On Jackson Heights’ open street, NYC’s ‘moped crisis’ is in full throttle
Luz Maria Mercado fought for the creation of her Jackson Heights neighborhood’s 26-block open street along 34th Avenue. Her early elation over the 2020 initiative in Queens has since given way to fear over the safety of her teenage sons when they use the thoroughfare, which is shared with a steady stream of e-bikes and mopeds.
The Adams administration has fought back, recently destroying confiscated two-wheelers using construction equipment, but so far there has been more hand wringing over the vehicles than lasting solutions, with an estimated 65,000 e-bikes on city streets, a proliferation officials say has been fueled in part by the large number of migrants doing delivery work.
The NYPD has confiscated 13,000 two-wheeled motorized vehicles and ATVs this year, typically for not being registered, according to the Adams administration. The total was 18,000 in 2023. The city uses enormous earthmovers to destroy the vehicles, which proliferate nonetheless.“When it comes to public safety, I like to say we are crushing it,” Adams said, as two enormous earthmovers drove back and forth over the vehicles, pulverizing them.
Najy Kamal, a Grubhub spokesperson, said the the safety of the "communities we serve, including our delivery partners and pedestrians, is an ongoing focus and top priority." He added that "our delivery windows allow adequate time for them to travel from the merchant to the customer safely." Residents and elected officials there have different ideas about the right way forward, and how best to strike a balance between protecting the livelihoods of workers with the safety of pedestrians. Broadly speaking, the solutions on the table have fallen into three categories: education, enforcement and engineering or design.
At the same time, DOT officials say enforcement efforts have been stepped up in the Jackson Heights neighborhood. Since May 20, police officers have issued 137 moving violations and seized 30 illegal vehicles and devices – a broad category that includes mopeds, motorcycles, ATVs, e-bikes and dirt bikes, along with skateboards and Segways.
Advocates for delivery workers say pedestrians are not alone in their concerns about safety. Ligia Guallpa, the executive director of the Workers Justice Project, said workers themselves are at risk, because they’re under intense pressure from the app-based delivery companies that employ them to deliver food fast.
He advocated the creation of a “micromobility lane” in the vicinity – car lanes converted into lanes for vehicles that travel 20 mph or less,Transportation Alternatives – so that moped drivers are not forced to make “a binary choice” between “using roads with cars or spaces for people.”
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