Streetopia Upper West Side

A green-painted, one-way separated bike lane next to a wide two-way, four lane street. Neglected grime-covered snow mounds obstruct half the width of the bike lane. There are several plastic flex posts sticking out of the leftover snow, presumably dislodged and deposited there by snow plows. A lone flex post remains adjacent to the vehicle lanes where its flex post companions once stood.

Here’s the shape of the Central Park West bike lane this past weekend, several weeks after this winter’s snowstorms.

It’s time this bike lane got a proper upgrade: real protection, wider lanes, and make it two-way. Also, can we fully clear the lane of snow next time?

@nyc-dot.bsky.social

Open Plans on Instagram: "Take a look at London’s impressive Low Traffic Neighborhoods! Residents, advocates & elected leaders shared how they have transformed their local streets to quiet, peaceful &... 949 likes, 23 comments - openplansnyc on February 4, 2026: "Take a look at London’s impressive Low Traffic Neighborhoods! Residents, advocates & elected leaders shared how they have transformed their ...

It’s time for LTNs in NYC on the UWS.

This video helps explain.

A plea to Council Member @shaunabreu.bsky.social: please get off X/Twitter and post to Bluesky instead. At a minimum, and maybe as an interim step, please cross post to Bluesky so advocates who left X/Twitter for moral reasons can still engage with you.

@nyc-dot.bsky.social should designate a at least one loading zone in front of every large building on the UWS and shared loading zones on each block proportional to population density.

CB7 can help decide where exactly the loading zones go on the block, but they don’t get to grant permission.

Easy to imagine these kinds of simple and amazingly effective treatments on the UWS. How about it @nyc-dot.bsky.social and @galeabrewer.bsky.social ?

It’s time for a mayor willing to think big and deliver on people-first streets. Here’s one idea for a quick win.
www.streetopia.city/reimagining-...

Tell Gale Brewer to Think Bigger - StreetopiaUWS Gale Brewer is about to enter her 25th year in elected office. Now is a great time to encourage her to use the next four years to help turn the Upper West Side into the preeminent livable neighborhood...

UWS Council Member Gale Brewer has been in office for 24 years yet the streets of her district are stuck in the past 🚗💨😷

We've made it easy to send her a letter to encourage her to use her final term in the Council to become a livable streets champion & leave a legacy of people first public space.

Advocates in front of Gale Brewer’s office, read a letter from UWS electeds to NYC DOT citing the need for universal daylighting. Gale was for it before she was against it. What changed?

“Daylighting is a simple & effective tool for improving both safety & quality of life at dangerous intersections…we should be leading the way forward to safer streets for every community, not continuing to exempt ourselves from common-sense state legislation.” – @galeabrewer.bsky.social, May 2024

A group of people gathered on the sidewalk in front Council Member Gale Brewer’s district office.

A group of people gathered on the sidewalk in front Council Member Gale Brewer’s district office.

A sign held up in front of Gale Brewer’s office that reads “You supported safety, Gale. Don’t turn your back now.”

“You can’t tell me a parking space at the corner of a street is worth a life.”

Advocates are in front of the district office of @galeabrewer.bsky.social this morning to ask her why she changed her mind and no longer supports universal daylighting in NYC.

Headshot of a smiling Tim Gill

New episode up! We talked with researcher Tim Gill about how we need to make our cities safe for children, not cars. "Children are basically living very captive and kind of contained lives, and that's just not healthy."
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

@nyc-dot.bsky.social is making up math here. There are roughly 300 intersections on the UWS or ~2,400 potential daylighting spots, many of which are already bus stops or fire hydrants.

@galeabrewer.bsky.social got some bad information.

Why are we bean counting street safety in the first place?

Should we teach 8 year olds how to move “defensively” through their neighborhoods just to stay alive? Or is the assumption that kids will be escorted everywhere (by a properly defensive adult) until their executive function is fully developed? That’s quite a bleak view of childhood & community.

A woman standing at a table in the sun on a pier under a viaduct next to a poster that says: “what’s the BEST BLOCK on the Upper West Side and why?”

If you’re on the west side today, stop by the West Side County Fair on Pier I and tell us what you think is the “Best Block in the UWS”

We’re just getting started and will be here all day. C’mon down!

The demand to cycle for transportation is undeniable among every age group across the city. The only thing holding us back is incomplete infraction and a political bias toward the status quo. It’s time for leadership that understands the value of positive change and has the will to make it happen.

"Everybody’s in favor of 'safety,' but compared to what? That’s the question: what are you willing to sacrifice for safety?"

City Hall’s interference here at the behest of @galeabrewer.bsky.social sets a terrible precedent and risks compromising future street improvement projects, almost all of which will require converting some amount of free parking to a use that serves a broader & more diverse segment of the community.

We expect more from CM @galeabrewer.bsky.social than this.

There are ways to make the UWS more appealing for families and more livable for everyone. Continuing to fight over every single free parking space ain’t one of them. That’s the kind of thing that’s actually chasing families out of NYC.

Screengrab of the linked article that reads: “Residents who have a car are already subject to the congestion pricing fee a few blocks away, high garage prices and now this new parking regulation," Brewer wrote. "I believe that this latest policy contributes to chasing families out of New York City.”

The vast majority of @galeabrewer.bsky.social’s constituents, incl most families, do not own a car, so this quote is rather curious.

Implying that having a family in the one of the densest, most transit-rich neighborhoods on the continent requires owning a car is some stale Robert Moses thinking.

Screengrab of the linked article that reads: "I would like to look at other aspects of smart curbs, but not priced parking," Brewer said in an interview. "I have hundreds if not thousands of people complaining.”

Street improvements aren’t a popularity contest decided by who screams the loudest and most often.

Letting a tiny minority hold the curb hostage because they want to keep getting something for free should be embarrassing for a progressive politician in 2025.

This is incredibly disappointing from @galeabrewer.bsky.social.

How can we reclaim our streets with Low-Traffic Neighborhoods?

Join the conversation with Jon Jon Wesolowski this Tuesday July 1st at 6:30PM to learn how we can create safer, more local streets.

📍Hi-Note - 188 Ave B

RSVP: www.eventbrite.com/e/what-europ...

@1014nyc.bsky.social

#2522 – Criminalization of Bikes in NYC and Biking in The Apocalypse - Bike Talk Listener email: the difference between bike packing and bike touring, and what handlebar bags and panniers to get (1:11). New York City has begun a policy of criminalizing minor traffic violations for...

We predict the war on e-bikes will run out of gas, and the apocalypse will be gentler than advertised. biketalk.org/2025/06/2522...
@streetopia.bsky.social
@openplans.org
@consumerreports.org
@transalt.org
@sbalkan5.bsky.social

A block of the Amsterdam Ave protected bike lane on the Upper West Side of Manhattan with an enormous puddle that is half the width of the lane.

A different block of the Amsterdam Ave protected bike lane with another enormous puddle.

Yet another block of the Amsterdam Ave protected bike lane with chipped paint, eroded pavement, and yes, you guessed it, another enormous puddle.

High quality bike lanes make cycling more appealing and accessible to more people. This is not a high quality bike lane.

Thank you for speaking out, Council Member.

Targeting bicyclists with criminal summonses does nothing to make our streets safer, particularly when car drivers inflict orders of magnitude more harm to everyone—pedestrians, cyclists, and other drivers.

Daylighting is good and popular policy that makes streets safer for everyone, especially pedestrians. We’re grateful to @galeabrewer.bsky.social for her support of @council.nyc.gov bill Int 1138 which would require NYC to *follow state law* and implement daylighting across the city.

Fixing NYC’s 72nd Street: A People-First Vision YouTube video by Inspired Infrastructure

Inspired Infrastructure got inspired by our W 72nd St vision. Check it out:

This 💯

The Upper West Side of Manhattan has about 10K parking spots, most of them free. That’s ~40 miles of parked cars in an area of just 2 sq mi. It’s a complete degradation of nearly all public space in the neighborhood. Just ask the kids who go to school on the street in this picture.

Ride along with the UWS’s very own bike bus. Activism that’s fun and healthy and create’s community all at the same time.