Cops Keeping Bike Lane Safe for Commercial Vehicles
Observed by BicyclesOnly on Thu, Dec 07 2006
This morning, I found these two cops parked in the bike lane, one reading the paper, the other doing official-looking paperwork, while two commercial vehicles parked behind them in the bike lane. I parked my bike and went over to speak to one of them. I was extremely polite with him and he was extremly testy and sarcastic toward me. He told me that given that there is a single lane for motor vehicle traffic in each direction of 77th Street, that commercial vehicles have a choice between parking in the traffic lane and parking in the bike lane, and the bike lane is the right choice for them. He added that he had specifically given permission to the van behind him to park in the bike lane.
3 Comments
Login or Register to comment.
Posted on Thu, Dec 07 2006 at 04:32 PM
Maybe the van should park in a parking spot and not in any traffic lane? When the police break the traffic laws, who are citizens supposed to turn to to enforce them?
Posted on Thu, Dec 07 2006 at 05:57 PM
Good question. I'm weighing whether to approach the local precinct or try the 311 route. In fairness, there were no parking spots on the street at the time (except for hydrants). But the van that the cops gave permission to was merely picking up two tool boxes, and the driver was able to carry them on his own in one trip. So he could have parked around the corner, and not in the bike lane, and walked. Some of the sarcastic comments from the cop included the question of whether I would want to be ticketed if I was moving into the building where the van was double parked, would I want my van ticketed, etc. I told him vans get ticketed all the time and they pay their tickets, why not on this street?
On related matter, I found the person responsible for the NYC Dep't of Finance "Delivery Solutions: Stipulated fine" Program. That the program that allows commercial parking violators to pay a fraction, or none, of their parking violations if they agree not to contest their ticekts. Her name is Marilyn Miller and she can be reached at 212-487-2485. She confirmed that parking in a bike lane is a "partially amenable" violation under the program, and so a program participants pay $28.75 ($115 X 25%) for each ticket for parking in the bike lane. Not much, really, especially when you consider that the cops aren't even enforcing it.
Posted on Thu, Dec 07 2006 at 06:14 PM
So the bike lane is a yellow zone? Ridiculous. This means the city's recent "biker safety" push to create 200 miles of more bike lanes is really creating 200 miles of parking.
This is a big stinky issue that should be made more clear to the public, especially as the city tries to take credit for making the city safer for cyclists, but at the same time practically encourages delivery trucks to park in those very lanes for financial reasons alone.