Filling The Gap

 About three weeks ago, I left for the last time. I’d been working at the college for just over four years.  I started there after going a year without teaching for the first time in nearly three decades, having lost my old job in the pandemic.

For the first five and a half semesters I worked there, I lived in Astoria.  My commute included crossing the Williamsburg Bridge.  I really enjoyed it—well, most of it anyway.

Until the Brooklyn Bridge opened its dedicated bike lane a couple of years ago, the Williamsburg’s bike lane was easily the best among New York City’s major crossings: It’s wide and has better sight lines than the Manhattan, RFK/Triboro, Queensborough/59th Street or George Washington Bridges.  And I loved that, like Manhattan’s lane, it runs alongside subway tracks. You could tell which passengers were tourists:  They were gazing at the urban panoramas that unfolded before them.  Some waved to me and other cyclists; a few even blew kisses my way. 

As with any major bridge crossing, you climb until you reach the apex.  That means, of course, you descend on the other side.Whee! 

Well, it’s fun until you reach Delancey Street on the Manhattan side.  You’re barreling down at about 40 or 50 MPH (65 to 80 KPH) when you encounter a passage not much wider than you, even if you’re young and skinny. Concrete blocks about your height flank it on either side.

Oh, and right before that strait, the surface drops about half a meter—as if you’re going off a high curb.  At 40-50 MPH (65-80 KPH).

Photo by Lloyd Mitchell

And you have to navigate all of that as people are crossing Delancey, a busy commercial thoroughfare.

Well, say what you will about our new mayor, but Zohran Mamdani, himself a cyclist, did what previous mayors didn’t:  He had the gap filled.  Better yet, he doesn’t plan to stop there:  He’s proposed a rebuild.

To Keep Cars Out Of Bike Lanes

One reason why I, and other New York City cyclists, don't use bike lanes is that motorists too often use them as passing or parking lanes.  

One of the most dangerous situations I encounter is only a block from my apartment.  The Crescent Street bike lane, which runs right in front of my door, is a two-way path separated from the one-way street by bollards (flexible posts).  If I am pedaling north, the direction opposite the traffic, and a vehicle--usually a taxi or Uber vehicle--pulls into the lane to drop off or pick up somebody at the Mount Sinai Hospital entrance--there is no place to go except into the traffic lane because, as often as not, the sidewalk is also blocked.

Such scenarios are repeated  in bike lanes all over the city, often by drivers who have less legitimate reasons for pulling into the lane than the ones who stop at Mount Sinai.  

Brad Hoylman. Check out his tie! (WireImage)

Thankfully, two New York State legislators--who, not surprisingly, are cyclists--have taken note of this problem.  They are proposing that cameras of the type used to catch speeders and red light-runners to detect scofflaw drivers in bike lanes.  Under their proposal, 50 locations--mainly in physically-separated bike lanes like the one on my street--would be the first to receive the cameras.   "We think there needs to be enforcement," said Brad Hoylman a State Senator from Manhattan and one of the sponsors of the proposal. 

Zohran Mandani (Photo by Brigitte Stelzer)

The proposal's other co-sponsor, Zohran Mandani, a State Assemblyman from Brooklyn, admits that the proposal won't be a "silver bullet" to keep the lanes clear.  He and Holyman explained, however, that knowing the cameras are in use could be a deterrent, as they are for drivers who might otherwise break other traffic laws.  So would the prospect of a $50 fine.

To be implemented as a policy, the proposal needs the approval of the New York City Department of Transportation, which has indicated that it would support such legislation.