Read the original article by Leonard Green at nydailynews.com here.
Whoa, Nelly!
Mayor de Blasio should be more concerned with saving children than wasting the public’s time and resources on disingenuous plans to get horses off city streets, says a carriage driver with plans to sue the city.
Horse owner Giovanni Paliotta said the mayor’s proposal to restrict horse carriage pick-up spots to Central Park would harm his business by taking him and other drivers out of the public view.
“The horses cause no traffic danger, rather their presence has been said to tame the pace of traffic, thereby making the streets safer,” Paliotta said in a notice of claim filed last week.
“Limiting areas of pick up to inside the park puts the industry, which has been occupying Central Park South and Grand Army Plaza for over 160 years, out of public view, limiting its ability to attract passengers and practically prohibiting the drivers’ ability to attract customers in the evening. Effectively the carriage drivers would not be able to earn a living, and they would be forced out of business.”
Such a move would give other industries, like pedi-cab drivers, an unfair advantage, the claim said.
De Blasio floated the pick-up plan in August with the backing of NYCLASS,which has pushed for an all-out ban on horse-drawn carriages. De Blasio’s own push for an industry ban failed miserably, and he has since sought middle ground on the issue.
But his proposal to accomplish the move through the city rulemaking process — cutting out the need to go before the City Council — has angered the carriage industry, which calls the plan “a clear violation of the separation of powers.”
A Law Department spokesman said the city would review the notice.
