NYPD Cracking Down on Brooklyn Bikers
The Brooklyn Paper reports that the NYPD will begin a borough-wide bike crackdown in a few weeks. More moving violations will be issued for the the failure to obey traffic signs and signals, surpassing the speed limit, tailgating, and failure to signal before turning. While the numbers of bicyclists is growing and the bike lanes…
The Brooklyn Paper reports that the NYPD will begin a borough-wide bike crackdown in a few weeks. More moving violations will be issued for the the failure to obey traffic signs and signals, surpassing the speed limit, tailgating, and failure to signal before turning. While the numbers of bicyclists is growing and the bike lanes on Prospect Park West have caused controversy, cops claim the reason for the crackdown is because bike accidents have been up. Some bikers aren’t convinced. Rider Lacy Tauber think cops should “focus on drivers,” while bike advocate Baruch Herzfeld thinks this could further strain the relationship between bikers and cops.
Bikelash! Cops to Crack Down on 2-Wheelers [Brooklyn Paper]
Just curious – how many cyclists have already killed or injured pedestrians in 2011?
Automobiles have:
– Struck a 3 year old and left him in critical condition (3 January : Kent Avenue in Williamsburg)
– Badly injured a mother and her two nine-month old twins – leaving one in critical condition (2 January : 4th Ave, Sunset Park)
– Critically hurt a 2 year-old in a hit-and-run (4 January : Kent and Flushing Avenues)
If you don’t like my arbitrary choice of the last 5 days to compare injuries to pedestrians by bicycles versus automobiles – pick another and let us know what you can find.
Bxgirl – 20 pedestrians killed by cyclists over a 10 year period. Agreed. Care to publish the number of pedestrians killed by cyclists in the same period?
IIRC the Oct 2004 NYT article reported on NYPD crackdowns on the monthly protest rides by Critical Mass as opposed to a general crackdown on cyclists.
After a few close calls, I was hit by a cyclist on the Brooklyn Bridge this fall. Hard. Not enough to knock me down but a good hard smack on the wrist that was swollen for a few days nonetheless.
Cyclist was travelling incredibly fast. When she hit my wrist with her bars she swerved further into the “walking” lane. Thankfully there were no pedestrians at that spot at that time – she sped off without even looking back. No check to see if I was severely hurt.
Personally I like cycling. But why riders need to go so fast within a few inches of a large number of pedestrians is stupid on the part of the cyclist, and even dumber for the city to allow it.
Yeah, goodness knows the bike lanes on the street get no special attention; they’re more often than not full of nasty snow and ice, meaning I’m back in your car lane with you honking at me.
Randi-
(http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/episrv/episrv-bike-report.pdf) For the period 1996- 2005
11 pedestrians killed by cyclists (See page 20).
Boerumresident….I was surprised to find that the walkways through Fulton Park were well cleared by Tuesday. I think you’re right.
On the snow cleaning issue Benson mentioned, aren’t the bike paths on park lands (like Eastern and OCean Parkaway and inside Prospect Park) cleared by Parks Dep’t staff as opposed to DOT or Sanitation? Maybe that would explain why they were cleared so quickly.
Why did the rabbi cross the street???
AH, but do they have a tach? 😉 I heard that’s what all the cool kids sport nowadays.