By Forum Staff
Mayor Eric Adams and City Department of Transportation Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez on Tuesday launched a comprehensive effort to reimagine the city’s curb space—deploying tools and strategies to make the city cleaner, greener, and healthier, Adams said.
With the explosion in home deliveries and growing range of transportation modes on city streets, curb space has become increasingly sought after, competitive, and chaotic. The “Curb Management Action Plan” includes 10 concrete steps to better design and manage the curb lane to reflect the increasingly wide range of needs of residents, workers, visitors, business owners, and all New Yorkers.
Highlights of the action plan include:
“Smart Curbs” Pilot: Working with business improvement districts (BIDs) and other community partners, DOT will select neighborhoods in which to reimagine curb space from scratch. In pilot neighborhoods, DOT will evaluate current curb regulations, identify community needs at the curb, and test new uses and technologies that make access easier – mitigating traffic congestion and double parking.
Curb uses may include:
- Microhubs and loading zones, providing dedicated space for commercial vehicles to reduce double parking;
- Public space improvements, including street furniture, plantings, pop-up markets, community art, delivery worker relief stations, and waste containerization; and
- Expanded bike parking and corrals, in accordance with delivery worker needs.
Prioritizing Curb Uses to Meet Neighborhood Needs: Effective curb management requires prioritizing curb functions that reflect local context. DOT will develop and publish a curb management hierarchy to inform the public and aid planning decisions. The guide will help prioritize curb usage across the city based on street or neighborhood styles, consistent with the city’s transportation goals and needs.
Make Home and Business Deliveries Safer, Sustainable, and More Efficient: In response to the tremendous growth of e-commerce, DOT is identifying ways to address freight-related safety, congestion, pollution, and quality-of-life concerns through smarter curb management. Strategies include incentivizing off-hour deliveries, establishing dedicated loading zones, and creating microhubs where goods can be transferred from larger freight vehicles to smaller low- or no-emissions vehicles.
Pilot the East Coast’s First Low-Emission Zone: DOT will examine ways to require and/or incentivize the use of low- and zero-emission trucks through the creation of low-emission zones in areas with the highest concentration of truck traffic and the worst public health outcomes. A pilot program for one or more locations will be implemented in a community disproportionately impacted by climate change.
Designate Curb Space to Make Passenger Pickups and Drop-Offs Easier: The surge in for-hire vehicle trips has created additional competition for curb space, often resulting in parking regulation violations like improperly occupying taxi stands, double parking, and unsafe pickups and drop-offs. To delineate existing space more clearly, DOT will establish dedicated pickup/drop-off zones for for-hire vehicles in high-volume locations.
Provide Space for Outdoor Dining, Waste Containerization, Street Furniture, and Other Public Realm Improvements: DOT will expand use of the curb lane for sidewalk widenings, curb extensions, bus boarding platforms, plantings, public art, and the Street Seats program, which creates small-scale public spaces adjacent to the sidewalk. DOT will allocate curb space to support implementation of “Dining Out NYC” – the nation’s largest outdoor dining program – and the New York City Department of Sanitation’s ongoing efforts to containerize waste to improve pedestrian travel and mitigate rodents. Working with the New York City Housing Authority, DOT will also provide curb space for the “Clean Curbs for Al” pilot to use large, on-site waste containers at public housing developments, including in the curb lane.
