New York City Traffic Law Blog

This past Wednesday, safety advocates, concerned citizens and city officials all gathered in Manhattan for a joint meeting of the City Council's Transportation and Public Safety Committees. The reason? The assembled group wanted to discuss such important matters as reckless driving/speeding and the adequacy of current vehicle traffic laws governing accident investigations.

Regarding the first issue, council members cited some particularly eye-opening and rather grim statistics. Specifically, they indicated that speeding was the primary cause of car accidents throughout the five boroughs in 2011, a year that saw 241 traffic-related fatalities.

"Wherever I go in my district and wherever I go in this city, one of the most common complaints is the speed with which people drive," said Councilman James Vacca (D-Bronx), chairperson of the Transportation Committee. "There are some people who think this is the Wild West and that they own the streets and everybody else should get out of the way."

The State of New York has many laws and regulations that apply to drivers on our roadways. Many of these laws address relatively minor issues, such as noise pollution, and the punishment for minor violations often comes in the form of fines.

Because the potential punishments for many traffic offenses are relatively minor, many people make the mistake of not taking traffic citations seriously. However, many offenses under New York's Vehicle and Traffic Law carry the possibility of severe sentences, including incarceration. When an alleged violation of a traffic law results in a death or injury, the legal consequences can escalate quickly.

If you live in New York City and own a car then you have more than likely taken part in the ritual of trying to decipher some of the signs outlining the city's arcane parking regulations. Sometimes you may have guessed right, while other times your powers of deduction may have failed you, resulting in an unwanted parking ticket/traffic violation.

While you may think the problem of virtually indecipherable parking signs is perhaps limited to only a few areas of the city, guess again. In fact, 26 City Council members introduced a measure last month that would command the Department of Transportation (DOT) to form a task force to review the city's parking signs to determine whether they are in need of some serious language revisions.

In the meantime, some enterprising computer experts have taken matters into their own hands by creating a new app for the iPhone called "Can I Park Here?"

In our previous post, we discussed how the State Senate recently passed a new DUI-related law designed to punish particularly dangerous behavior such as reckless driving and wrong-way drunk driving. Interestingly enough, a very prominent New York lawmaker -- Senator Charles Schumer -- recently held a joint press conference in which he called for federal action to combat yet another form of particularly dangerous behavior -- drugged driving.

Specifically, Senator Schumer and Senator Mark Pryor of Arkansas are co-sponsoring legislation that would direct $140 million in federal funding for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to be used exclusively for research to develop a test for detecting drugged drivers and to train police officers.

"Cops need a Breathalyzer-like technology that works to identify drug-impaired drivers on-the-spot -- before they cause irreparable harm," said Schumer at a Sunday press conference here in New York City. "With the explosive growth of prescription drug abuse it's vital that local law enforcement have the tools and training they need to identify those driving under the influence of narcotics to get them off the road."