Prepare, New Yorkers. A brand new invoice may quickly lengthen the identical automotive license plate and registration necessities to e-bikes within the largest metropolis within the US. However regardless of ostensibly specializing in security, some argue that the transfer is a misguided try to focus on marginalized communities.
The difficulty surrounds what is named “Priscilla’s legislation”, a invoice drawn up by NYC Councilmember Bob Holden and named after Priscilla Lake, a lady killed after being hit by an e-bike in Chinatown final yr. It went up for debate on Wednesday, however its potential passage is up within the air as New Yorkers debate the deserves and pitfalls of the suggest laws.
The invoice would lengthen the kind of automotive registration and licensing necessities to electrical bicycles. “Purple mild cameras work, and pace cameras work,” defined Holden. “Why not apply that to e-bikes? Now we have a public well being disaster. When individuals are strolling the streets, a harmful place to be is in a crosswalk.”
Holden appears to accurately determine how harmful it’s for pedestrians in NYC, who face deadly risks strolling via the town. Nonetheless, his push for license plates on electrical bicycles and e-scooters appears to disregard the plain largest hazard to pedestrians: vehicles.
Whereas e-bikes have been chargeable for 47 deadly visitors accidents in NYC within the final 5 years, in response to the New York Submit, vehicles have killed 61 pedestrians in NYC within the first half of 2024 alone. And that quantity is barely growing. Over 600 pedestrians have been severely injured by vehicles in NYC in simply the primary 9 months of 2024.
With vehicles inflicting over 10x the fatalities and considerably larger than 10x the intense accidents to pedestrians, focusing on e-bikes on this context is a bit like standing in the course of a rainstorm and remarking in regards to the excessive humidity. Maybe one may make an even bigger impression by first opening an umbrella.
The unusual fixation on a comparatively minor menace to pedestrians – and one that truly helps substitute the bigger on-road menace of vehicles – has not gone unnoticed by many New Yorkers. “They’re not going after the SUVs, those killing most individuals on streets. Cyclists are straightforward. Stand and hand out tickets usually to marginalized folks,” stated Queens resident Chong Bretillon.
It’s true that the identical effort utilized to imposing visitors legislation on e-bikes may have a a lot bigger impression on the security of pedestrians if as an alternative utilized to imposing visitors legal guidelines on vehicles and vans. With orders of magnitude extra accidents and deaths attributable to bigger autos, the unusual deal with comparatively safer, lighter types of various transportation like bicycles appears at greatest, misguided, and at worst, calculated.
Bike owner and e-bike riders usually embody larger percentages of marginalized communities, leaving some to argue that the restrictions are supposed to focus on such communities. E-bikes are the transportation technique of selection for supply employees in NYC, a lot of whom are immigrants. The decrease revenue occupation already presents a hardship in comparison with many higher-income employees driving vehicles into the town every day. Now these people, in addition to e-bike riders from all backgrounds, could should cope with additional restrictions to this environment friendly, lower-cost transportation various that has confirmed to be safer for all highway customers, not simply these tucked away inside SUVs.
through: PIX11
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