Camera-equipped MTA buses that issue tickets to cars blocking bus lanes will expand their scope next year, part of a pilot program to issue tickets to those vehicles blocking bike lanes as well.
The MTA was granted authorization to enforce bike lane blockage in this year’s state budget, in tandem with an expansion of its purview to ticket motorists blocking buses. And at Wednesday’s meeting of the MTA Board, the final transit confab of 2023, the agency’s Senior Advisor for Special Projects and Initiatives, Jessica Mathew, said a pilot program is in the works with the city’s Department of Transportation (DOT) to hit bike lane blockers in their wallets.
“We’re also thinking very carefully about the importance of having safer routes to ride a bike,” said Mathew. “As part of our authorization for expanded automated camera enforcement for buses, we are also able to expand that to bike lane violations as well. And we’re working with the DOT on how to roll out a pilot of that next year.”