Central Park visitors call for e-bike ban following crash rise

Safety advocates are pushing for a ban on electric bicycles in Central Park after reckless riders continued to break traffic rules, the New York Post reported. Data from the New York City Police Department shows that e-bikes and e-scooters were involved in 33 crashes in the park through October 18. Officers in the local precinct issued 144 e-bike tickets through October 25, up from 39 tickets during the same period a year earlier. [1]

The New York Post reported that municipal Parks Department staff are struggling to make cyclists obey rules in designated areas. Riders frequently ignore signs asking them to dismount and walk their bicycles. During one incident on a Wednesday, a Citi Bike user refused to stop when instructed by a park worker inside a designated no-riding zone. [1]

Central Park is an 843-acre urban space located between the Upper West Side and Upper East Side neighborhoods of Manhattan. It is managed by the Central Park Conservancy through a public-private partnership with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation. The site is the most visited urban park in the United States, attracting an estimated 42 million visitors every year. [2]

The push for tighter restrictions comes amid broader safety concerns in the public park. As FTMQ News reported earlier, New York police recently searched for a suspect who committed a knifepoint sexual assault near East 67th Street and Fifth Avenue inside the park grounds. [5]