Amanda Servedio was biking down the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge in Manhattan passing a slower biker to her right when a rider on an electric Citi Bike decided to pass her on the left, not leaving enough room for all three bikers to ride safely. Servedio tried to slow down to avoid a collision with the Citi Bike rider, but it was too late. The two collided, sending Servedio face-first into the concrete barrier next to her, which separated the narrow bike lane from the flow of cars. She required stitches on her lip, and surgery on her badly broken pinky finger. The person on the Citi Bike rode away from the crash.
Stories like this are all too common for bikers and pedestrians alike in New York City, where cyclists and pedestrians contend not only with other cyclists but also with cars and busses in what the INRIX Global Traffic Scorecard ranked the most congested city in the world. Since the start of 2024, 156 cyclists and 219 pedestrians have been injured by cars in the Midtown area of New York City, and three have died, according to data on NYC Crash Mapper. These areas included Midtown proper, Murray Hill, the Theater District, and Hell’s Kitchen.
Of these 375 crashes, 288 were from cars, vans, SUVs, busses, or trucks. The other 87 were from e-bikes, regular bikes, motorcycles, or mopeds, according to data from NYC Crash Mapper. Midtown is heavily trafficked popular tourist attractions like Times Square, Bryant Park, and Rockefeller Center. Cyclists and pedestrians are everywhere, making it easier for crashes to occur.
“I was biking through Midtown and approaching an intersection and I had a green light,” said a cyclist Ron Farwell. “There were lots of people on the sidewalk and as I was biking through the intersection, someone on their phone walked in front of the crowd into the bike lane.”
“I tried stopping but was on an old Citi Bike with bad brakes and there was moving traffic on one side of me, so I couldn’t swerve. I slowed down as much as I could, but I hit the person pretty hard, and it knocked them down.” Farwell said.
Citi Bike has become a mode of transportation for many New Yorkers and tourists alike, amassing over 1.5 million riders annually, according to Citi Bike. They claim to “have numerous touchpoints with riders to help them stay out of danger on New York City streets by choosing routes that are mostly on protected bike lanes, carefully following the rules of the road, and wearing helmets.” They also said all bikers are “required to review a safety guide in the Citi Bike app before their first e-bike ride to help them feel more comfortable and confident.”
When asked about inspecting bikes for damage, like the bad breaks on Farwell’s bike, a Citi Bike representative said “bikes are inspected and tuned every 45 days, and often even more frequently by our field team. As a best practice, we automatically replace parts such as brakes when they reach a set number of miles to help ensure they do not reach the point of failure.”
A Lyft spokesperson said “E-bikes are integral to the future of mobility in New York City, helping to fulfill policy goals around mode shift and climate change, while accelerating a ‘safety in numbers’ effect as they help attract even more new riders onto two wheels.” But is New York City ready for all the bikes and pedestrians on the streets?
“We don’t have the infrastructure on the ground in the city that will make biking safe,” said Alexa Sledge, a representative from Transportation Alternatives, an organization dedicated towards promoting, sustaining, and advocating for sustainable modes of transportation, like bikes, busses, subways, and walking. “For example, 75% of our space in New York City is dedicated solely to the driving and storage of automobiles, right? But there’s about a million more bikes in New York City than there are cars.”
Sledge explained how other cities, especially ones in Europe like Amsterdam, London, and Paris have redesigned their streets to put pedestrians and cyclists at the forefront of their road construction. However, in New York, we still prioritize cars and trucks.
“If you design a street that is really, really wide and gives the vast majority of the space on that street to cars, and then you force all the pedestrians into one tiny, tiny space and all the bikes into one tiny, tiny space,” Sledge explained, “that’s going to force a lot of unwanted interactions between bike riders and cars, bike riders and pedestrians, and pedestrians and cars.”
In recent years, New York Governor Kathy Hochul proposed the Congestion Pricing Program, which would have charged drivers a toll on their E-ZPass every time they entered the Congestion Relief Zone, which includes streets in Manhattan below 60th Street, including Midtown.
“Congestion Pricing will dramatically reduce traffic in the Congestion Relief Zone, transforming the area from gridlocked to unlocked. Less traffic means cleaner air, safer streets, and better transit,” according to the MTA’s website.
According to Transportation Alternatives, Congestion Pricing would reduce car traffic, and therefore reduce crashes as well.
However, in June 2024, Governor Hochul indefinitely postponed the Congestion Pricing Program. According to the Press Release from June, this program was paused to “avoid added burdens to working and middle-class families.” The press release also highlighted the voices of many politicians who supported Hochul’s decision.