Retaining no vestige of its gridlocked past near Union Square, the M14– once Manhattan’s slowest bus route— has been engineered with a few simple traffic calming techniques to put bus riders first. With priority for bus passengers and commercial needs, unnecessary trips made by car have dramatically reduced across the entire 14th Street corridor— freeing up enough public space to allow movement for the masses: expansions of sidewalk space, 5mph slow streets, and protected bicycle lane facilities adjacent to this transit miracle.

A long standing campaign to build a central safe corridor on Manhattan’s wife Avenues, in Spring 2020 advocates demonstrated that despite a public health crisis, New Yorkers can still mobilize to online public forums and demand change. With a traffic safety uptick and vision zero emergency familiar to everyone in Midtown, the vital continuation of the 6th Avenue complete street, to provide room for buses, bicycles and pedestrian safety— allows safe access through the most dire and dense parts of Midtown, and safely to Central Park.

After the tragic death of a young woman riding a Citi Bike using the unprotected bicycle facility, Council Member Helen Rosenthal joined TA advocates to demand a two-way protected bicycle facility, and in her words, extend the safety project to encircle the entire park and protect park goers on every side of the park. With nearly 300 public participants at a public meeting on the topic, and after a protest outside the residence where a counter lawsuit was proposed, Upper West Side advocates knew that the battle for safety over parking must be won