Good morning, Chair Brooks-Powers and thank you for holding this hearing today. I am here representing Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso.
Our office (has just released/is about to release) the 2025 Comprehensive Plan for Brooklyn, which examines how to improve conditions, manage growth, and advance health in the borough. One of the Plan’s main elements focuses on a topic relevant to today’s hearing: the public realm, including curb management. Curb space is a valuable, but often overlooked, component of the public realm. If not managed and designed responsibly, curb space can be overrun by private parking. But when viewed holistically, it is an opportunity for public goods such as trash containerization, parklets, rain gardens, sidewalks, bike parking, expanded bus stops, or dedicated space for local vendors.
Today I want to share a few of the Plan’s recommendations related to curb management and parking infrastructure:
- Daylight all Brooklyn intersections with hardscaped improvements. Borough President Reynoso strongly supports Intro 1138, which will make the city safer for all road users – pedestrians, older adults and people with disabilities, cyclists, and drivers – in other words, all New Yorkers. The National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO) recommends this practice to facilitate eye contact between road users and improve safety.1 Doing this while making space for other needs such as on-street trash containers, bike parking, Citi Bike docks, and planters is a win-win for our communities.
Daylighting should be considered a basic design standard for every intersection in the city; every time a work crew touches a street corner is an opportunity to rebuild it with daylighting. Borough President Reynoso encourages the administration to increase DOT’s in-house capacity to daylight intersections, including filling existing vacancies and approving new headcount. - Adopt a Residential Parking Permit (RPP) system. Currently, the vast majority of the borough’s on-street parking spaces are offered to private users free of charge. RPPs are a common tool used around the country where local residents with vehicles and driving records in good standing pay a yearly fee to secure parking within a given area. This helps make it easier for residents who need parking to find it, and alleviates congestion on local streets. However, there is a wrong way and a right way to implement RPPs. It is crucial that RPPs are introduced alongside other essential curb uses, such as trash containerization and deliveries.
- Reserve space for deliveries in every community. This would include expanding DOT’s Local Delivery Hub program, Neighborhood Loading Zones, Truck Loading Zones, and Commercial Metered Parking. This will help alleviate congestion along commercial corridors and prioritizes the needs of our small businesses over car owners.
- Create a dynamic pricing pilot for on-street parking in commercial corridors. Borough President Reynoso encourages the Council to hear Intro 0474-2024, which would require DOT to create at least one dynamic parking zone per borough where the parking rates would rise or fall depending on real-time demand. This will allow more people to access commercial corridors, also supporting local businesses.
- Integrate curb electrification into DOT’s Smart Curbs Pilot Program. The City should pilot a curb electrification program that prioritizes regular vending locations and incentivizes and/or reimburses vendors who switch from gas generators to electric power.
- Better enforce alternate-side parking rules by creating an escalating fine structure for persistent non-compliance.
Regarding the other bills being heard today, I want to share brief comments on Intro 99, which would require DOT to establish overnight parking areas in Industrial Business Zones (IBZs). In March, DOT announced a similar pilot program that would allow paid truck parking 24 hours per day in three IBZs, priced at $10 for eight hours. The goal of both is smart – to get illegally parked trucks off residential streets and allow drivers a safe place to park and sleep, discouraging dangerous driving.
However, questions remain for both the bill and the pilot remain about how enforcement will work. BP Reynoso supports local Industrial Business Service Providers (IBSPs), who are asking that whichever strategy the City ultimately pursues, it should come with more enforcement resources to discourage illegal vehicle storage and support removal of abandoned vehicles. Additionally, the City should consult with the IBSPs (in addition to the community boards) about the location of these parking areas, given that the IBSPs are the ones doing work on the ground in the IBZs.
Thank you again for holding this hearing today. Please check out the Comprehensive Plan for Brooklyn for more detailed recommendations about parking, curb management, street design, and freight movement. We look forward to working with you on implementation.