Transportation

In an effort to compete with Uber and other ride sharing companies such as Lyft, a New York City council member recently has introduced legislation for New York cab companies to have access to a app of their own. Council Member Ben Kallos said in a statement, “New York City must support our tech sector: Instead of making new technologies illegal, or regulating them out of business, we should provide a level playing field with fair competition so that companies, drivers and riders all win.”

A report written with extensive community input, titled Livable Streets, spotlights the 10 most treacherous intersections --including E. 57th St. and Second Ave., where there have been nearly six collisions per month and Second Ave. crossings at E. 63rd and E. 60th Sts., which each record roughly five collisions per month.

A New York City councilman is trying to save the city's taxi industry with an app for yellow cabs that would compete with Uber.

City Council member Ben Kallos admits that traditional taxis "have been successfully disrupted by Uber and other car services." So he's introducing legislation to create a Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) app "to level playing field so people can compete."

Kallos, meanwhile, said he worries about the proliferation of Uber and its competitors. "I think my nightmare would be hopping into a yellow cab in the future where they’ve got a phone for Uber a phone for Lyft a phone for Hailo ... and they’ve literally got a dashboard covered in phones because they want to make sure they’re signed up for every single e-hail app," he said. "My preference would people to have one phone, one interface."

Heads up!

The city would be required to give community members one month’s notice before making traffic changes under a bill introduced Thursday by Councilman Ben Kallos and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer.

"Community members have a right to know about changes that are happening in their neighborhoods, and community boards are one of the best ways to spread the word," said Councilman Ben Kallos

Bus riders in certain parts of the city might have an easier commute soon as more than 100 new countdown clocks are scheduled for installation citywide.

The clocks, which tick down how long riders have to wait for a bus to approach their stop, will be spread throughout 11 City Council districts where representatives allocated almost $2.8 million between them.

They're among the busiest bus routes in Manhattan, shuttling more than 70,000 riders across town every weekday.

But riders at 15 stops along the westbound M66, M79, M86 and M96 will soon have one more way of finding out just where that next bus is.

The real-time bus signs are thanks to a city-funded measure pushed by an Upper East Side councilman in the city's latest round of Participatory Budgeting.

They're also coming to the southbound M31 on York Avenue.

"People from all over the district voted for bus clocks. It was something that they wanted and there was a need for,” said Councilman Ben Kallos.

As part of a raft of bills on government data and transparency, Council Member Ben Kallos has introduced legislation that would require the city to release and map data about where NYPD issues moving violations, among other things. The bill would open up new traffic enforcement information to the public...

New York City's crime map can tell you where a burglary or assault occurred, but a bill being introduced today would make the city plot traffic tickets and summonses as well, the legislation's author, Councilmen Ben Kallos told amNY.

Kallos' bill requires noncriminal violations to be posted on the city's crime map along with dates, times and location information down to the longitude and latitude coordinates, if possible.

He said this level of detail would bolster the city's Vision Zero pedestrian safety effort by providing more exact locations of incidents and traffic violations.

Constituents in Councilman Ben Kallos' Upper East Side district voted to spend $300,000 for 15 electronic signs on the westbound stops of the M96, M86, M79 and M66 crosstown buses.

Kallos then set aside an additional $340,000 for 17 electronic signs on M31 downtown and westbound stops.

Kallos said he is working with Bike New York to make Roosevelt Island a model bike-friendly community and urged DOT to install better bike lanes on crosstown streets. He is hosting a forum on beautifying pedestrian islands along the First Avenue bike lane tonight, as well as a forum in June focused on working with restaurants and delivery cyclists. He also urged Streetsblog readers to fill out a survey on his website to help identify livable streets needs in his district.