Vision Zero ignores pedestrian behavior

Malverne, L.I.: After years of adding red light and speed cameras, pushing curbs out to diminish parking spaces, and daylighting to slow down drivers, it’s high time we focused on pedestrians. Where’s the outcry when they step into traffic when the light is for drivers? Why are people crossing a two-lane thoroughfare and waiting at the yellow lines? They treat their lives like a game of Frogger, zig-zagging through traffic for a serotonin rush.

Adding more restrictions to drivers without addressing poor pedestrian etiquette is unfair. Hizzoner shouldn’t waste taxpayer funds on daylighting because it’s cheaper to run a campaign of “pedestrians, stay on the curb until it’s your turn,” “cross at crosswalks” and “you’re not safe waiting for traffic to clear on the yellow lines.”

In offering safe streets, rename the Vision Zero program because you need excellent vision to traverse NYC streets. Vision Zero never inspired me. As a pedestrian, use proper etiquette and hang at the curb until it’s safe to cross. Look into the driver’s side of a stopped car when stepping into the crosswalk if the corner hasn’t been daylighted. Ask yourself if you’re going to make it across without being honked at, because if you’re getting honked at, that’s a driver with good vision. If you’re risking your life, then you’re going to get hit without being honked at by a driver with vision zero!

Kosmas Patikoglou

Dubious disabilities

Forest Hills: I’m crossing my fingers that the DOI review of NYPD disability pensions doesn’t throw the proverbial baby out with the bath water. I’m quite certain this review will uncover that the most egregious of these pensions were awarded to high-ranking officials (especially those appointed by Mayor Eric Adams). Meanwhile, members of the rank and file regularly have to hire lawyers to get the pensions they earned. I do wonder why John Chell seems perfectly fine golfing with a politician after his disability pension was locked in because of an “ankle injury.” I guess golf helps ankles. Who knew?

J.M. Culley

Negotiate

Middle Village: Re “Council pushes dismissal” (Sept. 18): I can’t imagine what the City Council is thinking. Speaker Julie Menin says this was “written as an emergency retention bill.” How is a single $10,000 check supposed to convince low-paid paraprofessionals to continue working with their $33,000 annual salary? It doesn’t even count toward their meager pension. UFT President Michael Mulgrew acknowledged that there are 8,000 para vacancies. Does he believe that this “respect check” will attract new applicants for the job even though it wouldn’t apply to them? The solution is quite obvious. The only way to fill the shortage of paras is to offer a decent living wage. To accomplish this, Mulgrew has to go through the proper channels: collective bargaining. This is Economics 101.

Lee Rottenberg

Trade-off

Manhattan: Two excellent articles by Mike Lupica (“One of a kind,” column, Sept. 21) and Pat Leonard (“Former general manager Accorsi, who made Eli a Giant, dies at 84,” Sept. 21) about the great Ernie Accorsi, who engineered the greatest trade in N.Y. Giants history by acquiring Eli Manning. That said — and I’m not trying to be a Debbie Downer by any means, far from it — Accorsi admitted that had the Chargers not agreed to the Manning trade, he would have selected Ben Roethlisberger. Who’s to say how many Super Bowls Roethlisberger could have produced as the Giants quarterback? As great as Manning was, so was Roethlisberger.

H. Wayne Mirsky

Belongs in a book

White Plains, N.Y.: Growing up, I learned the mechanics of baseball listening to Lindsey Nelson, Ralph Kiner and Bob Murphy on my transistor radio. I still remember when Murphy spoke about dancing with his daughter at her wedding. You could hear the smile on his face. Howie Rose had the same effect. Whenever he described the highs and many lows of Mets games, you felt like you were in the stadium with him. I truly hope Howie will write a biography about his Mets moments and experiences so he can “put it in the books.”

Randi Bernstein Feigenbaum

Illusory edifice

Ashburn, Va.: With President Trump now describing his proposed “Triumphal Arch” as a disguised drone-launching site to be filled with snipers waiting for an attack on the White House, is there no Republican officeholder with the courage to tell our deluded emperor that he has no clothes?

Mike Barrett

Arch enemy

Howard Beach: Is it just me or does Trump’s arch look like it was made by Nazis?

George Martin

Press boycott

New Haven, Conn.: About Trump banning some news organizations from the White House (“Outlets push back on ban,” Sept. 20): If the other news organizations have any feeling of solidarity and some guts, when the next press conference is announced, nobody will show up.

Sidney Harris

Unsupported claims

Brooklyn: Leonard Greene almost wrote something interesting in Sunday’s column “The world’s Wakanda moment” (Sept. 20). But, as always, he fails to prove his point: that racist-drawn maps misrepresent Africa’s true larger size. He provides few details other than that the continent is actually longer than its current map representation, and some U.S. State Department officials, as well as several AI models, were unable to correctly draw borders or name some of its countries. Also, no clarification for readers unfamiliar with the word “Wakanda.” But what exactly is wrong with the map, and what makes those misrepresentations racist? And are modern navigators really still using a map drawn in 1569?

Jack Flynn

No shame to seek

Manhattan: To Voicer John Gallup: My letters are to hold the U.S. government accountable for the atrocities and crimes it committed — and profited from — against American Descendants of Slavery. I do not expect a historically racist country like ours to feel any shame, embarrassment or guilt for its actions. Neither you nor the United States ever gave Black American citizens anything except trouble and despair. There is nothing that ADOS specifically achieved without paying for it with our blood, from the creation of the U.S. to the current day. John, you bragged about Historically Black Colleges and Universities but failed to mention why they were a necessity for Black Americans due to white Americans’ hatred and racism. I do not expect people like you to do things that you have proved you are incapable of doing when it comes to ADOS.

Heyward Johnson

Bake at…

New Windsor, N.Y.: That delicious-looking recipe for apple cake (“Kitchen shrink recipe,” Sept. 20) lacked a very important detail: oven temperature!

Lois Lichtenberg

Inconsequential

Staten Island: The other day, I came across an article about former President Barack Obama’s dog passing away. Why is this newsworthy? With all the chaos in the world right now, someone decided to print a story about Obama’s dog. What kind of reporting is this? I would demote the editor or whoever decided to print this nonsense.

Jeffrey Van Pelt