City Council

While current and former City Council transportation chairs James Vacca and John Liu reacted to bike-share with paranoia and fear, at least one council member was breaking out the credit card: Brooklyn's Brad Lander posted this tweet after signing up for a Citi Bike subscription yesterday.

It's getting to be a task keeping up with pending City Council bills that deal with electric-assisted bikes. Legislation proposed by Council Members Jessica Lappin and Dan Garodnick would hike fines for riding an e-bike, and two new bills would reportedly shift fines away from delivery workers to their employers and grant enforcement power to DOT and Parks Department personnel, who, if the bill passes, would have the authority to confiscate bikes. Meanwhile, Council Member Brad Lander wants to establish an e-bike task force -- a possible sign that lawmakers are looking to streamline the council's seemingly haphazard e-bike offensive.

Via Dana Rubinstein at Capital New York, the City Council Progressive Caucus has come out with a 13-point platform heading into the 2013 election season [PDF], and it includes some good planks on transit and street safety policy. All 51 council seats are up for a vote this year, with most of the important action coming on primary day, September 10.

This afternoon, the City Council passed a resolution asking Albany to move forward with legislation allowing New York City to install a speed camera demonstration program.

The City Council transportation committee has overwhelmingly passed a resolution in support of NYC's first-ever speed camera program.

This afternoon, the City Council's transportation committee held a hearing on resolutions asking Albany to move forward on two street safety initiatives: legislation allowing New York City to start a speed camera demonstration program, and a bill to close a loophole in the state's careless driving law. Votes on the resolutions are expected at the full City Council meeting on Wednesday.

Eight city council members have put a portion of their discretionary capital funds up for a vote as part of an exercise in participatory budgeting, which allows residents to decide how the money will be spent in their own neighborhoods. Votes in each district are approaching soon, and there's an opportunity to support livable streets projects.

City Council Speaker Chris Quinn and Transportation Committee Chair James Vacca finally responded to the deaths of Amar Diarrassouba and Raizel and Nachman Glauber today, after devoting their energy earlier in the week to keeping municipal parking underpriced.