Ben Fried started as a Streetsblog reporter in 2008 and led the site as editor-in-chief from 2010 to 2018. He lives in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn, with his wife.
Ben Fried
Recent Posts
Eyes on the Street: Wrong Way
| | 47 Comments
I’m really into this signage, spotted by Flickr user c34 on Broadway at 18th Street. I think the bike symbol should be bigger, but in general, NYC should have more of these. What’s your take?
Gibson Dunn Attorney Jim Walden: Blog Comment “Potentially Libelous”
| | 102 Comments
This Wednesday, while Streetsblog reporter Noah Kazis was wrapping up his piece on the propriety of devoting pro bono legal services to help wealthy Brooklyn residents eradicate a bike lane, we received a letter from Gibson Dunn attorney Jim Walden. We think the letter is illustrative of the tactics employed by opponents of the Prospect […]
Steve Cuozzo Hides the Truth: Midtown Biz Leaders Support Street Redesigns
| | 8 Comments
Steve Cuozzo columns about street reclamation are usually so divorced from reality that we’ve been letting him go unchallenged for a while. The insanity is usually self-evident. His latest screed against the 34th Street busway is no different. It’s got all the usual fearmongering (“be afraid,” is the mantra), contradictions (in one breath, DOT is […]
Schumer-Linked Group Wrongly Assumes That Council Backs Bike Lane Delay
| | 14 Comments
The group of politically-connected Prospect Park West bike lane opponents linked to Senator Chuck Schumer wants the city to take a break from making streets safer for cyclists and pedestrians. They call themselves “Neighbors for Better Bike Lanes,” but in a press release sent out yesterday, opponents of the Prospect Park West redesign make it […]
WPIX Long Island Reporter Rob Hoell Eats Marcia Kramer’s Lunch
| | 15 Comments
Here’s the piece about the Prospect Park West bike lane that ran on the Channel 11 News last night. While it would have been great to see more of the data showing the success of the redesign, WPIX Long Island reporter Rob Hoell gets a lot of the good political details into the segment: The […]
When Will the Central Park Bike Blitz Be Over? “Ask the Mayor”
| | 25 Comments
When NYPD announced that it was going to step up its bike enforcement at the beginning of the year, the best-case scenario went like this: Police would give out more tickets for risky, anti-social behavior like wrong-way biking, and the streets would seem a little more orderly as cycling continues its upward trajectory in NYC. […]
Have You Seen the Latest Marcia Kramer Segment on Prospect Park West?
| | 66 Comments
Hey, have you seen Marcia Kramer’s latest segment about Prospect Park West? It’s at least her third piece on a single Brooklyn bike lane in the last year. You can tell she’s had some practice — take a look (sorry about the minivan ad you’ll have to sit through first): If you only got your […]
Read All About It: Victims’ Loved Ones Fed Up With Markowitz
| | 3 Comments
For some reason this piece by Jake Pearson in today’s Daily News didn’t make it into the online edition, but here’s a look at what they printed on page 33… For those who don’t want to squint, Pearson’s lead paragraphs go like so: The families of Brooklyn residents killed or injured by cars while biking […]
Victim’s Mother Shames CBS2 for Using Traffic Death to Bolster Carl Kruger
| | 27 Comments
Last December, Sonia King lost her son Jason after a truck driver backed up illegally and ran over him while he was in the crosswalk on Madison Avenue at 81st Street, walking to work. The next month, she watched a Marcia Kramer segment on CBS2 about State Senator Carl Kruger’s bid to ban walking while […]
Does NYPD Know the Traffic Laws It’s Supposed to Enforce?
| | 22 Comments
We linked to this Gothamist post in the headline stack this morning, and it’s worth pulling out the story of obliviousness from the NYPD bike crackdown. Air Force veteran David Curtis Lettier was obeying all traffic laws while biking to class yesterday, when he was pulled over and cited for an imaginary offense: not wearing […]
Daily News to Cyclists: You Don’t Count
| | 17 Comments
In today’s Daily News, cartoonist Bill Bramhall continues the paper’s recent assault on Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan and the city’s efforts to make biking safer. He manages to simultaneously imply that New Yorkers who bike are a freakish spectacle and that they don’t exist. According to the most recent Department of Health survey, more than […]
Bloomberg: It’s Up to Albany to Revive Congestion Pricing
| | 2 Comments
If congestion pricing is going to resurface as a viable option to relieve traffic, help plug the enormous gap in the MTA capital program, and keep transit fares from ballooning in the years ahead, it won’t come from the Bloomberg administration. Testifying in Albany on Andrew Cuomo’s budget proposal today, Bloomberg said he won’t get […]