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From the American Motorcyclist
Association:
New York City Transportation
Department thumbs nose at federal law
PICKERINGTON, Ohio --
In one of the most outrageous acts the American Motorcyclist
Association has seen in years, the New York City Transportation
Department defiantly refuses to change its rules so that they
comply with federal law to allow motorcycles to use high-occupancy-vehicle
(HOV) lanes.
The department states
that it won't change its rules to comply with federal law because
the New York City Police Department opposes the change. But transportation
officials refuse to explain the police opposition despite numerous
attempts by the American Motorcyclist Association to get an explanation.
The Police Department opposition was supposed to have been recorded,
but wasn't, in a public forum--a city Transportation Department
hearing that was held Sept. 12, 2007 to change department rules
related to motorcycle use of HOV lanes to comply with federal
law. The rule change was to go into effect within 60 days of
that hearing.
"New York City's
public servants are intentionally ignoring a law passed by the
American people's elected representatives in the U.S. Congress,"
says Imre Szauter, AMA legislative affairs specialist, who has
been trying to get answers from New York City transportation
officials on the HOV-motorcycle issue.
"Because the New
York City Transportation Department refuses to change its rules,
every American motorcyclist faces tickets and fines when riding
in New York City HOV lanes," Szauter continues. "This
is outrageous and totally unacceptable. Karen Perrine of Staten
Island, New York, suffered through a two-and-a-half-year nightmare
because of a ticket she got on Oct. 26, 2005 while riding her
Yamaha FZ1 motorcycle in a New York City HOV lane."
The New York Department
of Motor Vehicles Appeals Board, in a letter dated February 15,
2008, agreed that Perrine was within her rights to use the Brooklyn-Queens
Expressway HOV lane when she was pulled over and ticketed for
an HOV lane violation. The board reversed her conviction and
removed it from her driving record.
Perrine, however, is
afraid to use the HOV lane again.
"When I opened the
envelope from the Appeals Board I felt some satisfaction in having
the conviction reversed, but it's been extremely unfair to me
that I have had to sit for over a year and a half with the points
from this ticket on my driver's license, while I waited for a
decision from the Appeals Board," Perrine says. "I
was not breaking the law.
"In the last year
and a half, those points have made me eligible for a new $300
New York Drivers Assessment Fee and led to the cancellation of
my auto insurance policy. The total cost of this ticket including
the appeal, the Drivers Assessment Fee and the replacement auto
insurance policy has been $1,270," she says.
"When I attended
a public hearing at the New York City Department of Transportation
in September 2007, and read a statement about my ticket and traffic
court hassles, I thought that I was helping to change the local
traffic laws and prevent other bikers from suffering as I have,"
she says. "The New York City Department of Transportation
had drafted an amendment that would make local traffic rules
comply with the U.S. Code, finally. The new rules were to take
effect by this spring."
In recent years, motorcyclists
in Phoenix and Pittsburgh also were ticketed for riding in HOV
lanes. But those tickets were dismissed when the ticketed motorcyclists
and the American Motorcyclist Association pointed out that federal
law allows motorcycles in HOV lanes.
In fact, Pittsburgh even
put up signs allowing motorcycles in HOV lanes after officials
there were informed of the federal law.
The U.S. Code governing
HOV lanes--Title 23, Section 166 (23USC166)--states agencies
that govern HOV lanes must allow motorcycles to use the lanes
unless they prove motorcycles pose a safety hazard on the lanes,
and that proof is accepted by the U.S. Transportation Secretary
following a Federal Register notice and public comment period
on the ban. |
