City Gets Green Light To Remove Brooklyn Bike Lane — For Now

BROOKLYN, NY — Amid an ongoing legal battle over a protected bike lane on Brooklyn’s Bedford Avenue, the Adams administration has been cleared to remove a portion of it, at least for now.

A four-judge appellate panel on Monday denied an injunction request, clearing the way for the Adams administration to begin removing the Bedford Avenue protected bike lane. The ruling lifts a previous court order that temporarily blocked the city from modifying the lane.

The decision, issued on July 16, came just hours before city crews were scheduled to begin tearing down the bike lane. It marked the second time a judge had intervened in the city’s plan to remove the Bedford Avenue lane.

Earlier, Brooklyn Supreme Court Judge Carolyn Walker-Diallo ordered the city to pause any work until a court hearing in August, but on July 9, she reversed course and allowed the city to move forward with the removal.

While Monday’s ruling permits the city to remove a three-block stretch of the protected bike lane between Flushing and Willoughby Avenues, it does not resolve the larger legal challenge. The appeal remains active and will continue to move through the courts.

"Today, an appellate panel ruled that the mayor can move forward with his plans to rip up proven safety improvements on Bedford Avenue," Alexa Sledge, Communications Director at Transportation Alternatives, said in a statement. "Mayor Adams’ pursuit of this ruling sets a dangerous precedent, establishing that any special interest group that promises the mayor votes or money could reshape our city without regard to safety, data, or the expertise of our most trusted public servants."

The ongoing controversy centers on a stretch of Bedford Avenue in South Williamsburg, where the protected bike lane has been a flashpoint since its installation. In 2024, the city redesigned the corridor with protective barriers following a troubling spike in pedestrian fatalities.

According to the Department of Transportation, five people were killed along the northbound section between Dean Street and Flushing Avenue since 2020.

The legal challenge, filed by the street safety advocacy group Transportation Alternatives, argues that the Adams administration’s decision to remove parts of the protected lane was “improper, irrational, made without proper legal notice, and an abuse of discretion.”

Mayor Adams abruptly decided in June to remove three blocks of the parking-protected lane following backlash from local community members who claimed the redesign had made the street more dangerous. An online petition opposing the protected lane, titled “DOT: Please Stop the Murder of Our Children,” garnered thousands of signatures from neighborhood residents.

The city’s Department of Transportation attempted to address the issues by installing designated bus loading zones, court documents showed, but they were frequently blocked by illegally parked cars or ignored.

The agency warned that taking out the protected bike lane would likely make the street more dangerous and could open the city up to litigation, and proposed alternatives like rerouting part of the lane.

According to documents, DOT acknowledged that “Removing the protected bike lane (PBL) won’t remove cyclists—it will only make the street less safe.” A presentation created by the DOT also warns that, should the Adams administration succeed in ripping out the safety improvements, “The City risks legal liability for knowingly reducing safety on a Vision Zero priority corridor.”

"By reverting a safe street to a dangerous one, Mayor Adams is exposing the City of New York, and as a result, all taxpayers, to significant financial and legal liability when New Yorkers are inevitably hit, seriously injured, or killed on Bedford Avenue," Sledge added. "The City’s legal liability has been firmly established in court documents filed by his own Department of Transportation. Settling lawsuits isn’t cheap, and New York City taxpayers will be on the hook for the mayor’s blatantly political decision-making."