New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch hold a press conference at the scene where a car slammed into the entrance of the headquarters of a Jewish religious order, the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters, in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, U.S., January 28, 2026. REUTERS/Madison Swart
(New York, NY) – It’s another win for the cyclists under the Mamdani administration. The Mayor is rolling back an effort from Former Mayor Eric Adams to issue criminal summonses to cyclists violating any traffic laws. While the two-wheeler crowd is cheering this move, anyone who has had to dodge a speeding e-bike is fuming.
Cyclists No Longer Criminally Charged
In April 2025, then-Mayor Eric Adams ordered the NYPD to move away from giving out tickets and start giving out court dates to cyclists breaking the law. Many law-and-order advocates applauded the move and welcomed the ramped up enforcement. Meanwhile, leftists at City Hall claimed the move put immigrant delivery workers at risk of deportation. Advocates for delivery workers also put the onus on the app companies, claiming that they push workers to break traffic laws in order to keep delivery times down. Ligia Guallpa, the head of delivery worker advocacy group Los Deliveristas Unidos, claims making deliveries is one of the most dangerous jobs in the city with about one in five workers being injured on the job.
Police Commissioner Caught in the Middle
NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch is one of the few people from the Adams administration that Mamdani kept on the job. Tisch faced plenty of pushback from left-winged city officials and council members for supporting the shift in cyclist policing under Adams. She wrote an op-ed piece for The New York Post defending the policy. Tisch argued that while drivers who receive multiple infractions, they could have their license suspended. Meanwhile, cyclists can continue to rack up violations without any proper recourse for enforcement. She also clarified that the crackdown was focused solely on e-bikes, who she said pose a significantly more dangerous threat over traditional cyclists.
As we now approach 100 days under Mayor Mamdani, former Secretary to New York Governor Melissa DeRosa was on 77WABC’s Cats and Cosby where she said the Democratic socialist’s policies spell out disaster for the city:
Can the Stats Be Trusted?
The numbers don’t look so good for the cyclist crew, as the NYPD says four people were fatally run down by e-bikes or e-scooters and 15 pedestrians were injured in 2025. The number is even worse for the riders as sixteen e-bikers died from crashes the same year. However, the two-wheelers are quick to point out that compared to the carnage caused by cars, it’s not even close. In 2024, 9,610 pedestrians were injured in crashes, but only 37 of them were hurt by e-bikes, roughly about 0.4 percent.
Just to throw another element into the debate, NYC E-Vehicle Safety Alliance (NYCEVSA) co -founder Janet Schroeder tells the New York Post the numbers don’t tell the whole story. She claims 119 of the group’s members are victims of a reckless e-bike rider, and 113 of those incidents were hit and runs. The NYCEVSA said in a statement that if the mayor really wants to treat cyclists like other drivers on the road, they should be required to have a license, registration and insurance.
More Regulations for Drivers
New York drivers are already facing the financial burden of congestion pricing if they want to get into Manhattan below 60th Street, and now the mayor wants them to pump the brakes entering school zones. The mayor signed an executive order lowering the speed limit to 15 miles per hour in all eligible school zones across the five boroughs. This is an expansion of “Sammy’s Law”, a state law passed in 2024 following a surge in traffic deaths involving children. The law allowed the city to set its own speed limits rather than follow regulations from Albany. Mamdani aims to make all 2,300 school zones into a 15 mile per hour zone by the end of his term.
