So no more unlawful pedicabs, or excessive noise forcing family and tourists to cut their visits short in this world-class park. And we know that New Yorkers and tourists are fed up with these quality of life concerns.
Together, we created a punch list of 78 specific action items to improve the safety and quality of life inside Central Park. To date, 48 are completed, 13 are in progress, and 11 are long-term, ongoing efforts. That teamwork includes coordinating enforcement strategies to address unlicensed pedicabs, while also engaging directly the pedicab operators to prevent violations before they even occur, launching a dedicated Pedicab Task Force to drive long-term solutions to bring operators into compliance and to hold bad actors accountable for and to protect the riders.
Park Enforcement Patrol has issued 289 summonses this year related to pedicab violations, and the NYPD Central Park Precinct has issued 194 related summonses up from 162 the same time period last year. The NYPD has also seized 19 pedicabs so far this year compared to just 1 during the same time period last year.
We are seeing fewer violations related to pedicabs.
Question: What is the specific regulation with respect to these pedicabs? Because if you go to Central Park South, for example, by 6th Avenue, it can be overwhelming. They’re blasting their music, cutting people off. What is the regulation regarding them, and how is that specifically being addressed?
Mayor Adams: Well, one thing for sure, and we’re talking about some enforcement, it’s not a petty concern, that’s for sure. You know, we are really concerned with the over proliferation of pedicabs that many of them are unlicensed.
They’re overcharging tourists. Some of the cases that we’ve heard are really astonishing. When you think about people coming here to visit the city, they don’t want to be ripped off and harassed in a manner. And so we did several operations. You want to talk about those operations?
Deputy Mayor Daughtry: Thanks, N.J. And that’s one of the biggest concerns here in Central Park is the pedicabs. They’re out of control. Last year, we did a really big pedicab initiative through Midtown as well as even down in Central Park. But a pedicab is just what it is, a pedicab.
You notice some of these pedicabs, the majority of them have motors on them. They’re not supposed to have motors. And their prices are very deceiving to New Yorkers, especially tourists, when I’m coming here from a different country because this is the best place in the world.
When they jump on a ride, it says $8.99. People think it is $8.99 per [person], but they’re charging you $8.99 per [minute]. So a ride around Central Park can cost a person almost $200. And that gets into a conflict between the rider, the ride-goer, and the pedicab operator.
So when the officers come in and converge on them, initially they try to take off. But we have a really tactical plan in place for how we go after these individuals. But if you see a pedicab with a motor on it, if you don’t see the license sticker on the side by the Consumer Worker Protection Program, they’re supposed to be registered.
And I would say about 95 percent of these pedicabs are not registered. They’re not licensed. So it’s an easy confiscation. We’re working with our law department in the sea of ways of how we can take these pedicabs legally and lawfully and not give them back to the owner because we only can have them seized for a couple of days.
So we’re working with our legal teams, our Law Department, to come up with some sort of resolution so we can actually take these pedicabs permanently if they don’t come pick them up.
Question: What about the music?
Deputy Mayor Daughtry: The music is also, you’re not supposed to have a sound reproductive device. I mean, listen, the pedicabs are fun, attractive for people that are not from here. But sometimes they do take advantage of our tourists.
And we don’t want that. We want people to come here, have a good time. We don’t want them to get into altercations with the pedicab drivers over a $250 fare, which is sometimes absurd. Thank you.
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