The city of New York has been trying to encourage an increase in bike lanes throughout the city. But the issue has become increasingly political, and progress has been slowed.
The Gotham Gazette explores the debate and looks at why the bike lanes have caused such controversy.
"While opponents have long tried to block plans for specific lanes, now critics are taking on the program as a whole. Some community boards and politicians express concern that the lanes have been developed too quickly and say they make it harder to walk and drive around the city and can pose a safety hazard and hurt businesses. They attack the administration for what they see an anti-car bias. A numbers of these critics have mounted efforts on a variety of fronts to try to slow down the Bloomberg administration's cycling plans.
To dramatize his increasing skepticism about bike lanes, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz rolled into his State of the Borough speech this year on a tricycle, and then blasted the city's cycling initiatives. 'For the majority of New Yorkers, it is simply not feasible to make bicycles their primary mode of transport, and unfortunately that's the direction I believe the city's policy is heading,' Markowitz said. "
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