Car Ownership Continues to Rise in New York City

The de Blasio administration says they're committed to the Vision Zero goal of shrinking car ownership, but they don't seem to be doing much to slow its growth.

1 minute read

October 23, 2018, 11:00 AM PDT

By Casey Brazeal @northandclark


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Car registrations are going up in New York City, "Overall, there were 1,923,041 cars registered to city residents at the end of 2017, compared to 1,808,038 four years earlier," David Meyer writes for Streetsblog.

Meyer cites the growth of the city's placard program and a struggling transit system as two reasons for the trend. "Last year, subway ridership declined even as the city’s population increased," Meyer reports. Meanwhile, a de Blasio policy awarded 50,000 new placards that allow New Yorkers to park places that would traditionally be illegal.

Meyer's argues that this growth in car ownership is counterproductive to goals of making the city streets safer, and goes against the program’s stated goal of reducing car trips.

Wednesday, October 3, 2018 in StreetsBlog NYC

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