The lack of any regulation on e-bikes — a very bad problem — has led the NYPD to shift away from civil fines and towards criminal summonses, with the use of summonses against e-bike riders jumping 4,000% in two weeks, according to data obtained by Streetsblog. Years after the Legislature legalized these things zooming every which way (including riding on sidewalks, riding the wrong way and failing to obey stop signs and red lights), we are still waiting for the Legislature to impose some order.
The NYPD solution to these problems has created more problems with criminal summonses. For the largely immigrant community of delivery workers — who have grown vastly in number as New Yorkers have gotten more and more used to delivery of food, groceries and goods — such a summons can have extremely grave consequences as the Trump administration ramps up its efforts to detain and deport as many people as possible.
We understand the NYPD’s argument that e-bike riders cannot have licenses revoked in the same way that motor vehicle drivers can, and that this makes summonses more sensical. Ultimately, it’s a question of proportionality. We have been vocal about the fact that unrestrained and dangerous e-bike riding is a real danger that poses a hazard to pedestrians, cyclists and drivers alike.
No one should be running stop signs or riding on sidewalks. Yet we could also all agree that running a single red light in an incident with no collisions should not be a feeder into the extremely serious consequence of potential deportation.
The NYPD notes that it does not actively collaborate with immigration enforcement in this regard, and we have no reason to believe that they do.
The issue is that active cooperation is not necessary; the moment someone is issued a criminal summons, that information gets fed into databases that lead back to ICE, and forces them to attend court hearings such that the federal agency will know exactly where and when they’ll be. Immigration “czar” Tom Holman himself has repeatedly stated that this is one of ICE’s preferred ways to detain someone in cities with sanctuary policies.
We have to consider the root cause of this. E-bike delivery drivers are not speeding and running lights because they are inherently negligent or reckless. They are doing so because their bosses at the delivery apps have made their livelihoods contingent on unreasonably fast delivery windows.
Contract workers who scrupulously follow all traffic laws and minimize the hazard to others are effectively penalized for doing so; if they do so enough, they may be kicked off the delivery apps altogether as customers trained to expect food at their doorstep in 20 minutes complain.
The solution has to run through the ultimate instigators of this behavior. Companies like Grubhub, Uber, Instacart and others must institute realistic delivery times, set standards and establish a culture where drivers understand that safety is the priority, not speed. They must also be held accountable for safety lapses directly.
There have already been detailed proposals around this front, such as those floated last year by Councilwoman Gale Brewer and Transportation Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez, as well as Albany action. No one wants unsafe riding, so let’s put together a system that encourages safety instead of putting the bottom-rung workers at grave risk.
