4 ms·

Agree with all of this except the part about enforcing the traffic laws against cars parked in the bike lanes. The NYPD is most certainly lazy and incompetent

Agree with all of this except the part about enforcing the traffic laws against cars parked in the bike lanes. The NYPD is most certainly lazy and incompetent (as well as corrupt), but the issue is the bike lanes themselves. Most of the city, especially the most congested parts, simple have no room for a bike lane. The vast majority of vehicles blocking the bike lanes are making pickups or deliveries. There is simply nowhere else for them to pull over (much less park). This fact was ignored by Bloomberg and his friends when they drew bike lanes all over the place on congested roads. It may be a noble goal to have plenty of space for bikers and pedestrians, but that isn't the way New York was designed, and its not feasible as long as the residents and the businesses depend on a steady stream of deliveries, pickups, garbage removal and other assorted vehicles associated with living in a city. Giving tickets to the UPS driver who has to deliver a package at a location is just going to cost him money, not deter him from pulling over - he has no choice.

JumpCrisscross 8y ago
> There is simply nowhere else for them to pull over Yes there is. We've just zoned it for streetside parking.
- StanislavPetrov 8y ago
  Do you live in New York? Have you been to Manhattan? There is very little parking anywhere. In the busiest places there is no street parking at all.
  - JumpCrisscross 8y ago
    > Have you been to Manhattan? I live on 26th Street. We have a bike lane, a traffic lane, and two sides of street side parking. This is the case across a large faction of Manhattan, the avenues exempted. For Exhibit A in stupid parking lanes, I present Broadway.
  - CydeWeys 8y ago
    I live and work in Manhattan and there's on-street parking everywhere. Most streets are easily wide enough for two travel lanes plus a bike lane, but instead have one or two rows of parked cars. It's quite common for streets to have two parking lanes, one travel lane, and no bike lanes. Just pull up satellite imagery on Google Maps and it'll all be obvious.
    - StanislavPetrov 8y ago
      I live and drive here. Parking is virtually non-existent. http://www.opencurb.nyc/ http://www.opencurb.nyc/ You see the sea of red lines? Those are all places you cannot park.
      - CydeWeys 8y ago
        I'm seeing a sea of green as much as I am a sea of red. "Parking is virtually non-existent" is so far from the truth I don't even know where to begin with that. You're literally looking at the map and complaining that not every single square foot of Manhattan can be used for parking. Guess what, land in the densest city in the country has better uses than parking cars. And yet in many neighborhoods almost every single block has twice the parking space than it does driving space (go look at East Village on that map). I think you're complaining about Midtown Manhattan, but what alternative solution could you possibly want? It's a simple matter of physics. The space just isn't there. There's no room to add parking; there's not even any room for people to drive or walk on the sidewalk.
        StanislavPetrov 8y ago
        The issue we are discussing is bike lanes. My whole point is the space just isn't there, and issuing tickets to trucks making deliveries in the vast areas that don't have parking isn't going to make it any better.
      - TheSpiceIsLife 8y ago
        Looks to me like that map indicates about half of one side of all the steeets are ok for parking?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
CydeWeys 8y ago
Here's the thing though. Those bike lanes are clearly being used by lots of people, as are the travel lanes by lots of drivers. What isn't being utilized well is all of that free parking along the street -- most of those vehicles only move twice a week when they have to because of street sweeping. So the simple solution is to eliminate all of the free parking and replace it with paid parking and loading zones. And raise the price high enough so that there's always spots free close enough to where you're going so that vehicles have a place to park themselves for short periods of time that's outside of the travel and bike lanes.
- vonmoltke 8y ago
  > So the simple solution is to eliminate all of the free parking and replace it with paid parking and loading zones. There's free parking in Midtown?

JumpCrisscross 8y ago

> There is simply nowhere else for them to pull over Yes there is. We've just zoned it for streetside parking.

StanislavPetrov 8y ago
Do you live in New York? Have you been to Manhattan? There is very little parking anywhere. In the busiest places there is no street parking at all.
- JumpCrisscross 8y ago
  > Have you been to Manhattan? I live on 26th Street. We have a bike lane, a traffic lane, and two sides of street side parking. This is the case across a large faction of Manhattan, the avenues exempted. For Exhibit A in stupid parking lanes, I present Broadway.
- CydeWeys 8y ago
  I live and work in Manhattan and there's on-street parking everywhere. Most streets are easily wide enough for two travel lanes plus a bike lane, but instead have one or two rows of parked cars. It's quite common for streets to have two parking lanes, one travel lane, and no bike lanes. Just pull up satellite imagery on Google Maps and it'll all be obvious.
  - StanislavPetrov 8y ago
    I live and drive here. Parking is virtually non-existent. http://www.opencurb.nyc/ http://www.opencurb.nyc/ You see the sea of red lines? Those are all places you cannot park.
    - CydeWeys 8y ago
      I'm seeing a sea of green as much as I am a sea of red. "Parking is virtually non-existent" is so far from the truth I don't even know where to begin with that. You're literally looking at the map and complaining that not every single square foot of Manhattan can be used for parking. Guess what, land in the densest city in the country has better uses than parking cars. And yet in many neighborhoods almost every single block has twice the parking space than it does driving space (go look at East Village on that map). I think you're complaining about Midtown Manhattan, but what alternative solution could you possibly want? It's a simple matter of physics. The space just isn't there. There's no room to add parking; there's not even any room for people to drive or walk on the sidewalk.
      - StanislavPetrov 8y ago
        The issue we are discussing is bike lanes. My whole point is the space just isn't there, and issuing tickets to trucks making deliveries in the vast areas that don't have parking isn't going to make it any better.
    - TheSpiceIsLife 8y ago
      Looks to me like that map indicates about half of one side of all the steeets are ok for parking?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

CydeWeys 8y ago

Here's the thing though. Those bike lanes are clearly being used by lots of people, as are the travel lanes by lots of drivers. What isn't being utilized well is all of that free parking along the street -- most of those vehicles only move twice a week when they have to because of street sweeping. So the simple solution is to eliminate all of the free parking and replace it with paid parking and loading zones. And raise the price high enough so that there's always spots free close enough to where you're going so that vehicles have a place to park themselves for short periods of time that's outside of the travel and bike lanes.

vonmoltke 8y ago
> So the simple solution is to eliminate all of the free parking and replace it with paid parking and loading zones. There's free parking in Midtown?