Mayor Bill de Blasio vowed to address the mounting traffic deaths on New York City streets, after a new report showed the NYPD has pulled back from enforcement against reckless driving.
Despite a 30% jump in traffic-related fatalities, the number of failure to yield summonses issued by police dropped by 63% between June 2020 and July 2021. Speeding drivers — a group that local officials have repeatedly blamed for the skyrocketing death toll — faced 27% fewer violations than before the pandemic.
During a 12-month period that saw a motorist kill a pedestrian every three days, the Right of Way law, a key tool intended to hold the most dangerous drivers accountable, resulted in just 13 total arrests.
The figures were released as part of the Mayor’s Management Report, a charter-mandated annual recap on a range of city metrics issued last week. They represent the latest blow to de Blasio’s sputtering Vision Zero initiative, which aimed to eliminate all traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2024.
Instead, the city is trending in the opposite direction. According to the Department of Transportation, there have been 192 traffic deaths so far this year — the highest number since before de Blasio took office.
The report attributes the jump to the combination of “lockdown and less pedestrian activity” in 2020, coupled with “less traffic and increased speeding” in the most recent fiscal year. But death and injury numbers don’t appear to be tapering off as traffic in New York City returns to pre-pandemic levels.
Daniel Flanzig, an attorney who has long represented cyclists and pedestrians, said he is receiving more calls about hit-and-runs than ever — and hearing of more drivers getting away with their crimes.
“It’s the lack of social responsibility you see in post-COVID era and the fact that there’s no enforcement anymore,” Flanzig said. “Why would you stay on scene if no one is going to bother chasing you?”
Even before the pandemic, the NYPD faced scrutiny for failing to properly investigate crashes. The department’s Collision Investigation Squad, which was overhauled in 2013 in the face of widespread criticism, has fewer officers investigating fewer crashes than it did before de Blasio took office. Despite promises to clamp down on the most severe crashes, the NYPD's clearance rate for fatal hit-and-run crashes has long hovered around 25%.
On Monday, the mayor said the NYPD had no choice but to step back in their role as Vision Zero enforcers during the pandemic, but would be returning soon.
“We know that very aggressive enforcement by the NYPD played a crucial role,” he said. “We also know that everything in terms of enforcement got disrupted profoundly by COVID because the NYPD was called to a variety of other crucial tasks, because there was a long period of time where the strength of the department was reduced because of COVID.”
“I do expect as we come out of COVID to see those enforcement levels intensify again,” he added.
But Cory Epstein, a spokesperson for Transportation Alternatives, said the mayor had become overly reliant on the role of policing in stopping traffic fatalities.
"The NYPD's massive decrease in traffic enforcement, while we see an alarming increase in deadly traffic violence, is a wake up call that we need enforcement that's always on duty," Epstein said. "This comes by permanently redesigning streets and expanding automated enforcement, and New York City can restore the promise of Vision Zero by significantly investing in both."
