Outdoor Dining, School Streets, Vision Zero Hearing
As the City Council looks to develop a permanent outdoor dining program, we’d like to recirculate some of the benefits that outdoor dining and Open Streets bring to communities.
As a recent NYU study revealed, the outer boroughs now account for 51% of all Open Restaurants sites, compared to 30% pre-pandemic. Low-income communities and communities of color have both doubled their share of Open Restaurants sites. Pre-pandemic, 17 city council districts had no outdoor dining, while today the Open Restaurants program extends into all 51 districts.
In NYC 25x25, we propose taking a fraction of NYC’s 3 million-plus free parking spaces and repurposing that to give streets back to people. One thing we could do with that reclaimed space is add 5.4 million square feet of space for arts and cultural venues, restaurant seating, street vendors, retail, and other uses to bolster economic recovery.
(And we’d still have more than 17 square miles of space to work with after that!)
SEE WHAT WE CAN BUILD WITH NYC 25x25
THREE THINGS TO KNOW
1️⃣ Valentine’s Day sale at the TA shop. When you place an order for a mystery throwback tee from our gift shop now through February 14, we’ll throw in a second mystery tee for free. It’s all the mystery of a blind date with none of the awkwardness and double the reward!
2️⃣ Schools need car-free streets. Streetsblog covered a study on kids’ psychology and behavior around cars, emphasizing how critical it is to keep students safe from the dangers of cars. For a guide to creating a car-free street around your school, check out our School Streets Toolkit.
3️⃣ In the news. Here's what we're reading this week:
A PBS News Hour feature looks at the new Safe Streets and Roads for All grant program, as pedestrian deaths reach their highest totals nationwide in 40 years. New York City received $21 million from this grant, part of which will go toward a Delancey Street redesign.
Elected officials in Queens are calling for more protected bike lanes following the death of a cyclist in Astoria, as the Astoria Post reports. State Senator Kristen Gonzalez cited Spatial Equity NYC in noting that the district has fewer than 2% of road miles with a protected bike lane.
The Staten Island Advance examines how to make Hylan Boulevard safer, as the road accounted for 33% of all traffic fatalities on Staten Island over the last 10 years.
TWO THINGS TO DO
1️⃣ Make Citi Bike more affordable and accessible. Sign our petition calling for New York City to provide public funding for bike share programs. With public funding, the program can finally expand to areas currently without service, while also keeping membership affordable for New Yorkers.
1️⃣ Register for the Women’s Ride. We’re six weeks out from the second-annual Women’s Ride, which will take riders through the Bronx and Upper Manhattan on Saturday, March 25. Registration is free, so sign up today!
ONE ACTION TO TAKE NOW
Register now to testify at the City Council's Vision Zero hearing. On Tuesday at 10 a.m., the Transportation Committee is hosting a hearing on Vision Zero. Register to testify for the hearing and let the City Council know we need urgent action to get Vision Zero back on track.
Thanks for reading!
Ted and the TA team
P.S. Missed our Families Bike Brooklyn panel in January? You can watch a full video of the event on our YouTube channel! Hear from elected officials, transit advocates, and bike riders from across the borough as they discuss how we can make streets safe for New Yorkers of all ages to bike.