First time in NYC, and I had read about congestion pricing before coming. I have no metric to compare to besides my own city in Mexico. I got to say, my city is way smaller and the congestion is much worse. We were able to cross streets even when cars had green. It was much quieter than my city and the busses moved much quicker. There was a noticeable increase in traffic on the weekend but the bus still felt quick and the wait to cross the street wasn’t that much longer. The metro was pretty fantastic. The 24/7 service is a must for me. The trains arrived pretty frequently and were warm in this frigid weather.

Some negatives: I was disappointed that the congestion zone wasn’t the whole island of manhattan. Went to the MET and immediately noticed the difference in traffic. Also, arriving to JFK, the air train was down so the trip to Jamaica by bus took ages because of traffic. The bus is pretty nice, but a lot of people park in the bus lane (police included) so that it was always late. Not by much mind you, but it should be faster. It would also be nice to have timed lights for the busses so that they would only have to stop for people to board. The metro needs to put up glass between the tracks and the platform for both safety and punctuality. A few people fell on the tracks while I was there (I didn’t witness this but had to deal with some delays). Furthermore, NYC needs to give the homeless housing, and drug addicts a place to safely consume. It’s an abomination that these people have to face such extreme weather in one of the richest cities in the world. They shouldn’t be on the metro; they need help from society. We all want to feel safe and safety is a two way street.

Conclusion: Public transport system is one of the best in North America (behind México City), but needs a lot of updates. Hopefully congestion pricing can do it, because I love this city and look forward to coming back to see the improvements.

“And furthermore, I do not believe that every single head of an agency needs to align with me 100% across every single issue, but rather specifically on that issue of that agency. For example, I'm a big critic, often, of Michael Bloomberg’s mayoralty. I also look with deep admiration at his empowering of Janette Sadik-Khan to be the head of the Department of Transportation, and how that reshaped the streetscape across New York City. And I think that those are the kinds of examples. Those are also the kinds of individuals that I think we have to bring into the next administration, as opposed to people that you want to give patronage to at every single turn.”

https://nyeditorialboard.substack.com/p/zohran-mamdani-interview-transcript

I really like Zohran - he’s got my vote.

The one thing I wish he explained better is the relationship between the MTA and the Mayor (NYCDOT). The MTA is funded through NY State and is at the hands of the Governor (Yes I know how the Board works but let’s be real). Keep in mind as well that NY State is a strong Governor state. What I mean by that is the state budget is very much dictated by the Governor (and as a result power) than the legislature in comparison to most other states. Read the NY State constitution. The MTA operates the buses but NYCDOT controls the streets. Thus, any street redesign such as creating bus lanes or bike lanes is controlled by NYCDOT- an arm of the Mayor.

Zohran: Make MTA buses fast and free.

Zohran is in an incredible position as Mayor to create faster buses through the repurposing of our streets to reduce private vehicle usage and construct more bus dedicated lanes in our system. Furthermore, he has the ability to enhance bus lanes by enforcing bus lanes to a greater degree ever seen in this country. Not only provide tickets for those that enter bus lanes but by making the tickets stronger (financially and legally) to discourage drivers from entering a bus lane. He can also change red light timing to prioritize bus lanes and create physical barriers to isolate bus traffic from other lanes. Keep in Mayor Adams only built 2.7 miles of bus lanes in 2024 (he promised 15+). There’s more tools at Zohran’s disposal to make buses faster if he is Mayoe.

Creating free buses is more challenging. The State runs the buses. I know the MTA is historically not perfect but we have to remember that a funded MTA is a good thing. Never forget the summer of hell of 2017- and also don’t deny that the MTA has improved significantly in the last 5+ years. The authority cut the operating budget by 3% (400m dollars) since 2019 while at the same time providing more service. This might not sound like a lot but cutting costs in government is a whole different animal than the private side. We’re talking union labor (75k MTA employees + 150k union jobs generated by the capital plan), NY State is a union state and it’s good we pay our workers to have a decent living. The MTA has taken necessary steps to find ways to be financially smarter including consolidation of certain departments that used to be agency based such as construction and development. https://www.mta.info/document/163396g

You never know who is going to be Governor in a couple years and who will be in charge of deciding the budget- including that of the MTA.

We also should consider how the MTA should be rethought if there are free local buses from an operating standpoint. Are SBS free? Does this include Limited or just Local? Same express bus price? What about the subway? Now I think there is a world where free buses work in nyc. Part of the equation to that is creating more effective bus lanes as expressed earlier. I just think we need to think carefully about how we create a better system with free local buses.

I’m all over the place with this one but thanks for reading.

Go Zohran.

We’re hosting a Community Workshop to talk about how we can make our streets safer and more accessible for walking and biking in Bed-Stuy. If you care about safer streets, better biking infrastructure, or just making our community a better place to live, we want to hear from YOU!

When: Tuesday February 3 at 6pm

Where: Marcy Library

Who’s invited: Everyone! Whether you walk, bike, bus or just care about improving our neighborhood, we need your ideas.

We will have kid-friendly activities, too

RSVP HERE

I know there was a virtual workshop recently for the waterfront project. Does anyone have any updates or information to share? Thanks.

Hey I'm Jakob, a street safety advocate in Indianapolis and the new chair of the Bike Indianapolis advocacy committee. I've been following your subreddit for a long time, and the growth has been inspiring. I've even called Kathy Hochul's office about congestion pricing!

Bike Indy has seen a lot of growth in members, and the public discourse around street safety has been growing as well. I'd like to start a new subreddit to emulate r/MicromobilityNYC called r/MicromobilityIndy or something similar.

How could this be done in a place like Central Indiana which is very car dependent? Should we be cross-posting to other local subreddits? Street safety advocates were mostly on X but are transitioning to Bluesky. Should we go where the people are or attract them to Reddit?

I've read the StreetsBlog article and it mentioned monthly meetups. Looking for other advice.

Thank you and keep fighting the good fight.

Now that January is over, im wondering if any stats have come out that might demonstrate how it's affected traffic, income, etc. Anyone have a lead on relevant resources?

The path is currently closed, so if you want to access the Ward's/Randall's Island pedestrian bridge, you need to do so from 1st Avenue and then cross over at 102th St.

Does anyone know the timing for opening the greenway? Will it be open by spring? I have a kid who needs to commute to/from Randalls, and I prefer him going via the promenade rather than 1st avenue.

This is something advocates have been asking for for a long time. The NY State DOT has finally agreed to take a look at how they can improve the West Side Highway, and they are asking the public to provide feedback on a map. Want the highway removed altogether and turned into a regular avenue? Let them know. Want a lane of car traffic removed and dedicated to micromobility? Put it on the map. Think the ban on e-bikes on the Greenway is a joke? Let them know. So few people participate in requests for feedback like this that your input can really make a difference.

Link for feedback

First: fuck cars. They're dangerous, expensive, and ruin our city's social fabric, turning people into antisocial monsters who view every new neighbor as a competitor for precious road space. We all on the same page here? Great.

Second: That DOT daylighting study was actually a pretty high-quality study. Yeah, it wasn't perfect, but by examining spots where laws (but not physical barriers) banned parking, it examined scenarios that would be created at roughly 27,000 of the city's 41,000 intersections that would be impacted by this law. The bill only requires hardening at 1,000 intersections a year. Meaning after a year, 1,000 intersections will be safer, and 26,000 will be more dangerous. After 10 years (and again, this assumes a DOT that actually does what the law says!) we have 10,000 intersections that'll be safer and 17,000 that'll be more dangerous. Is that really what we want?

Third: It seems to eliminate 2x more parking spaces than it should. In California, daylighting (which was created by state law about a year ago, and led to the elimination of ~5% of street parking in SF) is for "approach" lanes. In the DOT study, they looked at locations where hydrants increased visibility for the "approaching" traffic. This makes sense: parked cars only impede visibility for approaching traffic. Once you eliminate a parking spot in the approaching lane, drivers will be able to see pedestrians in the crosswalk on the other three sides of the intersection. In other words, assuming that increasing visibility increases safety, at a standard intersection, we should only eliminate four spots, not eight. (On one-way streets, you'd eliminate two parking spots on the approach side; on two-way streets, you'd eliminate one parking spot on either side.)

But here's what the bill says:

... no person shall stand or park a vehicle, whether occupied or not, except momentarily to pick up or discharge a passenger or passengers, within 20 feet of a crosswalk.

Better language might be "within 20 feet of a crosswalk where the direction of traffic is toward the crosswalk." I'm not a lawyer or a bill-drafter, though.

If there's something I got wrong, please correct me. If there's something I'm missing, please say so. But it might be reasonable to change our goals here or see if council members backing the bill would be open to amending it. It might even help us get more sponsors.

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BhqLmxyHo/?mibextid=wwXIfr

I know this sub knows her well, but here's a reminder!

She, so far, has:

1. Called LGBTQ NYers pedophiles
2. Called for destruction of public property
3. Called for violence against journalists
4. Called for the killing of students
5. And now, she called for the killing of political opponents

I don't care that everyone "loves her in her district" because they think she's "great in person" or whatever. This woman is unfit to be in the council and needs to be expelled.

Petition here: https://actionnetwork.org/letters/expel-vickie-paladino?source=direct_link&