Statement from Transportation Alternatives after Person Killed on a Bike in Bronx Bus Crash

There is no protected east-west connection for bike riders in the South Bronx.

15,000 residents in the Bronx commute by bike.

City Council District 17, where the crash occurred, ranks 3rd citywide for serious injuries and traffic fatalities according to Spatial Equity NYC.

THE BRONX, NY — An MTA bus struck and killed a 57-year-old man on a bike at the intersection of 149th Street and Brook Avenue in Mott Haven. 

149th Street is a Vision Zero Priority Corridor and truck route, but despite a 2020 redesign, the street is still missing critical safety infrastructure. There’s no bike lane, no daylighting, no raised crosswalks or curb extensions. On average, one New Yorker has been seriously injured on 149th Street every month for the past three years. Just a block away, 26-year-old Jose Angel Victoriano was killed while riding a bike in 2022. 

There is no protected east-west connection for bike riders in the South Bronx. There’s a paint-only bike lane half a mile south or sharrows a mile north – neither of which provide true protection to bike riders. 

Statement from Transportation Alternatives Executive Director Ben Furnas:

"We are devastated to learn that a bike rider was killed in the Bronx. Our thoughts are with their family, friends, and entire community.” 

“New York can do so much more to protect people on bikes and support bus drivers. Bus drivers in the five boroughs face impossible conditions, and they need protected bus lanes, boarding islands, and re-timed lights. Bike riders have no safe way to travel in the South Bronx, where they’ve been abandoned without a safe east-west connection. A high-quality network of protected bike lanes make streets safer for everyone – helping bus drivers safely do their jobs while protecting pedestrians and people on bikes. Designing streets without infrastructure for bikes forces giant buses with limited visibility to share space with vulnerable people on bikes – it’s a dangerous, and too often, deadly, combination.”

“The Adams Administration is failing to build out a high-quality network of protected bike lanes, as required by law under the streets master plan. Missing these deadlines isn’t just inconvenient and illegal – it’s deadly.”

Statement from Kevin Daloia, a longtime Bronx Activist: 

“There’s a ghost bike on 149th and Saint Ann’s, 149th and Brook, Brook and 141st, and it looks like there’s another one needed at Brook and 149th. I've personally installed a dozen ghost bikes with a mile of this spot alone. This is a crisis – and the Bronx deserves better from its leaders.”

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