Streetsblog New York City

The Staten Island Advance reports on Monday's press conference outlining the qualities that leading City Council members would like to see in the next DOT Commissioner. The Bloomberg Administration responded to the Council with the following statement:

The Mayor will appoint a commissioner who will carry out policies to meet the sustainability challenges he outlined in his '2030' speech and will continue [outgoing DOT] Commissioner Weinshall's work reducing pedestrian fatalities and increasing safety for all New Yorkers through the implementation of innovative programs like Thru Streets.

The Advance also notes: 

Bloomberg, who with Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden pushed through the unprecedented bans on smoking and trans fats, should take that same intrepid approach with the next transportation commissioner, said Gene Russianoff, attorney with the Straphangers Campaign.

Meanwhile, a source inside DOT Commissioner Weinshall's office says that Deputy Commissioner for Traffic Operations Michael Primeggia, who is often credited by Weinshall as the architect of DOT's Thru Streets program, is "being considered" for the commissioner's job.

People are starting to kick around the names of potential successors to outgoing DOT Commissioner Iris Weinshall. This morning, Crain's Insider reports:

Insiders believe that Mayor Mike Bloomberg will look inside his administration for Iris Weinshall's replacement as transportation commissioner. But because Bloomberg will be out in 2009, top transportation people may favor state jobs: state transportation commissioner, Long Island Rail Road president or New York City Transit president. NJ Transit is seeking an executive director.. Two private-sector candidates could be Janette Sadik-Kahn of Parsons Brinckerhoff, who lost out to Weinshall for the job, and former MTA chair Bob Kiley, who implemented congestion pricing in London. Weinshall is leaving for CUNY in mid-April.

Sadik-Kahn was Mayor David Dinkins' Transportation Advisor. In addition to setting up London's congestion charging system, Kiley was chairman of the MTA in the 1980's.

Here are some other names that are flying around:

• Emily Lloyd
• Sam Schwartz
• Gary Toth
• Jack Lettiere
• David Woloch
• Michael Primeggia
• And then there's this one. It's not quite a "name" per se. More a question: Isn't there some deputy commissioner from London we could call?

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.

Read more...

A rendering of the Sands Street bike path on the Brooklyn side of the Manhattan Bridge

Here is yet another sign that change is afoot at New York City's Department of Transportation:

Insiders are reporting that Ryan Russo has been promoted from the Brooklyn Borough Commissioner's office to take over as the new Director of Alternative Modes. That might not be the correct title and we do not yet know the exact job description but it looks like Russo will be running many of DOT's pedestrian and bike projects and taking over the languishing Safe Routes to Schools program.

Russo is in his early 30's, lives in Brooklyn, often shows up to community meetings on a customized orange bike, and has a background in urban planning. In his two-and-a-half years as the Downtown Brooklyn Transportation Coordinator Russo has racked up a quantity of impressive accomplishments (PDF file) for pedestrians, cyclists and more livable streets. 

Among these accomplishments, Russo oversaw significant expansions and improvements of Downtown Brooklyn's bike network (PDF file). This includes the design and development of unprecedented, new, two-way, physically-separated bike lanes on Tillary and Sands Streets to help make the dangerous approaches to the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges safer. He faciliated the creation of the Willoughby Street pedestrian plaza. He moved a major, traffic-calming redesign of Vanderbilt Avenue from a back-of-the-envelope sketch to paint-on-asphalt in a matter of months. And, god bless him, he stopped the honking on Clinton Street by "feathering" the traffic signals.

Russo leaves his current post open to one significant criticism. He was hired at the end of the Downtown Brooklyn Traffic Calming Project specifically to develop a Downtown Brooklyn Transportation Blueprint. As the DOT's web site says, the Blueprint was supposed to be "a year-long study." It has been 20 months since the first public meeting and Downtown Brooklyn still has no Blueprint.

That being said, if we had to choose between a "Blueprint" and the numerous tangible improvements that Russo has helped create over the last few years, we'll take facts-on-the-ground ahead of a document any day.

In his new job, Russo's immediate superior is Gerard Soffian. Soffian reports directly to Deputy Commissioner Michael Primeggia.

We are hoping that as his first official act in the new office, Ryan will declare that walking is no longer to be called an "alternative" mode of transportation.

Outgoing Bike Program Director Rips Agency Bosses

The long-time Director of the New York City Department of Transportation's Bicycle Program says that Commissioner Iris Weinshall and her top deputy for traffic operations, Michael Primeggia have burdened the city with unnecessary law suits and stymied the progress of the city's bicycle programs.

"I waited for a long time for the direction from the commissioner's office to change, or for the commissioner to be changed," Andrew Vesselenovitch e-mailed to about twenty agency colleagues and a handful outsiders on Friday, his last day at the agency. "I hope that you won't have to wait much longer."

In his resignation letter, Vesselenovitch cites two specific examples of agency failures. First, he claims that DOT could have saved the city millions of dollars in lawsuits "resulting from the puzzling addition of unusually high expansion joint covers on the Williamsburg Bridge." Vesselenovitch says he brought the issue to the attention of Deputy Commissioner Michael Primeggia in 2003 and was told to "butt out."

The infamous "bone-breaking bridge bumps" caused serious injuries to numerous New York City cyclists and generated $10 million in law suits, one-fifth the total cost of building the the bridge's bicycle and pedestrian paths.

Vesselenovitch also says the agency "could have produced plans for forty to fifty miles of workable bicycle lanes each year" but inexplicably only managed to install a little more than fifteen miles of bike lanes in the last two years.

At 6:05 pm on Friday, Vesselenovitch ended his five-year tenure at DOT, writing, "The motivation for my seeking to leave is not so happy for me or for the city. There is much more that the bicycle program could have done than it was allowed to do."

Vesselenovitch's resignation and criticism arrives at the end of a month in which three cyclists were killed on the streets of New York City. In its brief, two sentence, official statement following the fatalities, DOT implied that there is little it can do to make the city's "crowded streets" safer for cyclists.

Based on the e-mail below, the agency's Bicycle Program Director believes otherwise:

From: Vesselinovitch, Andrew
Sent: Friday, July 07, 2006 6:05 PM
To: XXXXXX
Subject: Leaving DOT

Dear All:

As many of you know, today is my last day at DOT. As many of you also know, I am leaving to pursue a wonderful opportunity to study architecture, a lifelong interest. I want to thank all of you for having made my five years at DOT and seven years in city government productive and exciting.

I would also like to add that the motivation for my seeking to leave is not so happy for me or for the city. There is much more that the bicycle program could have done than it was allowed to do. The bicycle program, for example, could have produced plans for 40-50 miles of workable bicycle lanes each year. Instead, DOT installed little more than 15 miles, total, in the last two years. We could have saved the city settlements for lawsuits (and residents injuries) resulting from the puzzling addition of unusually high expansion joint covers on the Williamsburg Bridge. I brought this to bridge's attention in 2003 and was told by Michael Primeggia butt out.

I waited for a long time for the direction from the commissioner's office to change, or for the commissioner to be changed. I hope that you won't have to wait much longer.

Thank you and good luck,

Andrew Vesselinovitch
Bicycle Program Director
40 Worth Street, Room 1035
New York, New York 10013