STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — The New York City Council will not vote on a universal daylighting bill before the end of the year, according to multiple reports.
The bill in question, Intro 1138, would ban parking within a certain distance of any intersection with a crosswalk, a process known as daylighting.
Late on Tuesday night, Streetsblog NYC reported that City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, a Democrat representing parts of Queens, would cut the legislation from the agenda of the last City Council meeting for 2025.
At the time, a spokesperson for Adams told Streetsblog that the legislative agenda for the meeting was not finalized.
On Thursday, however, Transportation Alternatives — a nonprofit that advocates for public transit and safer streets — issued a statement saying that the deadline to advance bills for a City Council vote had passed, and that the universal daylighting legislation had been pulled.
Also on Thursday, Borough President Vito Fossella referred to the legislation as “shelved” in a press release that celebrated the move as a “huge win for common sense.”
“As we have said since Day One, a one-size-fits-all approach was fundamentally inappropriate and irresponsible,” Fossella said in the press release.
“For now, we thank Speaker Adams for doing the right thing and taking the “Universal” out of Universal Daylighting,” Fossella, a steady opponent of the bill, continued.
The universal daylighting bill isn’t dead, however.
Ben Furnas, executive director of Transportation Alternatives and member of the transportation transition committee for Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, indicated that the legislation could be re-introduced under the upcoming administration.
“Today, in response, the Speaker of the City Council has decided to block the universal daylighting bill,” Furnas said in a statement. “We will keep pushing for universal daylighting under a new City Council and a new mayor, and we won’t stop until every child has a safe walk to school.”
About daylighting
The universal daylighting legislation would ban vehicles from parking within 20 feet of any intersection with a crosswalk, equal to roughly one full car length.
New York state law already outlaws parking within 20 feet of a crosswalk. However, New York City has a special exemption that allows it to set its own parking rules.
Supporters of the bill have referred to studies that say allowing parking within 16 feet of intersections significantly increases the number of pedestrian injuries.
Proponents also point to the success of daylighting — among other changes — in Hoboken, New Jersey, which has not had a single pedestrian death in several years.
Fossella and other opponents on Staten Island have said that while they approve of daylighting certain intersections on Staten Island, they oppose the bill’s “one-size-fits-all” approach.
Opponents also argue that the New York City Department of Transportation opposes the proposed legislation.
The DOT has cited a report the agency published in January, which found no increase in pedestrian safety at intersections that have daylighting in place without physical barriers installed.
Supporters have challenged the findings in the report, however.
The transportation agency has also said that implementing the universal daylighting bill would cost more than double its current annual budget.
The current iteration of the bill has 30 sponsors in the City Council.
While this would be enough votes for the bill to pass, it is four shy of the two-thirds majority required to override a potential veto by Mayor Eric Adams.
During a September interview with PIX11, Councilmember Julie Won — a Democrat representing parts of Queens and original sponsor of the bill — said that if the legislation doesn’t pass before the end of the year, it would need to re-start the legislative process.