Transportation Nihilists and Delinquents

NY Post 

 Two of the Big Apple’s top transportation honchos — known for talking tough at traffic scofflaws — need speed themselves, data reviewed by The Post reveals.

Department of Transportation Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez and his baby mama Christina Melendez, a top director at the Department of Education, have racked up a staggering 66 traffic violations totaling at least $5,600 in fines the past decade using the same vehicle – including 14 since 2019 for speeding in school safety zones, according to city records.  

The chair of the City Council’s Transportation Committee, Councilwoman Selvena Brooks-Powers (D-Queens), has cruised in a family car that racked up 25 tickets over the past 16 months, including 20 for speeding near schools and another for blowing a red light, records show. 

 It’s unclear how many of the summonses were handed out on Melendez’s Nissan Rogue when Rodriguez was behind the wheel. 

As DOT commissioner for the past two years, he’s enjoyed the perk of having a city vehicle that comes with an assigned driver.

“Ydanis Rodriquez, who gets chauffeured in a giant SUV, and Selvena Brooks-Powers are prime examples of ‘do as I say, not as I do,'” fumed Councilman Robert Holden (D-Queens).

They’re “hypocrites who act as if laws don’t apply to them,” he added. 

Other lefty pols with a long history of being speed demons who’ve racked up plenty of traffic violations include Comptroller Brad Lander, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, and Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine.

Rodriguez regularly drove Melendez’s Nissan to work at City Hall when he was a Manhattan councilman — even obtaining a parking placard for it — but he and his former domestic partner, who share two daughters, have since split, according to sources. 

The vehicle was slapped with six speeding tickets during the final five months leading up to Rodriguez’s January 2022 appointment by Mayor Adams as DOT commissioner.

Since then, the Nissan has received six parking tickets – including two for misusing a parking permit—and was caught speeding in July and November of last year.  

On March 2, 2023, the vehicle was slapped with two tickets totaling $160 for illegally parking in a spot in lower Manhattan on Warren Street reserved for state senators and assembly members.

The traffic agent noted in the tickets that the car was flashing a Department of Education parking permit. Melendez works nearby as the DOE’s $195,000-a-year executive director of Family and Community Engagement.

A Post photographer on Thursday spotted Melendez getting into the vehicle, which was illegally parked 

Rodriguez, who has cheered congestion pricing and speed cameras and has helped promote City Hall’s anti-car agenda, earns $243,171 and now gets a free ride to work in a city vehicle.

He has not driven his ex’s car since being appointed commissioner two years ago “and is confident he has not received any [traffic] violations in this role,” said DOT spokesman Vincent Barone.

The DOE and Melendez declined to comment.

Brooks-Powers has been a longtime proponent of using speed cameras to help curb traffic accidents and has pushed legislation seeking to reward New Yorkers who report hit-and-run drivers fleeing deadly crashes.

However, a 2019 Nissan the pol has said she shares with her husband Demetrius Powers II racked up 25 tickets totaling $1,395 in fines since September 2022 — including the 20-speed cam violations, records show. 

 

 NY Post

Some New York City agencies are using the viral image of Kansas City Chiefs star Travis Kelce screaming at head coach Andy Reid during the Super Bowl to push their policy agendas.

“OUTDOOR DINING TAKES UP LESS THAN .5% OF STREET PARKING IN NEW YORK CITY. PUBLIC SPACE IS FOR EVERYONE, NOT JUST CARS,” posted the city Department of Transportation Monday on X, along with a photo of Kelce jawing on the sidelines at a stone-faced Reid.

Some critics slammed DOT for using the photo of Taylor Swift’s boyfriend barking at his coach to drive home anti-car policies advocated by Transportation Alternatives and other advocacy groups.

“Instead of focusing on filling potholes and installing speed bumps in a timely manner, the DOT prefers to tweet nonsense that New Yorkers couldn’t care less about,” fumed Councilman Robert Holden (D-Queens). “The Department of Transportation Alternatives needs a major change in leadership.”

DOT spokesman Nick Benson quipped that he’s “notoriously bad at lip reading, but I think it’s a safe assumption that Travis Kelce was vociferously expressing his support for outdoor dining in New York City.”

The guy photographed above is Vin Barone, he's in charge of media at the Department Of Transportation Alternatives which includes their obnoxious twitter account (which is also stupidly known as X).

 

NYC Department Of Transportation Alternatives: You'll get citibike and like it

 

Queens Chronicle

The city’s Department of Transportation has approved a plan that will result in more than 50 Citi Bike docks coming to Community District 5, with construction beginning as early as December.

The reception from officials representing the Maspeth-Glendale-Middle Village area was about what might have been anticipated, particularly with the anticipated loss of parking.

Information obtained from Community Board 5 on Monday said about 40 of the docking stations would be on the street, with the others on sidewalks — this in spite of numerous requests to preserve parking.

“The one-size fits all approach of DOT with Citi Bike is nonsensical and ought to be reconsidered,” said Councilman Bob Holden (D-Maspeth). “Time and time again, the DOT pretends to engage the community and waste their time garnering input, only to move forward with a widely unpopular project. The community devised an alternate proposal that made sense and mitigated any issues of losing much-needed parking. The local community board did not approve this project. The community will not accept it.”

Holden said he intends to fight the DOT “until they listen to the community and stop pandering to special interest groups who monopolize public space.”

In a press release sent out Monday evening, District Manager Gary Giordano said the DOT had not given Community Board 5 definitive numbers on the parking spaces to be lost.

The DOT also gave no numbers in a response to the Chronicle.

“Citi Bike has proven to be a wildly popular transportation option with ridership soaring since the pandemic,” DOT Spokesman Vin Barone said in an email. “DOT has thoughtfully incorporated, and continues to incorporate, community feedback into our final proposal in a way that ensures convenient and reliable access to Citi Bike. We look forward to expanding this vital service to help offer Queens residents safe, sustainable, and efficient ways to get around.”

  

These pictures where these citibikes were abandoned on this same block were recently taken in the past month in South Richmond Hill, where there are no citibike racks to speak of. Really not sure if it's the same one. This is what's coming to your town even though there is absolutely no security or any effort to maintain them by the bikeshare provider and proprietor Lyft/Citibike. This is spiteful and chaotic theft and corporate privatization of public spaces being done by a regulatory captured municipality. 

@DannyHarris_TA and @TransAlt wants @CitiBikeNYC to be its own New York City transit agency

This is why they should never be taken seriously. Especially by our elected officials #NYCDepartmentOfTransAlt pic.twitter.com/7xiBu84TBf

— JQ LLC (@ImpunityCity) November 18, 2022

Why no one should trust @TransAlt and Don @DannyHarris_TA. This guy insists that TA is still a grass roots organization despite that it's rooted in corporation, big bank, lobbyist, "non" profit group, venture capital and oligarch money

And Lyft, the only killer cars he likes pic.twitter.com/xlTnN4O0fY

— JQ LLC (@ImpunityCity) November 14, 2022

Le bike lane resistance

Rockawave 

Merchants on Beach 20th Street in Far Rockaway continue to face headaches with the new raised-bike lane on their street, creating a tripping hazard and making their day to day ability to function their business far more difficult.

According to several business owners and observed by Wave reporters, cars park on the bike lane, which the businesses owners say bike riders don’t use anyway. When cars park on either side of the street it creates a bottleneck, creating more traffic. Also, many businesses on the block do not have loading docks, and with people parking on the bike lane, they have nowhere to handle deliveries. 

“This is dangerous,” said Jose Santana, owner of Unisex by Santana Salon on Beach 20th. Santana recently spoke at the September Community Board 14 meeting, and has helped draft a letter to the Department of Transportation, signed by most of the merchants on the strip. 

Businesses say that since the bike lane was constructed in July, they have seen few bike riders actually utilize it.   

“There’s no bicycles,” said Ming Liu, owner of Sunny’s, a mix Hibachi and Mexican restaurant. “This is 20th Street, there’s so many cars…A lot of people park on the bike lane,” he said. 

Like other owners, Liu called the raised-lane “dangerous” and that he’s seen people fall down. 

Odali Rodriguez, owner of Green Village Meat Market, has experienced this first hand. 

“I tripped, I was going across the street and I tripped,” he told The Wave. “It’s very dangerous, I’ve seen incidents, including myself.” 

Rodriguez is one of the few stores on the block with a loading dock in the back, so he is more worried about the danger of tripping. 

“When you walk there you think everything is flat, there’s no indication that it’s not flat,” he said. 

Other merchants agree that the bike lane is dangerous, Seon Maynard who owns a West Indian Market says he has seen at least ten people trip. 

“They should be suing the city,” he said. 

Some owners have received $115 tickets for loitering while loading goods, like Enrique Perez from Valencia Cakes & Flowers. 

“We should be able to load and unload, we shouldn’t be getting a ticket if we take too long,” Perez said. “It’s hard for us because people are parking there,” he said. 

PIX News 

 Speeding, traffic jams and dangerous crossings are all the problems one street in Queens is causing neighbors.

Rego Park’s 62nd Drive is identified as a “high crash corridor“ by the New York Department of Transportation (DOT). More than a dozen people have been seriously hurt on the road over the last five years.

The DOT’s solution was to add a bike lane on the side, with parking in the center. Unfortunately, neighbors say it came with new problems.

“My main concern is people’s health,” neighbor Arsen Gurgov said.

Gurgov has lived on 62nd Drive in Rego Park for the past 25 years. He says the new bike lane and parking configuration have made things worse than ever.

“My son was having an allergic reaction and I called for an ambulance. It took them too long to get here because they were stuck in a jam,“ he said.

Speeding in the Rego Park area is also still a big problem. A very big problem.

Year to date, police have written more than 3.5 times as many speeding tickets as they did in the same time last year; 1,577 speeding tickets compared to just 434 the previous year.

Moving violations are also up 40%.

A DOT spokesman says they presented the idea about the bike lane to the community board a year ago as a way to fix the dangers.

“These bike lanes improve safety for all road users, providing much-needed traffic calming while adding important protected bike lane connections between Queens Boulevard and Flushing Meadows Park,” spokesman Vincent Barone said.

Rego Park neighbors disagree with the DOT. Nearly 100 of them have signed a petition to have the bike lane and center parking adjusted or removed altogether.

“It’s either or,” Gurgov said. “They either get rid of the side parking, or they get rid of the bike lane. You can’t have both. It’s too narrow of a street.”

Vincent Barone is a bike zealot idiot. These two stories confirm that the DOT is forcing bike lanes on communities to drive them crazy and they are being weaponized as tools for gentrification.