Elections

On WNYC this morning, Brian Lehrer posed the best transportation question of the 2013 mayoral campaign, asking Bill de Blasio, "Have you thought about transportation as one of your tools to fight inequality?"

When it comes to bicycling, Joe Lhota has a penchant for ignoring facts in favor of opinions. As Hurricane Sandy approached landfall, the then-MTA chief tweeted a photo of a man riding in a shared lane on Fifth Avenue in Park Slope, implying that bike lanes are to blame for bike-bus crashes. This May, he said that DOT didn't coordinate with the fire department on bike-share station siting, when FDNY said that, in fact, DOT vetted the locations with them.

StreetsPAC announced general election endorsements in four City Council races today.

It looks like Joe Lhota didn't listen to Nicole Gelinas or Transportation Alternatives. Yesterday, Lhota released what his campaign billed as a "comprehensive policy book" [PDF], but New Yorkers interested in safer streets or better bicycling and walking are still awaiting much of any policy from the Republican candidate.

Have you voted yet?

On his radio show this morning, John Gambling asked Joe Lhota what he thinks about congestion pricing and transportation issues generally. Lhota spent the next three minutes (starting at 8:25) explaining that under his administration, DOT would focus on its "core competency." Bus lanes didn't make the cut. Bikes? Forget about it.

Yesterday, New York City Democrats chose the candidate who's campaigned as the anti-Bloomberg. But on issues of traffic safety and surface transit, Bill de Blasio, despite some wavering, has pledged to build on the current administration's progress while tackling the unfinished business of reforming the NYPD's approach to traffic violence. And with several City Council candidates endorsed by the newly-formed StreetsPAC winning hotly contested primaries, the results of last night's election bode well for livable streets in NYC over the next four years. As StreetsPAC board member Eric McClure put it, "It's clear from the results of the primary that support for safe and complete streets has gone mainstream."

Here's an ironic twist for the mayoral candidate who all but ignored bicycling and walking in his transportation platform: Bill Thompson has rented mobile advertisements-by-bike, with yellow-vested, red-helmeted riders pedaling around Borough Park with Yiddish-language advertisements for his campaign.