Street Memorial Riders Urge City Hall to Tame Traffic Now


On Sunday, January 6, over 200 people gathered to remember those killed by motor vehicles while biking and walking the streets of New York City in 2007. StreetFilms was there for the Street Memorial Project’s 3rd Annual Memorial Ride & Pedestrian Walk. So were the parents of 27-year-old Sam Hindy, who was killed trying to navigate the Manhattan Bridge by bike in November. During the event, Sam’s father, Brooklyn Brewery founder Steve Hindy, placed his son’s death in the larger culture of an American car culture gone out of control:

America is in love with the internal combustion engine. But cars, trucks and buses are killing and maiming pedestrians and bicyclists in New York City virtually every day. They are choking the street life of our city. Our thirst for fossil fuels is forcing us into horrible foreign adventures like the Iraq war.

In 2007, 23 bicyclists and over 100 pedestrians were killed by motor vehicles on New York City’s streets. City Room covered the event too.

ALSO ON STREETSBLOG

If DOT Can Accelerate Street Repaving, It Can Accelerate Safety Projects

|
Mayor Bill de Blasio made a visit yesterday to one of the city’s more car-dependent areas, on Staten Island’s south shore, to tout an additional $242 million in his budget for street repaving. The additional money will bring the city’s repaving plan to a total 1,200 lane-miles through June 2016, a 20 percent boost over previous projections. Well-maintained streets […]

Two 125th Street Intersections Slated for Ped Safety Fixes

|
The proposed redesign for the intersection of 125th Street and Lenox Avenue. The project would convert left-turn bays on Lenox into wider pedestrian refuges. Image: NYCDOT Harlem’s Main Street is slated to receive some pedestrian safety improvements at two dangerous intersections. Where 125th Street meets Lenox and St. Nicholas Avenues, NYCDOT safety plans call for […]

Council Member Lappin Calls for Citywide Street Safety Office

|
Jessica Lappin, the sponsor of new street safety legislation. Image: NY Real Estate Law Blog. In order to create a more tightly integrated public policy on safer streets, Council Member Jessica Lappin introduced legislation yesterday to create a new Office of Road Safety within the Department of Transportation. Lappin imagines the office creating a citywide […]