Although every Community Board that surrounds Central Park is in favor of a car-free trial period, and even though it has the backing of some key City Councilmembers, the bike-friendly DOT has mysteriously refused to give it a try. All the DOT has said so far is "there are no plans at this time," with no explanation as to why the WILL of the PEOPLE is being thwarted. But yesterday one reporter asked Mayor Bloomberg about it, and got an answer that was as tautological as it was patronizing. Transportation Nation reports from the scene of yesterday's press conference:
Reporter: about banning cars in Central Park for the summer - (inaudible — the agency) said there are no immediate plans. Can you comment?
Mayor Bloomberg: Miss, I think you’re just totally ill-informed. The roads where they’re talking about we have banned cars for ninety percent of the time already. So we’re really only talking about ten percent. We are doing studies, I’ve talked to the commissioner, yesterday I think it was, she’s doing a study. Until we can really understand the traffic patterns and the effect it will have we’re just not going to go and rush to do it.
See, you can't do a study without a study! As it happens, the DOT has managed to make a lot of changes in this town by doing trials exactly like the one the Community Boards are asking for in Central Park. We've previously speculated that the DOT is circling the wagons in reaction to media mudslinging about the supposedly imperious manner in which the department has expanded bike lanes and installed pedestrian plazas—both changes, we might add, have been proven popular and successful.
So for now the dream of a car-free park remains deferred while the DOT conducts some vague study instead of actually giving it a test run. But some other changes are afoot in the park. As we previously noted, a new plan is being tested that would permit cyclists to use two pedestrian paths to get across the park, at around 102nd Street and 96th Street. Currently, cyclists must take the loop or use the crosstown street at 72nd that only goes east to west.
But unlike the car ban trial, this cycling proposal hasn't sailed through the community boards. Community Board 8, which represents the Upper East Side, voted 31-13 against the trial, and last night the plan met some resistance during a public hearing called last night by Community Board 7 on the Upper West Side. One resident warned that this is the first step to letting bikes on "all sidewalks," and worried that the city's coming bike share program will result in novice cyclists terrorizing pedestrians. (Imagine if the man on the shared bike was a terrorist!) And in an editorial, The Observer says, "If the plan moves forward, the city has to protect pedestrians. Otherwise, there surely will be a tragedy."
CB 7 has yet to vote on the changes, because they want to see how the new bike routes do during the trial period. It seems a "study" just isn't good enough for them!
