23 ms·

Bus Lane Blocked, He Trained His Computer to Catch Scofflaws

350 points by sethbannon 9y ago

milliams 9y ago
It looks the like the author of the code has written about it at https://medium.com/@alex.morgan.bell/drivers-are-breaking-the-law-slowing-commutes-and-endangering-lives-i-can-prove-it-and-fix-it-9fe1f9a101b9 https://medium.com/@alex.morgan.bell/drivers-are-breaking-th... as well
atomical 9y ago
Why not start recording and uploading pics and video of the individual employees instead of just posting pictures of their vehicle?
- jandrese 9y ago
  If you are a UPS driver in NYC what are your other options? This is a systemic issue, not some "bad apples". You won't fix it by naming and shaming the pawns.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - eli 9y ago
    Isn't that exactly what commercial loading zones are for?
  - sjburt 9y ago
    In many cities, UPS tells its drivers to park illegally and then pays the resulting tickets in bulk. It's a cost of doing business for them. This cost is limited by the number of parking enforcement vehicles. If the cost were increased enough (perhaps by enforcing the law more aggressively), UPS might choose a different strategy such as telling its drivers to park legally and walk further.
    - jfk13 9y ago
      Apparently the parking fines are not high enough.
      - kevin_b_er 9y ago
        Does a flesh and blood person suffer from increased fines for repeated violations? Then so should a corporate person.
    - gnud 9y ago
      That sounds a bit weird to me. A company shouldn't be allowed to instruct it's employees to break the law - not even traffic regulations. So the fee should go to the driver, not to the company. I think that might solve the issue quickly.
    - jandrese 9y ago
      You're basically asking the drivers to perform a miracle every time they deliver a package. Anybody who lasts more than a week would qualify for Catholic sainthood. Saint Jim, patron saint of on-street parking.
      - jopsen 9y ago
        Maybe delivery services should be more expensive? You are subsidizing private enterprise by tolerating organized violation of traffic laws. If you want delivery companies to be allowed to behave this way, then make a law. It's perfectly reasonable for a municipality to except certified delivery companies from some traffic rules...
        jandrese 9y ago
        How much surcharge should you expect for the ability to perform a verifiable miracle on demand? An actual workable solution would be to simply not allow deliveries to a building unless it has an available commercial delivery spot. That may make some businesses unhappy however. Residents may be unhappy to see entire sections of the city suddenly have no walkup businesses as well.
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  I tried suing UPS directly. https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20151002/central-harlem/harlem-bicyclist-sues-ups-for-routinely-parking-trucks-bike-lanes https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20151002/central-harlem/har... its still ongoing. There are over 1000 UPS trucks on NYC streets so the shaming force would have to be huge.
jandrese 9y ago
So the solution is simple: Create a dedicated package delivery/cab pickup/dropoff lane for those vehicle that clearly need to stop frequently but for short times. /s Maybe try to reclaim some of the street parking spots by making them 5-10 minute stop only. Given the ratio of street parking to population that's probably not enough. Enforcement would be difficult too. It seems the crux of the issue is that there are vehicles that need to make short stops at establishments and cant afford to spend an hour finding a legitimate parking spot each time. The only reasonable option now is to park illegally and try to be quicker than the cops.
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  Maybe. But instead of dedicated points. Why not just have a market set the price of parking. So no free parking. And the price of parking is set so that we are at 75% capacity by day/hour or something like that. So that way there are always spots available and everyone pays their due.
  - gandreani 9y ago
    I agree! "Cheap" parking is another syndrome of America's car culture. Nothing is free and we pay for the free/cheap parking in other ways. In this case it trickled down to the buses and bikers. They pay for it in longer more dangerous commutes
    - vonmoltke 9y ago
      How is "car culture" relevant to contractors and delivery vehicles?
      - gandreani 9y ago
        They take up all the spots on the street...
        vonmoltke 9y ago
WhompingWindows 9y ago
While the attempt to hold public and/or private vehicles accountable for these violations is laudable, I question how these problems truly get fixed. NYC is very densely populated, it has a lot of commercial transit, tourists, bikes, scooters, j-walkers, busses, Ubers, taxis, and getting these all to play nicely on the same road network seems beyond the current infrastructure and enforcement scheme. Obviously, many of the observed cases should be penalized, but some 100k annual violations in a city of over 10 million people, that's a drop in the bucket of violations. In the long run, it seems to me that enforcement is not the solution as much as infrastructure, technology, and culture. Why not make major avenues/streets one-way and convert half the street into bike lanes, then remove bike lanes from other streets which are too narrow to allow cars/bikes/busses to move together well? Or, improve the subway infrastructure so that surface transit is less appealing by comparison. Or, create a system where we don't have public storage of privately owned vehicles in parking spots. How about the issue of vehicles that have 4 seats on average, but have <2 people in them in typical use. Buses are cheaper than trains to implement, however I've seen many massive buses often run completely empty, thus their capacity factor is definitely closer to 50% than the 100% that public transit afficionados would love to believe. Maybe we need more granularity in offering the right bus for the right job, which would be more energy and space efficient as well. Given all these potential solutions, it remains to the rancorous and slow-moving world of representative government to play a massive role in these solutions. I can't foresee the problem getting substantially better any time soon via politics, but rather culture/technology will be a more nimble answer.
- lgregg 9y ago
  When I was in LA, I noticed that they had about 3 three different types of buses and their short/minibuses were everywhere.
- mjevans 9y ago
  The actual solution is to separate the layers. Top: Human scale movement (pedestrians, non-motorized and 'very' small motor (1 HP per human mass being moved) personal transport devices (think wheel chairs and maybe slow-speed scooters/electrically assisted bikes). Mid (down): delivery / private vehicle / emergency services. Lower: Bulk public transit (subways and the like). While we're at it, put parks and recreation areas in the middle of the human level of traffic. Maybe storefronts along the sides.
Bellspringsteen 9y ago
Hello HN, I wrote a longer post here, https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 I also called in to Ask the Mayor this morning to discuss. He was not happy https://soundcloud.com/alex-bell-103/askthemayor-bill-deblasio-on-blocked-bus-stops-and-bike-lanes https://soundcloud.com/alex-bell-103/askthemayor-bill-deblas...
- sdhgaiojfsa 9y ago
  I can kinda understand why he wasn't happy. Your initial phrasing was very hostile. I am not sure what he would have said if you had phrased your question more neutrally, but your tone definitely gave him the opportunity to partially ignore your (totally valid!) concerns.
  - Bellspringsteen 9y ago
    What was the hostile part? The "Dont tell me its a state problem?" I mean the man punts everything to the state, I had to preempt
    - sdhgaiojfsa 9y ago
      But it didn't work, right? He turned your attempt at preemption into a distraction from your point. I don't know how best to handle these things, but what I might have said is something like, "<Why it's important that bus and bike lanes not be blocked.> <What you invented, the results.> <Would the city consider investing in an invention like mine, or else what are we going to do to reduce the rate at which these blockages occur?>" FTR, I'm totally in favor of the automatic enforcement you describe! I'd also like to mostly or entirely remove free parking from the city.
      - Bellspringsteen 9y ago
        Yeah, good point. Maybe I should have tried to be less accusatory.
ayemiller 9y ago
The bizarre looking thing that he is riding-- https://gearjunkie.com/small-urban-bike-design-alex-bell https://gearjunkie.com/small-urban-bike-design-alex-bell
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  Hfahahahah
- aedocw 9y ago
  Thank you for posting that link - as I was reading the article, that picture was the first thing that caught my eye and I couldn't figure out what he was riding!
- CydeWeys 9y ago
  Wow, he figured out how to miniaturize a penny-farthing and add gearing to boot. I want to try that. I doubt I'd replace my road bike, but I want to know what that's like to ride.
iooi 9y ago
> The blocking of bus and bike lanes has become a sore spot among transportation advocates who believe the city’s enforcement efforts are inadequate. As a native, this is the crux of the issue. Traffic enforcement in NYC (specifically, Manhattan) is atrocious. So many cars run red lights, make illegal turns, block the sidewalk, stand illegally, etc. It's self-perpetuating, the more people see others get away with these infractions, the more likely they are to do it themselves. They really have to start fining people for every single infraction, especially the minor ones, to change the horrible car culture in the city.
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  True. But do we want humans doing the enforcement? How many humans would you need? What about night? What about equality of enforcement? I touch on some of the issues https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 I am unsure.
  - UncleEntity 9y ago
    > But do we want humans doing the enforcement? I think as a general rule we always want humans doing the enforcement, Confrontation Clause and all that. Plus anything that brings us closer to The Total Surveillance State I'm generally against.
    - askvictor 9y ago
      If there is video evidence of the offence that can be brought to court, is this a concern for you? If there is a chronic disregard for particular laws due to the fact they cannot be enforced on a large scale by humans, then what do you propose as a solution if we're discarding video surveillance?
      - UncleEntity 9y ago
        > If there is a chronic disregard for particular laws due to the fact they cannot be enforced on a large scale by humans, then what do you propose as a solution if we're discarding video surveillance? I see your point... cameras everywhere to catch all the non-violent drug offenders then?
liminal 9y ago
This is a cultural issue. I'm new to New York and was immediately surprised by how little drivers care where they leave their cars. Traffic here moves very slowly and a lot of it seems due to lanes being blocked by unattended vehicles. I wonder if this is an American attitude, like the way Americans seem to care much less about recycling trash.
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  Definitely. Where are you from? If you go to Tokyo you will be astonished by the unlocked bicycles, clean streets, parking, etc. Its possible. You just have to design the city so that those actions are the default. And educate people. And educate some more. And yell.
  - huebnerob 9y ago
    Japanese culture has an extreme respect for laws, you can't just 'teach' someone that.
- lazerpants 9y ago
  It's not an American thing, it's mostly just an NYC, and maybe Boston, Philly, DC thing. The parking/driving thing, not the recycling one.
  - electricslpnsld 9y ago
    Happens on the west coast too, particularly in the Bay Area cities.
    - djrogers 9y ago
      Maybe happens to a small degree in San Franscisco proper, but in all my visits to the city I’ve never seen anyone parked in the bus lanes on Market for example. As for the rest of the Bay Area, I skinny you’d find anything close to a tithe of NYCs illegally parked and stopped vehicles. In my town you’d find as close to zero as makes no difference, as would be the case in most others I spend time in.
madhadron 9y ago
How about putting armored plows on the front of the buses and letting them shove whatever is parked in their way in the buslanes out of the way? Preferable left angled plows so it blocks general traffic instead of the sidewalk.
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  Seems a little violent.
  - r00fus 9y ago
    Only if you see cars as the dominant lifeform on this planet (a la Transformers). Cars don't have a right to loiter on public roadways.
- Joeri 9y ago
  I have a relative who used to drive a bus in brussels and would “nudge” cars out of the way if they were only partially blocking his path. The bus was none the worse for wear, and the cars he didn’t care about.
aarmenante 9y ago
Where are taxis, ride-sharing vehicles, and delivery trucks supposed to stop? I get frustrated when I ride my bike to work and the bike lanes are blocked, but I have always just assumed that will be the case when riding in a commercially dense area. This is probably rarely the case, but when cops are instigating something (I'm sure 90% of the time they are just getting coffee) and need to park their car, are they supposed to circle the block, or block traffic? US cities are unfortunately optimized for cars and trucks. It's how stores get resupplied and people get dropped off when not near public transportation. I'm not trying to stir-the-pot, but I find there is a mildly militant tone to biking activism that makes me not take it very seriously. I'm sure I'll get downvoted for this ha. After you have had to sit through critical mass (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Mass_(cycling) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Mass_(cycling)) for the 10th time when you are trying to get home from work or get your car door kicked when trying to make a right turn in the city you develop a visceral reaction to news about cycling outrage. I would love to be able to get around NYC on a bike without having to fear death, but I don't think software engineers writing ticketing software that targets delivery truck drivers is the best solution. Better civic planning is.
- psychometry 9y ago
  The solution is to turn parking spots into loading zones.
  - aarmenante 9y ago
    Yeah. I think you're right. My cousin drives everywhere in NYC and I think it's INSANE. I can't think of many reasons non-commercial vehicles need to be parked on the street. If you live in Manhatten you probably don't need a car to get to your job or have enough money to justify renting a parking space.
    - Bellspringsteen 9y ago
      Totally about parking. https://www.amazon.com/High-Cost-Free-Parking-Updated/dp/193236496X https://www.amazon.com/High-Cost-Free-Parking-Updated/dp/193... is a great book. Its all about parking in some ways.
jackconnor 9y ago
Great article, and really, really good work with analyzing all that video. Those blockage rates, 40% & 55% of the time, are insane, I hope they listen to start working on a fix, because the current situation is ridiculous.
lopmotr 9y ago
How is enforcement so totally lacking? Why do they need to use police for it? Where I live, the police don't do that, the city council's parking wardens see a packed car blocking a lane and call a tow truck to remove it. So all the bus lanes and clearways (temporary no parking lanes) are always free when needed. Maybe if they towed a few UPS trucks, they'd send a message to the others.
intrasight 9y ago
I think it's a mistake to conflate bike and bus lanes in urban transportation analysis. It should not be possible for any vehicle to enter let alone park in a bike lane. As for bus lanes, the bus authority police should be empowered to address this.
- jmkb 9y ago
  Many of the bike lanes in NYC are nothing but a stripe of paint along the side of a single-lane road, whose curbs are lined with parked cars. Cars double-parking for loading, etc will inevitably either block the bike lane or block the auto lane, causing cars to swerve into the bike lane. eg, https://www.google.com/maps/@40.7784195,-73.9470116,3a,75y,295.87h,74.74t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sb972S4CcXVvS0TdLQo1A8g!2e0!7i16384!8i8192!5m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@40.7784195,-73.9470116,3a,75y,2...
  - intrasight 9y ago
    Yes I know. But as we see in many European cities, it doesn't have to be that way.
    - jmkb 9y ago
      The obvious solution is to remove the on-street car parking on at least one side of any street that hosts a bike lane, and use the space for a separated bike route with a protective barrier. Unfortunately I doubt it's politically feasible at this time. There's plenty of resistance to bike lanes already; reducing the street parking would be seen as an undue hardship on the middle class. I do feel things will change over time though -- I know several New Yorkers who used to have cars but now, in the age of car/bike sharing and app-enabled car services, no longer own one.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago
Maybe we should also train a computer that can catch scofflaw bicyclists that ignore stop signs and red lights. http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/dot_bikesmart_brochure.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/dot_bikesmart_broc...
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  You are right that the bicycle community does itself no favors with some of our behavior. We are working on it. I think the bigger issue I raised was about the Busses.
  - rsync 9y ago
    "We are working on it." I am not sure there is anything that can be worked on ... As a driver who lives in a very popular biking environment (and who has given some careful thought to the issues and has taken his own turns being a biker) I am increasingly convinced that riding a bike and driving a car on the same roads are fundamentally antagonistic behaviors. I find that unfortunate, but I think it might be the case.
    - oh_sigh 9y ago
      Yes, there don't seem to be good solutions. I don't want to get run over by a car, or have a car cut in front of me and turn into my path of travel, so sharrow/striped bike lanes aren't great. But in all of the separated bike lanes in NY, you have pedestrians cutting across them at all times, frequently hidden behind cars or behaving in erratic unpredictable manners, so these lanes aren't too good either. Granted, in a separated bike lane I'm more worried about killing a pedestrian that jumps in front of me, and less worried about my own health as I am in a sharrow/striped bike lane.
    - wbl 9y ago
      Why does Amsterdam manage to serve both cars and bikes?
    - razorunreal 9y ago
liminal 9y ago
The one thing I've seen help with this problem is to physically separate the bicycle lane from the other traffic. A series of bollards are cheap to bolt to the road or with more effort a grade separation can be made.
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  Yes, protect lanes for buses and bikes etc is the best solution. Hopefully this research adds emphasis on why those are important.
- djrogers 9y ago
  Those bollards take up space, and we’re already dealing with what are in some cases very old and narrow roads.
- cataphract 9y ago
  Bollards in the middle of the road are dangerous. The solution is to segregate the bike lane by putting it on the right of the parked cars, next to the pedestrians. This means that cyclists will cross together with the pedestrians and that left turns require two lights, but these can be programmed so that the waiting time is minimized (OTOH, cyclists have no lights for turning right).
- flukus 9y ago
  I've seen this not work. Places where people want to park generally have driveways or street corners where the grade separation needs a break and drivers will use this break to get into the bike lane.
Nilef 9y ago
I’ve been working on a startup to solve this problem for a few months now - There’s a lot of difficult issues to work through in this space, especially for non-grid system cities and solving problems around getting data off of cameras. I’m in the UK - Give me a shout if you’re interested in working on this with me, it’s a big piece of work to chew on! Email is in my profile
u801e 9y ago
I wonder if the problem could be solved if the bus lane or bike lane was in the middle between two general traffic lanes, rather than off to the side (where people tend to idle or park).
- gr3yh47 9y ago
  in that case wouldnt the bus would necessarily need to cross traffic to get to and from a stop? and traffic would have to cross the bus lane to make turns?
  - lgregg 9y ago
    It's around. https://makewealthhistory.org/2017/09/04/transport-innovation-of-the-week-bus-rapid-transit/ https://makewealthhistory.org/2017/09/04/transport-innovatio...
post_break 9y ago
I need this software at home! I have a camera watching parking spots and I'd love to know if a spot is open before heading home from work or even better, if I hit a geo fence just before I got home so I knew which spots were open.
Jach 9y ago
Maybe bikes can just ride over cars and the police can decide to not enforce that in addition to not enforcing the lane blockages. People would probably stop parking there pretty quick. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33Hkyb9c9NQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33Hkyb9c9NQ Of course if you/the bike can't make such a jump... well I already get annoyed by bikes on the road which can't reach the road's speed limit so I'll shut up here.
- justherefortart 9y ago
  Speed limits are a ceiling not a floor.
  - Jach 9y ago
    And yet the average speed of a well-flowing road will invariably be near the speed limit. If your mode of locomotion can't reach the road's ceiling, it shouldn't be on that road.
    - lopmotr 9y ago
      Only if you can afford to build an extra slow road/lane for them. In the real world, you often can't. In that case, no, slow vehicles should be on that road. They're still people trying to get somewhere just like everyone else. Sometimes they're trucks going uphill - you can't exclude trucks from entire towns. The rule in most places are to pull over from time to time to let following vehicles pass.
- oh_sigh 9y ago
  The speed limit in NYC is 25, and traffic in manhattan averages 8mph. I can tell you from personal experience that I will pass most cars in manhattan unless I'm riding on an avenue that has rolling greens, and I'm just a recreational rider.
jonjojr 9y ago
The real life Sheldon Cooper. Block my walk path, i'll sue, if I lose, i'll build a robot to destroy you all.
wemdyjreichert 9y ago
I don't want to ride a bike everywhere I go. I don't want to have to shower and change a suit between meetings. I want to sit in the comfy, climate-controlled cushions of my car and relax. Biking activism will not change that. Creating bike and bus lanes in a city as dense as NYC is not a solution. Subways are faster, carry more people, and don't block existing traffic like bike and bus lanes.
- mikepurvis 9y ago
  The great thing, though, is that you don't have to _personally use_ the dedicated bus and bike infrastructure in order to benefit from it. By making these modes more comfortable and efficient, others (like those who don't need to wear to suits to meetings) are able to choose them, getting their cars off the road and leaving more room for yours.
- rconti 9y ago
  None of those things you want will happen in Manhattan anyway. So you're creating a straw man.
- cataphract 9y ago
  Your personal preferences are understandable, but they should not be the basis for public policy. Most households in New York do not even own a car. Using a 200 hp machine to move one 70 kg person is extremely wasteful. Not to mention the death toll (>1000 persons/year in NY) and the disproportionate amount of public property reserved for motor traffic and parking. Are you arguing that the ensuring the comfort of some car owners is the best use of public resources?
rconti 9y ago
Seems like a perfect use for the SF solution of having ANPR on busses. I don't love the cameras but it seems like a better answer than fixed cameras everywhere; it can be setup to only scan plates when there is a problem, instead of surveilling an entire area 24x7.
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jopsen 9y ago
You can't fix violations at this rate with enforcement... You're better of re-thinking the system so it's not violated as much. Putting up a barrier, and making wide pits that only busses can cross..
vzaliva 9y ago
It is not often one sees NY Times linking to Github :)
rripken 9y ago
Seems like bus drivers need to be able to issue parking tickets for blocking bus lanes. Maybe add a camera to the bus that is only used when a car is actually found blocking the bus lane and have the images lead to tickets.
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HIPisTheAnswer 9y ago
Any behavior which damages the physical integrity of others is criminal. Thus, burning fuel without everyone else's permission is a crime.
askvictor 9y ago
In Melbourne AU, we have these issues too (actually, more cars driving in Bus lanes), that police don't seem to bother enforcing. However, I see much more frequently other traffic violations that would benefit from a similar analysis on a large scale - two examples that come to mind are tailgating, and cars stopped in the middle of an intersection on a red light blocking cross traffic from going through. Both cases are so prevalent that even some (human) enforcement action wouldn't make a dint at this stage - it's become a cultural issue I suspect (probably due to lack of enforcement over the years as the roads get more congested and people more stressed/hurried). I get the fears of big brother and all that, but how do you solve these kinds of problems without mass automated surveillance?
makecheck 9y ago
People seem to prefer using the “main” streets and/or the exact street that leads to their destination, even when parallel roads would work just as well. For instance, I would often see cyclists causing major headaches by insisting on using space on busy roads (that lacked a clear lane) for miles, when there were dozens of residential side streets that ran 90% of the same way and were deserted. In those situations, the better solution is to just not use the congested road and pick another one that is basically going the same way. Similarly, buses run on predictable schedules and traffic is regularly frustrated sitting behind stopping buses when they could simply pick a parallel road where the bus doesn’t run at all. In a downtown scenario, maybe roads should be entirely reclassified to ensure separation. Maybe every 3 blocks is a street that has two lanes exclusively for cyclists, and then cyclists are banned from the other blocks that have only car lanes? Maybe deliveries and other stops should only be allowed on one of the 4 “sides” of a city block, with illegal stops on the other sides?
Tepix 9y ago
Neat hack. However: Total video surveillance as the solution? No thanks! How about: a) adding the cameras to the buses and storing only images of offending vehicles b) creating parking spaces dedicated to short term parking up to, say, 3 minutes or so
tomohawk 9y ago
And this is supposed to convince people that living in a dense urban environment where there's not even enough space to meet the basic transportation needs is somehow desirable? Seems like much more of a dystopia than a utopia.
- rublev 9y ago
  The concrete jungle is only a dystopia to those who are constantly in a whirlwind of inconvenience and don't have enough money to throw at it. If you're rich you cover the inconveniences with nice condos, taking cabs, and eating out.
pteredactyl 9y ago
I'm a cyclist. But get a kick out of the high number of sanctimonious cyclists out there. They feel since they're on the road they're entitled to all of it. Of course it's not ideal when a car is parked in the bicycle lane, but you can signal and go around it, as other cars do.

350 points by sethbannon 9y ago

It looks the like the author of the code has written about it at https://medium.com/@alex.morgan.bell/drivers-are-breaking-the-law-slowing-commutes-and-endangering-lives-i-can-prove-it-and-fix-it-9fe1f9a101b9 https://medium.com/@alex.morgan.bell/drivers-are-breaking-th... as well

atomical 9y ago

Why not start recording and uploading pics and video of the individual employees instead of just posting pictures of their vehicle?

jandrese 9y ago
If you are a UPS driver in NYC what are your other options? This is a systemic issue, not some "bad apples". You won't fix it by naming and shaming the pawns.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- eli 9y ago
  Isn't that exactly what commercial loading zones are for?
- sjburt 9y ago
  In many cities, UPS tells its drivers to park illegally and then pays the resulting tickets in bulk. It's a cost of doing business for them. This cost is limited by the number of parking enforcement vehicles. If the cost were increased enough (perhaps by enforcing the law more aggressively), UPS might choose a different strategy such as telling its drivers to park legally and walk further.
  - jfk13 9y ago
    Apparently the parking fines are not high enough.
    - kevin_b_er 9y ago
      Does a flesh and blood person suffer from increased fines for repeated violations? Then so should a corporate person.
  - gnud 9y ago
    That sounds a bit weird to me. A company shouldn't be allowed to instruct it's employees to break the law - not even traffic regulations. So the fee should go to the driver, not to the company. I think that might solve the issue quickly.
  - jandrese 9y ago
    You're basically asking the drivers to perform a miracle every time they deliver a package. Anybody who lasts more than a week would qualify for Catholic sainthood. Saint Jim, patron saint of on-street parking.
    - jopsen 9y ago
      Maybe delivery services should be more expensive? You are subsidizing private enterprise by tolerating organized violation of traffic laws. If you want delivery companies to be allowed to behave this way, then make a law. It's perfectly reasonable for a municipality to except certified delivery companies from some traffic rules...
      - jandrese 9y ago
        How much surcharge should you expect for the ability to perform a verifiable miracle on demand? An actual workable solution would be to simply not allow deliveries to a building unless it has an available commercial delivery spot. That may make some businesses unhappy however. Residents may be unhappy to see entire sections of the city suddenly have no walkup businesses as well.
Bellspringsteen 9y ago
I tried suing UPS directly. https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20151002/central-harlem/harlem-bicyclist-sues-ups-for-routinely-parking-trucks-bike-lanes https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20151002/central-harlem/har... its still ongoing. There are over 1000 UPS trucks on NYC streets so the shaming force would have to be huge.

jandrese 9y ago

So the solution is simple: Create a dedicated package delivery/cab pickup/dropoff lane for those vehicle that clearly need to stop frequently but for short times. /s Maybe try to reclaim some of the street parking spots by making them 5-10 minute stop only. Given the ratio of street parking to population that's probably not enough. Enforcement would be difficult too. It seems the crux of the issue is that there are vehicles that need to make short stops at establishments and cant afford to spend an hour finding a legitimate parking spot each time. The only reasonable option now is to park illegally and try to be quicker than the cops.

Bellspringsteen 9y ago
Maybe. But instead of dedicated points. Why not just have a market set the price of parking. So no free parking. And the price of parking is set so that we are at 75% capacity by day/hour or something like that. So that way there are always spots available and everyone pays their due.
- gandreani 9y ago
  I agree! "Cheap" parking is another syndrome of America's car culture. Nothing is free and we pay for the free/cheap parking in other ways. In this case it trickled down to the buses and bikers. They pay for it in longer more dangerous commutes
  - vonmoltke 9y ago
    How is "car culture" relevant to contractors and delivery vehicles?
    - gandreani 9y ago
      They take up all the spots on the street...
      - vonmoltke 9y ago

WhompingWindows 9y ago

While the attempt to hold public and/or private vehicles accountable for these violations is laudable, I question how these problems truly get fixed. NYC is very densely populated, it has a lot of commercial transit, tourists, bikes, scooters, j-walkers, busses, Ubers, taxis, and getting these all to play nicely on the same road network seems beyond the current infrastructure and enforcement scheme. Obviously, many of the observed cases should be penalized, but some 100k annual violations in a city of over 10 million people, that's a drop in the bucket of violations. In the long run, it seems to me that enforcement is not the solution as much as infrastructure, technology, and culture. Why not make major avenues/streets one-way and convert half the street into bike lanes, then remove bike lanes from other streets which are too narrow to allow cars/bikes/busses to move together well? Or, improve the subway infrastructure so that surface transit is less appealing by comparison. Or, create a system where we don't have public storage of privately owned vehicles in parking spots. How about the issue of vehicles that have 4 seats on average, but have <2 people in them in typical use. Buses are cheaper than trains to implement, however I've seen many massive buses often run completely empty, thus their capacity factor is definitely closer to 50% than the 100% that public transit afficionados would love to believe. Maybe we need more granularity in offering the right bus for the right job, which would be more energy and space efficient as well. Given all these potential solutions, it remains to the rancorous and slow-moving world of representative government to play a massive role in these solutions. I can't foresee the problem getting substantially better any time soon via politics, but rather culture/technology will be a more nimble answer.

lgregg 9y ago
When I was in LA, I noticed that they had about 3 three different types of buses and their short/minibuses were everywhere.
mjevans 9y ago
The actual solution is to separate the layers. Top: Human scale movement (pedestrians, non-motorized and 'very' small motor (1 HP per human mass being moved) personal transport devices (think wheel chairs and maybe slow-speed scooters/electrically assisted bikes). Mid (down): delivery / private vehicle / emergency services. Lower: Bulk public transit (subways and the like). While we're at it, put parks and recreation areas in the middle of the human level of traffic. Maybe storefronts along the sides.

Bellspringsteen 9y ago

Hello HN, I wrote a longer post here, https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 I also called in to Ask the Mayor this morning to discuss. He was not happy https://soundcloud.com/alex-bell-103/askthemayor-bill-deblasio-on-blocked-bus-stops-and-bike-lanes https://soundcloud.com/alex-bell-103/askthemayor-bill-deblas...

sdhgaiojfsa 9y ago
I can kinda understand why he wasn't happy. Your initial phrasing was very hostile. I am not sure what he would have said if you had phrased your question more neutrally, but your tone definitely gave him the opportunity to partially ignore your (totally valid!) concerns.
- Bellspringsteen 9y ago
  What was the hostile part? The "Dont tell me its a state problem?" I mean the man punts everything to the state, I had to preempt
  - sdhgaiojfsa 9y ago
    But it didn't work, right? He turned your attempt at preemption into a distraction from your point. I don't know how best to handle these things, but what I might have said is something like, "<Why it's important that bus and bike lanes not be blocked.> <What you invented, the results.> <Would the city consider investing in an invention like mine, or else what are we going to do to reduce the rate at which these blockages occur?>" FTR, I'm totally in favor of the automatic enforcement you describe! I'd also like to mostly or entirely remove free parking from the city.
    - Bellspringsteen 9y ago
      Yeah, good point. Maybe I should have tried to be less accusatory.

ayemiller 9y ago

The bizarre looking thing that he is riding-- https://gearjunkie.com/small-urban-bike-design-alex-bell https://gearjunkie.com/small-urban-bike-design-alex-bell

Bellspringsteen 9y ago
Hfahahahah
aedocw 9y ago
Thank you for posting that link - as I was reading the article, that picture was the first thing that caught my eye and I couldn't figure out what he was riding!
CydeWeys 9y ago
Wow, he figured out how to miniaturize a penny-farthing and add gearing to boot. I want to try that. I doubt I'd replace my road bike, but I want to know what that's like to ride.

iooi 9y ago

> The blocking of bus and bike lanes has become a sore spot among transportation advocates who believe the city’s enforcement efforts are inadequate. As a native, this is the crux of the issue. Traffic enforcement in NYC (specifically, Manhattan) is atrocious. So many cars run red lights, make illegal turns, block the sidewalk, stand illegally, etc. It's self-perpetuating, the more people see others get away with these infractions, the more likely they are to do it themselves. They really have to start fining people for every single infraction, especially the minor ones, to change the horrible car culture in the city.

Bellspringsteen 9y ago
True. But do we want humans doing the enforcement? How many humans would you need? What about night? What about equality of enforcement? I touch on some of the issues https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 https://hackernoon.com/cameras-as-traffic-cops-99a85513e1e0 I am unsure.
- UncleEntity 9y ago
  > But do we want humans doing the enforcement? I think as a general rule we always want humans doing the enforcement, Confrontation Clause and all that. Plus anything that brings us closer to The Total Surveillance State I'm generally against.
  - askvictor 9y ago
    If there is video evidence of the offence that can be brought to court, is this a concern for you? If there is a chronic disregard for particular laws due to the fact they cannot be enforced on a large scale by humans, then what do you propose as a solution if we're discarding video surveillance?
    - UncleEntity 9y ago
      > If there is a chronic disregard for particular laws due to the fact they cannot be enforced on a large scale by humans, then what do you propose as a solution if we're discarding video surveillance? I see your point... cameras everywhere to catch all the non-violent drug offenders then?

liminal 9y ago

This is a cultural issue. I'm new to New York and was immediately surprised by how little drivers care where they leave their cars. Traffic here moves very slowly and a lot of it seems due to lanes being blocked by unattended vehicles. I wonder if this is an American attitude, like the way Americans seem to care much less about recycling trash.

Bellspringsteen 9y ago
Definitely. Where are you from? If you go to Tokyo you will be astonished by the unlocked bicycles, clean streets, parking, etc. Its possible. You just have to design the city so that those actions are the default. And educate people. And educate some more. And yell.
- huebnerob 9y ago
  Japanese culture has an extreme respect for laws, you can't just 'teach' someone that.
lazerpants 9y ago
It's not an American thing, it's mostly just an NYC, and maybe Boston, Philly, DC thing. The parking/driving thing, not the recycling one.
- electricslpnsld 9y ago
  Happens on the west coast too, particularly in the Bay Area cities.
  - djrogers 9y ago
    Maybe happens to a small degree in San Franscisco proper, but in all my visits to the city I’ve never seen anyone parked in the bus lanes on Market for example. As for the rest of the Bay Area, I skinny you’d find anything close to a tithe of NYCs illegally parked and stopped vehicles. In my town you’d find as close to zero as makes no difference, as would be the case in most others I spend time in.

madhadron 9y ago

How about putting armored plows on the front of the buses and letting them shove whatever is parked in their way in the buslanes out of the way? Preferable left angled plows so it blocks general traffic instead of the sidewalk.

Bellspringsteen 9y ago
Seems a little violent.
- r00fus 9y ago
  Only if you see cars as the dominant lifeform on this planet (a la Transformers). Cars don't have a right to loiter on public roadways.
Joeri 9y ago
I have a relative who used to drive a bus in brussels and would “nudge” cars out of the way if they were only partially blocking his path. The bus was none the worse for wear, and the cars he didn’t care about.

aarmenante 9y ago

Where are taxis, ride-sharing vehicles, and delivery trucks supposed to stop? I get frustrated when I ride my bike to work and the bike lanes are blocked, but I have always just assumed that will be the case when riding in a commercially dense area. This is probably rarely the case, but when cops are instigating something (I'm sure 90% of the time they are just getting coffee) and need to park their car, are they supposed to circle the block, or block traffic? US cities are unfortunately optimized for cars and trucks. It's how stores get resupplied and people get dropped off when not near public transportation. I'm not trying to stir-the-pot, but I find there is a mildly militant tone to biking activism that makes me not take it very seriously. I'm sure I'll get downvoted for this ha. After you have had to sit through critical mass (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Mass_(cycling) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Mass_(cycling)) for the 10th time when you are trying to get home from work or get your car door kicked when trying to make a right turn in the city you develop a visceral reaction to news about cycling outrage. I would love to be able to get around NYC on a bike without having to fear death, but I don't think software engineers writing ticketing software that targets delivery truck drivers is the best solution. Better civic planning is.

psychometry 9y ago
The solution is to turn parking spots into loading zones.
- aarmenante 9y ago
  Yeah. I think you're right. My cousin drives everywhere in NYC and I think it's INSANE. I can't think of many reasons non-commercial vehicles need to be parked on the street. If you live in Manhatten you probably don't need a car to get to your job or have enough money to justify renting a parking space.
  - Bellspringsteen 9y ago
    Totally about parking. https://www.amazon.com/High-Cost-Free-Parking-Updated/dp/193236496X https://www.amazon.com/High-Cost-Free-Parking-Updated/dp/193... is a great book. Its all about parking in some ways.

jackconnor 9y ago

Great article, and really, really good work with analyzing all that video. Those blockage rates, 40% & 55% of the time, are insane, I hope they listen to start working on a fix, because the current situation is ridiculous.

lopmotr 9y ago

How is enforcement so totally lacking? Why do they need to use police for it? Where I live, the police don't do that, the city council's parking wardens see a packed car blocking a lane and call a tow truck to remove it. So all the bus lanes and clearways (temporary no parking lanes) are always free when needed. Maybe if they towed a few UPS trucks, they'd send a message to the others.

intrasight 9y ago

I think it's a mistake to conflate bike and bus lanes in urban transportation analysis. It should not be possible for any vehicle to enter let alone park in a bike lane. As for bus lanes, the bus authority police should be empowered to address this.

jmkb 9y ago
Many of the bike lanes in NYC are nothing but a stripe of paint along the side of a single-lane road, whose curbs are lined with parked cars. Cars double-parking for loading, etc will inevitably either block the bike lane or block the auto lane, causing cars to swerve into the bike lane. eg, https://www.google.com/maps/@40.7784195,-73.9470116,3a,75y,295.87h,74.74t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sb972S4CcXVvS0TdLQo1A8g!2e0!7i16384!8i8192!5m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@40.7784195,-73.9470116,3a,75y,2...
- intrasight 9y ago
  Yes I know. But as we see in many European cities, it doesn't have to be that way.
  - jmkb 9y ago
    The obvious solution is to remove the on-street car parking on at least one side of any street that hosts a bike lane, and use the space for a separated bike route with a protective barrier. Unfortunately I doubt it's politically feasible at this time. There's plenty of resistance to bike lanes already; reducing the street parking would be seen as an undue hardship on the middle class. I do feel things will change over time though -- I know several New Yorkers who used to have cars but now, in the age of car/bike sharing and app-enabled car services, no longer own one.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago

Maybe we should also train a computer that can catch scofflaw bicyclists that ignore stop signs and red lights. http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/dot_bikesmart_brochure.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/dot_bikesmart_broc...

Bellspringsteen 9y ago
You are right that the bicycle community does itself no favors with some of our behavior. We are working on it. I think the bigger issue I raised was about the Busses.
- rsync 9y ago
  "We are working on it." I am not sure there is anything that can be worked on ... As a driver who lives in a very popular biking environment (and who has given some careful thought to the issues and has taken his own turns being a biker) I am increasingly convinced that riding a bike and driving a car on the same roads are fundamentally antagonistic behaviors. I find that unfortunate, but I think it might be the case.
  - oh_sigh 9y ago
    Yes, there don't seem to be good solutions. I don't want to get run over by a car, or have a car cut in front of me and turn into my path of travel, so sharrow/striped bike lanes aren't great. But in all of the separated bike lanes in NY, you have pedestrians cutting across them at all times, frequently hidden behind cars or behaving in erratic unpredictable manners, so these lanes aren't too good either. Granted, in a separated bike lane I'm more worried about killing a pedestrian that jumps in front of me, and less worried about my own health as I am in a sharrow/striped bike lane.
  - wbl 9y ago
    Why does Amsterdam manage to serve both cars and bikes?
  - razorunreal 9y ago

liminal 9y ago

The one thing I've seen help with this problem is to physically separate the bicycle lane from the other traffic. A series of bollards are cheap to bolt to the road or with more effort a grade separation can be made.

Bellspringsteen 9y ago
Yes, protect lanes for buses and bikes etc is the best solution. Hopefully this research adds emphasis on why those are important.
djrogers 9y ago
Those bollards take up space, and we’re already dealing with what are in some cases very old and narrow roads.
cataphract 9y ago
Bollards in the middle of the road are dangerous. The solution is to segregate the bike lane by putting it on the right of the parked cars, next to the pedestrians. This means that cyclists will cross together with the pedestrians and that left turns require two lights, but these can be programmed so that the waiting time is minimized (OTOH, cyclists have no lights for turning right).
flukus 9y ago
I've seen this not work. Places where people want to park generally have driveways or street corners where the grade separation needs a break and drivers will use this break to get into the bike lane.

Nilef 9y ago

I’ve been working on a startup to solve this problem for a few months now - There’s a lot of difficult issues to work through in this space, especially for non-grid system cities and solving problems around getting data off of cameras. I’m in the UK - Give me a shout if you’re interested in working on this with me, it’s a big piece of work to chew on! Email is in my profile

u801e 9y ago

I wonder if the problem could be solved if the bus lane or bike lane was in the middle between two general traffic lanes, rather than off to the side (where people tend to idle or park).

gr3yh47 9y ago
in that case wouldnt the bus would necessarily need to cross traffic to get to and from a stop? and traffic would have to cross the bus lane to make turns?
- lgregg 9y ago
  It's around. https://makewealthhistory.org/2017/09/04/transport-innovation-of-the-week-bus-rapid-transit/ https://makewealthhistory.org/2017/09/04/transport-innovatio...

post_break 9y ago

I need this software at home! I have a camera watching parking spots and I'd love to know if a spot is open before heading home from work or even better, if I hit a geo fence just before I got home so I knew which spots were open.

Jach 9y ago

Maybe bikes can just ride over cars and the police can decide to not enforce that in addition to not enforcing the lane blockages. People would probably stop parking there pretty quick. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33Hkyb9c9NQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33Hkyb9c9NQ Of course if you/the bike can't make such a jump... well I already get annoyed by bikes on the road which can't reach the road's speed limit so I'll shut up here.

justherefortart 9y ago
Speed limits are a ceiling not a floor.
- Jach 9y ago
  And yet the average speed of a well-flowing road will invariably be near the speed limit. If your mode of locomotion can't reach the road's ceiling, it shouldn't be on that road.
  - lopmotr 9y ago
    Only if you can afford to build an extra slow road/lane for them. In the real world, you often can't. In that case, no, slow vehicles should be on that road. They're still people trying to get somewhere just like everyone else. Sometimes they're trucks going uphill - you can't exclude trucks from entire towns. The rule in most places are to pull over from time to time to let following vehicles pass.
oh_sigh 9y ago
The speed limit in NYC is 25, and traffic in manhattan averages 8mph. I can tell you from personal experience that I will pass most cars in manhattan unless I'm riding on an avenue that has rolling greens, and I'm just a recreational rider.

jonjojr 9y ago

The real life Sheldon Cooper. Block my walk path, i'll sue, if I lose, i'll build a robot to destroy you all.

wemdyjreichert 9y ago

I don't want to ride a bike everywhere I go. I don't want to have to shower and change a suit between meetings. I want to sit in the comfy, climate-controlled cushions of my car and relax. Biking activism will not change that. Creating bike and bus lanes in a city as dense as NYC is not a solution. Subways are faster, carry more people, and don't block existing traffic like bike and bus lanes.

mikepurvis 9y ago
The great thing, though, is that you don't have to _personally use_ the dedicated bus and bike infrastructure in order to benefit from it. By making these modes more comfortable and efficient, others (like those who don't need to wear to suits to meetings) are able to choose them, getting their cars off the road and leaving more room for yours.
rconti 9y ago
None of those things you want will happen in Manhattan anyway. So you're creating a straw man.
cataphract 9y ago
Your personal preferences are understandable, but they should not be the basis for public policy. Most households in New York do not even own a car. Using a 200 hp machine to move one 70 kg person is extremely wasteful. Not to mention the death toll (>1000 persons/year in NY) and the disproportionate amount of public property reserved for motor traffic and parking. Are you arguing that the ensuring the comfort of some car owners is the best use of public resources?

rconti 9y ago

Seems like a perfect use for the SF solution of having ANPR on busses. I don't love the cameras but it seems like a better answer than fixed cameras everywhere; it can be setup to only scan plates when there is a problem, instead of surveilling an entire area 24x7.

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jopsen 9y ago

You can't fix violations at this rate with enforcement... You're better of re-thinking the system so it's not violated as much. Putting up a barrier, and making wide pits that only busses can cross..

vzaliva 9y ago

It is not often one sees NY Times linking to Github :)

rripken 9y ago

Seems like bus drivers need to be able to issue parking tickets for blocking bus lanes. Maybe add a camera to the bus that is only used when a car is actually found blocking the bus lane and have the images lead to tickets.

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HIPisTheAnswer 9y ago

Any behavior which damages the physical integrity of others is criminal. Thus, burning fuel without everyone else's permission is a crime.

askvictor 9y ago

In Melbourne AU, we have these issues too (actually, more cars driving in Bus lanes), that police don't seem to bother enforcing. However, I see much more frequently other traffic violations that would benefit from a similar analysis on a large scale - two examples that come to mind are tailgating, and cars stopped in the middle of an intersection on a red light blocking cross traffic from going through. Both cases are so prevalent that even some (human) enforcement action wouldn't make a dint at this stage - it's become a cultural issue I suspect (probably due to lack of enforcement over the years as the roads get more congested and people more stressed/hurried). I get the fears of big brother and all that, but how do you solve these kinds of problems without mass automated surveillance?

makecheck 9y ago

People seem to prefer using the “main” streets and/or the exact street that leads to their destination, even when parallel roads would work just as well. For instance, I would often see cyclists causing major headaches by insisting on using space on busy roads (that lacked a clear lane) for miles, when there were dozens of residential side streets that ran 90% of the same way and were deserted. In those situations, the better solution is to just not use the congested road and pick another one that is basically going the same way. Similarly, buses run on predictable schedules and traffic is regularly frustrated sitting behind stopping buses when they could simply pick a parallel road where the bus doesn’t run at all. In a downtown scenario, maybe roads should be entirely reclassified to ensure separation. Maybe every 3 blocks is a street that has two lanes exclusively for cyclists, and then cyclists are banned from the other blocks that have only car lanes? Maybe deliveries and other stops should only be allowed on one of the 4 “sides” of a city block, with illegal stops on the other sides?

Tepix 9y ago

Neat hack. However: Total video surveillance as the solution? No thanks! How about: a) adding the cameras to the buses and storing only images of offending vehicles b) creating parking spaces dedicated to short term parking up to, say, 3 minutes or so

tomohawk 9y ago

And this is supposed to convince people that living in a dense urban environment where there's not even enough space to meet the basic transportation needs is somehow desirable? Seems like much more of a dystopia than a utopia.

rublev 9y ago
The concrete jungle is only a dystopia to those who are constantly in a whirlwind of inconvenience and don't have enough money to throw at it. If you're rich you cover the inconveniences with nice condos, taking cabs, and eating out.

pteredactyl 9y ago

I'm a cyclist. But get a kick out of the high number of sanctimonious cyclists out there. They feel since they're on the road they're entitled to all of it. Of course it's not ideal when a car is parked in the bicycle lane, but you can signal and go around it, as other cars do.