing. Dedicated staff could spell the difference between a valuable monthly gathering with limited authority and an office with some bureaucratic heft.

East Side electeds continue to express support for the MTA and NYCDOT's redesign of First and Second Avenues while pushing for a more complete corridor. In exchanges with Streetsblog this week, they called attention, in particular, to the absence of plans for separated bus lanes along the corridor.

Assembly Member Jonathan Bing, who represents the Upper East Side and East Midtown, praised the redesign, "even if it's not everything that we asked for." The release of a specific design, he said, "brings into sharper focus the major benefits we will get." But Bing didn't hide his displeasure with the bus lanes: "I was one of the signatories to a letter a couple of weeks ago calling for segregated lanes and obviously anything that does not comport with the terms of the letter is disappointing."

Two years ago, a bill sponsored by Bing enabling the use of bus-mounted enforcement cameras fell short in Albany, a measure which he says is now urgently needed. "This current decision makes it even more important that we push for cameras, as that's going to be pretty much the only means of enforcement," he said.

State Senator José M. Serrano, whose district stretches from the West Bronx down to East Harlem and Yorkville, didn't single out the corridor's design itself but called on DOT and the MTA to implement the project equitably. Many improvements are on hold in Serrano's district pending Second Avenue Subway construction.

"This new service will improve the commute for East Side residents from the Lower East Side, all the way north to my district in East Harlem," he said. As such, Serrano "would like to emphasize how important it is that the design be completed in full throughout the corridor... We must ensure that, wherever possible, equal facilities and infrastructure -- such as the separated bike lane or the red painted bus lane -- are provided to the entire corridor."

Assembly Member Micah Kellner, who also represents the Upper East Side, told Streetsblog he's excited about the project, particularly after some of his concerns about station placement had been addressed. Even so, he isn't satisfied. "My remaining concern is the lack of physically separated bus lanes," Kellner said. "While I appreciate the need to address the needs of businesses that rely on deliveries," he added, "the primary goal of SBS must be to provide mass transit consumers with uninterrupted, speedy service along the First and Second Avenue corridors -- this should be the priority over all other small inconveniences."

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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.

Each session has been suffused with elephant-in-the-room syndrome. Somehow, the agenda never includes motor vehicles, even though cars, cabs and trucks do 99.5 percent of the traffic maiming and also commandeer street space and mindshare to the point where clashes between bikes and peds become inevitable.

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:

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According to city statistics, over the last seven years the number of cyclists on New York streets has risen by 75 percent. With increased investments in infrastructure, overseen by a new, pro-cycling DOT commissioner, the city hopes to double the number of riders by 2015.

Of course, obstacles remain. As reported in a Los Angeles Times piece from yesterday on the current state of New York cycling, as their favored mode enjoys a renaissance that even a bike snob can't ignore, riders must nonetheless contend not only with careless motorists, but also toasted newspaper columnists, a hostile police department, and certain double-talking City Council members.

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This recent constituent e-mail shows that Council Member Jessica Lappin's lukewarm support for congestion pricing seems to have turned into full-fledged support now that the proposal has no chance of being implemented (taking a page out of Assemblywoman Joan Millman's book). In Lappin's defense, she did vote for pricing when it came before the council. But it might have been helpful had she found her voice a few months -- or even weeks -- before the plan went to Albany.

Thank you for contacting me in support of Mayor Bloomberg's congestion pricing proposal. As you probably are aware, on March 31, the City Council approved a home rule message authorizing the state to approve Mayor Bloomberg's plan. The vote was 30 members in support and 20 against. I voted in support of the proposal. However, neither the State Assembly nor the State Senate acted in time to move this plan forward.

Anyone who drives in New York understands that congestion is a major problem, particularly in the Central Business District (CBD). Heavy traffic doesn't just anger and inconvenience drivers. It impacts our economy and environment as well. It is estimated that congestion costs the city $11.6 billion worth of lost business revenue, productivity, operating costs, and fuel and vehicle costs. In addition, because of our poor air quality, New York City asthma hospitalization rates are more than twice the national average.

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The Post had a short item today, which we've linked to a couple of times, reporting that members of the City Council have sent a letter to Mayor Bloomberg asking for changes in the congestion pricing proposal that would raise fees for New Jersey car commuters or have the Port Authority commit more funds to the MTA.

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.

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As City Council Member Jessica Lappin trains her sights on businesses that employ bike delivery workers, her colleague from Queens, Hiram Monserrate, has vowed to take on another pressing issue: making it cheaper for people to drive to sports stadiums.

On Wednesday Monserrate announced that he is submitting a "consumer protection bill" to end "price-gouging at or around NYC sports arenas." Specifically, the bill would set standard fees across the city and impose penalties for exceeding them during "special events," like baseball playoff series.

From Monserrate's press release:

Councilmember Monserrate decided to introduce the bill after he joined with friends to attend Sunday's post-season baseball game between the NY Yankees and the Cleveland Indians. He observed a dramatic increase in parking fees around Yankee stadium to $50 and even attempts to charge up to $150 by unscrupulous operators.

"As a Met Fan from Queens, I decided to attend [read: drive to] last Sunday's game and show some support to our other New York Team, the NY Yankees. I observed several lots with Parking Lot Full signs, all operated by Central Parking Company. They were advertising a $50.00 fee to park. Shockingly, and to add insult to injury, one particular lot (also operated by Central) had a "FULL" sign in front but the attendants told me if I paid $150.00 they would park my car," Monserrate said.

He added, "As we look forward to both the NY Mets and NY Yankees playing in next year's post-season, we need to enact consumer protections against price-gouging for New York fans. While New Yorkers cheer for the hometown teams our City needs to protect us from price-gouging parking lot operators who unfairly take advantage of NY fans."

So, to Monserrate, being asked to pay market rates for auto storage at a sporting event that is accessible by transit qualifies as an "insult."

The council member might want to check with the Yankees before tightening up those fees too much. They're going to need all the revenue they can get.