Trucks

In neighborhoods around the city truck traffic with its cacophony of diesel engines, noxious fumes and earthquake-level vibrations, is getting worse. With truck traffic expanding, NYC is turning to some downright illegal tactics.

Not only are the more trucks, but they're bigger and illegal. NYC traffic laws states that trucks can be no longer than 55 feet in length.
Community contacts: Carl Rosenstein
Sandy Balboza 718-852-7418

At approximately 3:30 PM, Tuesday January 12, 1999 bicyclist Brad Minch was struck and killed by and oversized,18 wheel, tractor trailer truck at the intersection of 6th Avenue and 30th Street.

Brad Minch, age 20, worked as bicycle messenger for the Click Modeling Agency for the last year and a half after moving to New York City from Cleveland. Company management considered him to be a highly skilled and experienced cyclist by company management.

According to pedestrian safety specialists at the street safety group Transportation Alternatives, Juan Estrada and Victor Flores, the young Brooklyn boys killed on February 9 on their way home from school, might be alive today if the City engineered the intersection of 9th Street and 3rd Avenue differently.

The tragic death of nine year old Jahmal Stewart could have been prevented. The truck driver that killed him was ratrunning – using an illegal shortcut through Jahmal's Bronx neighborhood. Simply put, the truck driver should not have even been on Baychester Avenue, where young Jahmal was killed. Ratrunning trucks are a plague on neighborhoods throughout the city – from Edenwald, Bronx to Jamaica, Queens, and Bushwick, Brooklyn to Lower Manhattan.