Tuesday’s Headlines: Soft Focus Edition

Part of Vision Zero is the vision thing.

As it does every few years, the Department of Transportation created a new advertising campaign “to help curb dangerous driving behaviors.” The new, $3-million ad buy is called “Rewind,” as in, “You can’t rewind a crash.”

Here’s the marquee video:

It’s a gorgeous ad, isn’t it? And that’s sort of the problem. We certainly applaud the DOT’s effort to get the word out that selfish, reckless drivers kill people in a split-second. But we at Streetsblog feel that slick production from the Madison Avenue fantasy factory end up distancing most viewers from the behavior depicted in the commercial — “Well, I don’t drive like that” — while at the same time glossing over the horror the results from crashes.

We understand that people have frail sensitivities, but it’s not the job of public service ads to sugar-coat the truth to protecting drivers’ feelings. But ain’t that America? I mean, have you ever compared a pack of cigarettes in America, with its tame, image-free surgeon general’s warning with a European pack of smokes — covered in graphic and revolting images of smokers’ wasted inner organs?

You can’t soft focus the horror. Public agencies shouldn’t try.

So in service to what crashes really look like — and to hopefully allow drivers to see exactly what they do when they drive recklessly, we created this public service ad:

NY1 also covered the new ad campaign, which it called “brutal, but effective.” Whatevs.

In other news:

• Speaking of carnage, a beloved Brooklyn rabbi was run down and critically injured by a driver in Williamsburg over the weekend. We wonder when any of that neighborhood’s leaders will encourage DOT to make the roadways safer. (Williamsburg365)
• More news of carnage: The wigmaker/influencer/recidivist reckless driver who killed two kids and their mom on Ocean Parkway earlier this year will get much less jail time than Brooklyn prosecutors wanted. (NY Post)
• The City reheated our nachos a bit, but it’s always good to hear other outlets telling an incoming mayor what he needs to do to make the streets safer and our neighborhoods more livable. Welcome to the war on cars!
• No hard feelings? Mayor-elect Mamdani has reached out to President Trump for a meeting. (NY Times)
• Meanwhile, will the current mayor ever come back to New York? From Israel, he’s off to Uzbekistan, which is the wrong direction. (NY Times)
• Like Streetsblog, amNY covered a new report about the danger of last-mile warehouses.
• MTA nerds will remember Phil Eng — but now he’s in Boston unsuckifying Beantown transit. (Christian Science Monitor)
• Here’s a hot take on not keeping Jessica Tisch atop the NYPD. (Forever Wars)
• Hell Gate’s story about the ongoing nefariousness of de facto Mayor Randy Mastro had a gem of a quote from Council Member Gale Brewer: “I’m glad to say good things about Randy Mastro,” she said, admitting that they last worked together to kill “a plan to charge for hundreds of parking spots in Brewer’s district,” the outlet reported. (Watch out because she may become Speaker.)
• Sophia Lebowitz had it a few months ago, but the Tribeca Citizen updated everyone on the Deliverista hub downtown.
• Exciting news: Assembly Member Stacey Pheffer Amato of Eastern Queens is calling it a career, the Rockaway Wave reported. If Streetsblog readers know her at all, it’s from how lousy she was on congestion pricing, so we wish her well in retirement.
• Want to serve on a Brooklyn community board? What’s wrong with you? Just kidding. Sign up here.