Monday, June 3, 2024
Sunny. High 84 degrees. It will be the hottest day of the week.
Notices
Our calendar has lots of local events. Click on the link or the lady in the upper righthand corner to check.
June is Pride Month, described by NYC Pride as “a time to reflect on the long and resolute battle that members of the LGBTQIA+ community have waged in the name of love and equality — free to live their lives openly without fear of violence, discrimination, or persecution.”
It is not a federal holiday, but June 6 (Thursday) is the 80th anniversary of D-Day. “On June 6, 1944, Allied forces launched Operation Overlord — the codename for the massive Allied invasion of Normandy, France—with more than 150,000 troops,” according to the National WWII Museum. Across the country, the memory of the Allied forces who participated in the Normandy landings is honored.
Upper West Side News
By Gus Saltonstall
Meryl Streep and Martin Short were spotted on the Upper West Side last week, filming for the Hulu television series “Only Murders in the Building.”
The two stars were in the midst of a romantic scene on West 86th Street, between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenues, when Upper West Sider Ed Park snapped a few photos.
Short is one of the original cast members of the show, set on the Upper West Side, while Streep joined in more recent seasons. The fourth season of the show will return on August 27.
In the first three seasons, the central outdoor filming location for “Only Murders” was the real-life Belnord, at 225 West 86th Street, an eye-catching address with a massive entryway and gate.
The Belnord was designated a New York City landmark in 1966, and is one of the rare NYC buildings where a car can enter and do a loop around the courtyard to exit.
The building is called “The Arconia” in the Hulu show.
A New York Times headline this week posed the question: “Have E-Bikes Made New York City a ‘Nightmare’?”
The article mentions the Upper West Side and includes viewpoints from Upper West Siders. The author speaks to delivery drivers and people who have been injured by bikes, including Upper West Sider Pamela Manasse, who suffered a severe brain injury after being struck by an electric bike in 2022.
Following the injury, Manasse, along with Janet Schroeder, founded the NYC E-Vehicle Safety Alliance, which promotes various regulations for e-bikes.
The organization includes 74 people that have been injured by e-bikes, and supports a bill that would ban the vehicles from parks and greenways, and also require that e-bikes are registered.
The Times article also includes viewpoints from city officials; commentary on the role of delivery apps and how much we are ordering food since the pandemic; and the dynamic between bikes and cars.
The story does not, however, provide an answer to the question in its headline.
You can read the entire article — HERE.
Last week, amid the hoopla of the Trump trial, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office also announced the indictment of a man who flashed a loaded gun on a train as it pulled into an UWS station.
On Friday, Bragg announced the indictment of Michael Monahan, 33, for displaying a loaded .38 caliber revolver after getting into an argument with a person on an uptown 2 train as it approached the 96th Street station.
“As alleged, Michael Monahan possessed a fully loaded gun and displayed it to a subway rider while onboard a public train,” Bragg said in a news release. “This alleged conduct also jeopardized the safety of the other train passengers and thankfully, nobody was hurt. Our transit system is no place for dangerous weapons and anyone who seeks to cause harm will be held accountable.”
When Monahan displayed the gun during the early morning argument on May 4, passengers on the train car fled to the adjacent car. Along with the fully loaded revolver, police officers also recovered a switchblade knife from his pocket, according to the DA.
Monahan has been charged with multiple counts of criminal possession of a weapon.
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Do E-bikes have to be a ‘nightmare’ to be reined in? Seriously?
Irrespective of the adjective, their current use degrades our quality of life and needs to change. Period.
and was obvious to anyone with half a brain BEFORE the city allowed their approved use.
I think the Times article needs to be more specific. Are delivery e-bikes a problem? In our neighborhood whole heartedly yes.
Sadly because of e-bikes, strolling, a well loved pass time of UWSiders, is no longer the pleasure it once was. You can’t stroll on the sidewalks or in the park.
We are constantly told bikes are almost holy because they are not cars but cars are not on the side walks or buzzing you in the park on the pedestrian paths. Why is it that supporters of e-bikes and bikes in general feel that they should be immune from both criticism and regulation?
Because a LOBBY Trans Alt which masquerades as a pro-biking organization (which indeed used to be one before it was a lobby) has captured BOTH the Mayor and the DOT Chair-BIG TIME. If anyone were telling you the truth that’s what they’d say. They (Trans Alt) want no regulation of e-vehicles. They want no NYPD enforcement of e-bikers (deliveristas). And by virtue of their power and their money given out freely to our politicians they are succeeding in keeping lawless and dangerous e-bikers wholly unaccountable.
Last week I was almost hit twice. Once by an e-bike scooter riding in the street with the traffic who while the cars were all stopped at a red light went through it with me in the crosswalk inches from where he rode. Another time by a Citibike who went through a red light seeing me in the crosswalk-telling me he could go through the red light because he was turning! Umm-to turn you have to go through the crosswalk pedestrians were crossing in. This is everyday NYC.
Many of us are thinking of leaving cause it’s just too hard to be here when our elected leaders continually govern for the lobbyists and private interests and not their constituents! How great is it to go out for some groceries and end up injured on the street for the crime of walking to a market!
In the mean time-CALL your council members and demand licensing, registration and insurance for e-vehicles. And then demand the NYPD start enforcing the laws already on the books!! Don’t go quietly. A good group fighting for our safety on the streets is nycevsa.org NY E-Vehicle Safety Organization They are one of the only groups really accomplishing what our elected leaders seem unwilling to do!
Because someone whose name I shall not say is teaching everyone that the more laws, rules and norms you flout, the more awesome you are.
In a word, entitlement.
in two words ‘arrogant entitlement’.
You can’t stroll on the sidewalks anymore? Hyperbole much? Personally I don’t like e-bikes either but really, there is no question or debate about it, cars are far and away more of a threat to pedestrians, the numbers are incontrovertible.
Frankly, my major concern in Riverside Park, the Greenway, etc is less with e-bikes per se and rather with the gas powered motorcycles that illegally drive at high speed on sidewalks and bike paths. This is totally inexcusable and it’s a major enforcement problem because nobody wants to take responsibility for it.
Your major concern is the occasional “gas-powered motorcycle” but not the abundant 60-70lbs e-bikes and Citibikes riding on virtually every sidewalk in the neighborhood? A large subset of riders believe they have to ride the bike right to the door of the restaurant or right to the bike station, even if that means wiggling around pedestrians along a 3o-yard sidewalk.
What do you think that weight does, even traveling at 3=10mps as the rider is getting on or off the street, and crushes you from behind because you took an “errant” step sideways WHILE on a sidewalk?! What do you think it does to a 4-yr-old ? to a 87-yr-old?
They’re silent, they’ve obviously already been proven to be deadly, especially to frail people, and all kinds of folks are riding them on every single sidewalk.
Hyperbole? Not even close.
I fail to see how cars pose a constant threat to pedestrians on a sidewalk. And what percentage of drivers ignore red lights and go the wrong way on one-way streets compared to the percentage of e-bike riders? There’s no comparison.
Note the lack of Brewer as a sponsor of this bill! Wonder why?
https://legistar.council.nyc.gov/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=6509431&GUID=1F2F9592-90F7-46C9-BDCD-7D2B32DD3A8F
Nightmare….no, that’s hyperbole….but they do degrade the quality of life for anyone who isn’t at home waiting for his dinner to be delivered.
Its not just the sidewalks, either, its crossing the bike lanes and streets, too. Many biker violate all kinds of traffic rules.
However, if police would start enforcing existing rules, and the city council would realize that ebikes are motorized vehicles, and insist that they be registered, we could cut down the recklessness considerably. But the important thing is the enforcement. Unless the police are engaged, nothing will change. Can the mayor do anything about enforcement? I suggest that you contact him. His text number is readily available.
For those living the harsh reality of terror of merely walking on sidewalks and crossing streets…and need more than just posting on local news sites…I would urge you to reach out to the E-Vehicle Safety Alliance and help them help you!
They are actually DOING SOMETHING…DEMANDING LAWS AND BILLS BE PASSED…and beginning to make real progress, both in City Hall (that bastion of inept, and often corrupt City Council Members) and in Albany, Do something good for yourself…and for those whose voices are NOT BEING HEARD.
Contact nyc-evsa@outlook.com
Their website: https://www.nycevsa.org/
This weekend in Queens! Be safe people.
https://youtu.be/MC3E69B1sGc?si=sxgj2KAju1P9otWF
I am thinking walking should be illegal as pedestrians are always in my way while riding my e-Bike. Sidewalks have one purpose these days-and e bike highway. Get out of my way grandpa!
When a pedestrian is injured by a licensed motor vehicle the injured person will have their medical expenses covered by the company insuring the driver or the vehicle involved. Fault is not usually an issue. Why not require that the entity the deliverista is delivering for be insured and responsible for the medical and other expenses of the injured persons. Forever.
How about letting customers choose whether they want their delivery faster with the “full speed I don’t give a damn” service, or for a lower cost, the “happy to wait, don’t hurt anyone” service. Maybe you get a larger portion or a chocolate bar or a drink. Make the customer part of the solution. Incentivize safety.
It’s a good thought, but there’s absolutely zero incentive for the restaurateur to provide anything of value if the customer agrees to a slower delivery. There’s zero incentive for the delivery service to implement something like this because it just means fewer deliveries and less revenue for them.
Maybe offer an option where the customer foregoes delivery entirely and picks up the meal themselves? In return, they save the tip and pay a potentially lower price for their meal since the restaurant isn’t paying a vig to the delivery service. Wait – I think we have that already.
Regarding the e-bike article: I have recently been clipped by e-bikes twice between 70th and 71st, near the little triangle between Columbus and Broadway. Both times the bikes were going the wrong way and were about three inches away from me. It was terrifying. You cannot hear them, and they seem to come out of nowhere.
I understand that many e-bike riders are trying to make a living, but that doesn’t give them a pass to not observe the rules of the road, including that pedestrians have the right of way, as I was taught many moons ago in driver ed in CT.
Taxi and Uber drivers, delivery trucks, and others are all trying to making a living too, and they are nowhere near the nuisance that ebikes are.
As I recently wrote to our wonderful Gail Brewer, I hope that e-biker riders will be licensed in the future with drivers ed a prerequisite. Additionally, stiffer penalties for breaking the law need to be enacted. Also legislative pressure should be exerted on delivery companies causing them to ease up on the penalties they impose on their drivers for not delivering orders at the speed of light. It seems to me the delivery companies are as much to blame as the e-bike drivers.
So people bellyache over delivery riders after the city gave all our public space to cars for free.
They would rather riders lose their lives making one of the over 10k deliveries a day -to the UWS alone- than get drivers to pay for their personal storage so we can have safe bike lanes.
Cars are what is killing 300 New Yorkers a year. The obsession with delivery riders is fear mongering at best.
The obsession with delivery drivers is definitely not fear mongering. It’s what’s actually happening to me and others who live in NYC every time we walk out of our doors. This is not just some manipulative news story. Maybe you are new here and so don’t know that things were once better? Cars certainly cause problems and the argument about them taking up free parking space on the street is certainly an argument that can be had, but the issue with e-bikes causing danger by not following the rules is absolutely legitimate. I can certainly be afraid of cars, but the vast majority of the time, they behave in a predictable manner. It is the norm for e-bikes to not behave in predictable manners which is part of what makes their speed and weight so dangerous. And to be honest, I think it’s unfortunate that the city is allowing an industry to place pressure on its workers to behave in this way just to earn enough income to survive in NYC. It may even be racist. Perhaps the city doesn’t care what happens to the largely brown New Yorkers who are doing these jobs. Not to mention the residences where they and their families live that catch on fire. We can do better and it really shouldn’t be hard.
Well, no. Not even close. I don’t want the riders to “lose their lives”. And how in the world would things like enforcement of traffic laws, rider training, registration/licensing and insurance cause them to “lose their lives” in the first place? I want to potentially save their lives by ensuring that they obey all traffic regulations. I want to potentially save their lives by ensuring that the delivery services they work for do not incentivize them to risk their own or others’ lives.
What’s wrong with that?
I have lived here for my entire life.
Don’t drive. We walk or use transit. We don’t order food delivery.
Bicycle proliferation since the Bloomberg years have definitely made life much worse for me and my family.
Bicyclists (pedal, e, Citibike, racing) routinely go through red lights, the wrong way, weave around pedestrians, ignore bike lanes.
And Citibike users especially don’t seem to hesitate to curse any pedestrian who dares object.
Wow.
There is a rather simple solution to at least part of this problem. Do not order food from places that use delivery services. Pick up your own food and interact with your community! Food delivery services are raking in the dough while mistreating their workers. And bilking the restaurants using their app service. Seems like UWS-ers used to care about such things as the treatment of workers. Maybe the population here has changed. There is so much wrong with living like this all for a few orders of burritos.
Ebikes are hazardous. Dangerous. All this back and forth about hyperbole is ridiculous. It’s the truth, not hyperbole, not exaggeration, the truth. Anyone who has been struck, and injured, either temporarily or permanently, knows full-welll the danger. These delivery bikes are upward of 100 lbs. Citibike about 80 lbs, and those riders are horrific. Police can only do what’s possible without a license plate to identify the constant egregious lawbreakers.