Press

by Mona Davids on November 1, 2024

In an interview with the New York Voice, Janet Schroeder, co-founder of the New York City E-Vehicle Safety Alliance (NYC EVSA), shared her commitment to creating safer streets for New Yorkers. Schroeder co-founded the organization with Pamela Manasse. This movement, led by advocates like Schroeder and Manasse, is gaining momentum across the city. This advocacy group, born out of tragedy, is pushing for a law they’ve named “Priscilla’s Law,” after Priscilla Loke, who was fatally struck by an e-bike in a Chinatown crosswalk. NYC EVSA’s mission is clear: to make New York City streets safer for pedestrians, cyclists, and e-vehicle users alike through a comprehensive set of bills that require registration, regulation, and accountability for e-bikes, e-scooters, and similar motorized vehicles.

From NYC-EVSA on October 23, 2024

NYC E-Vehicle Safety Alliance calls on Speaker Adrienne Adams to end her obstruction and finally call for a hearing on Intro 0606-2024, PRISCILLA’S LAW, for registration of e-vehicles. The bill is named in honor of Priscilla Loke, who was killed by a Citi-E-Bike last year, and has majority support, 31 of 51 Councilmembers as Co-Sponsors.

When: Wednesday October 23 at Noon, Demonstration and Rally at City Hall —West Gate (Broadway and Murray Street).

Priscilla Loke was beloved by her family, friends, and students at Chinatown’s Head Start, where she was the Deputy Director. Her life was cut short by the e-vehicle violence which has become commonplace on NYC streets. This bill honors the memory of Priscilla Loke and all the victims of e-vehicle violence by providing accountability by registering all e-vehicles.

By Otto Fritton on August 12, 2024

As electric bikes have boomed in New York City, enforcement of traffic regulations against scofflaw riders has failed to keep pace. Many locals complain about whizzing electric Citi Bikes and other e-micro-mobility vehicles rushing pell-mell on the city’s streets and even sidewalks and sometimes traveling in the wrong direction.

John Campo is a professional cyclist and former West Point championship-winning coach. He’s also known as the “Angel of Kissena Velodrome” for pushing for a 1963 bike-racing track in Queens that had fallen into disrepair to be renovated, which the Parks Department finally did in 2004.

By Samantha Liebman on June 20, 2024

As the number of e-bikes has grown on the city’s streets, so have injuries, and there have also been deaths.

One group is calling on the city to require them to be registered, so there’s more accountability when something happens.

Priscilla Loke, a beloved educator, was hit by an e-bike in Chinatown last September.

It shook her longtime co-workers at the Chinatown Head Start.

“After she made a call to us and then she was unconscious,” recalled Peggy Ng, the former education director at the Head Start who worked with Loke for 35 years. “In a coma, and she passed away three days later without saying a word. Without saying anything. We miss her so much.”

By Henry Rossoff on June 20, 2024

You see it all the time all around the city– e-bike riders, often on their phones moving in and out of traffic, some barreling by pedestrians. Now there is a new push at the City Council level to register these e-bikes.

Friends and family clutched pictures of Priscilla Loke as they stood on the steps of City Hall.

Loke was killed by an e-bike running a red light in Chinatown last fall and her loved ones now support the registering of all bikes, scooters and other vehicles with an electric motors under what would be known as Priscilla’s law.

By Ann Cooper on June 7, 2024

“You’re not looking!” I chided my friend from Washington, D.C. who came to the city Memorial Day weekend. I was reminding her of the lesson I’d given the day before, on how to navigate New York City streets on foot in the era of electric bikes, electric scooters, and mopeds. Crossing a street: look both ways, several times, before stepping out, even when the light is clearly signaling it’s safe to walk. On the sidewalk: never assume you’re safe just because you’re not in the street; an unseen, unheard “micromobility” vehicle could whiz by you from the rear at any moment, its driver offering no warning whatsoever.

By Dodai Stewart on May 28, 2024

Elijah Orlandi knows what many New Yorkers think about delivery workers on e-bikes: They ride too fast. They zigzag in and out of traffic and bike lanes — sometimes going the wrong direction altogether. They materialize on sidewalks, idle in groups and block the paths of pedestrians. They risk colliding with people, pets and cars in their rush to get where they’re going.

By Maria Danzilo on February 16, 2024

New York City’s future growth and stability depend on establishing sensible transportation and street usage policies. However, our streets have become a chaotic mess, due mostly to the proliferation of unregulated e-bikes and electric scooters. New York City now has more than 65,000 gig delivery workers racing through our streets and on our sidewalks to deliver food to busy New Yorkers. Most of them use e-bikes because they are faster. These micro-mobility vehicles have overtaken bike lanes with drivers who routinely disregard traffic laws, putting pedestrians at great risk.

By Lincoln Anderson on December 15, 2023

It was a blustery day last week when councilmembers and New Yorkers demanding “accountability” for e-bike riders rallied outside City Hall. Despite the chill, they were fired up by the hope that a bill requiring all e-bikes to sport license plates could be passed before the end of the year.

By Gabriele Holtermann on December 7, 2023

E-bikes and e-scooters used in New York City should be required to be registered like cars, elected officials and traffic safety advocates demanded Wednesday.
During a Park Row rally outside City Hall on Dec. 6, the group pushed for a swift hearing of a bill, introduced by Council Member Robert Holden in 2022, mandating that all legal e-mobility devices — including e-bikes and e-scooters — to be registered with the Department of Transportation and equipped with a license plate.

By Ramsey Khalifeh on December 6, 2023

Councilmember Robert Holden of Queens demanded city lawmakers move forward with his proposed bill to require license plates and vehicle registrations for any electric bike, scooter or other motorized vehicle.

The bill, which was introduced last year and is sponsored by 31 of the City Council’s 51 members, takes aim at the e-bikes used by thousands of delivery workers as well as pedal-assist e-bikes, such as those in the Citi Bike fleet.

By The Village Sun on September 23, 2023

A new and growing grassroots advocacy group is calling on local politicians to take steps to ensure citizens’ safety and “rein in the chaos caused by out-of-control e-bike riders” — including requiring all e-bikes to be licensed, registered, inspected and insured.

By Ashley Mastronardi on August 30, 2023

The Manhattan Bridge was the scene of a bloody e-bike crash that left four people injured in July. As the number of e-vehicles in the city continues to rise, so do calls for them to be regulated.

By The Brian Lehrer Show on August 1, 2023

A bloody crash last week on the Manhattan Bridge bike lane that involved scooters and e-bikes illustrated why cyclists are concerned for their safety. Julianne Cuba, reporter at Streetsblog, reports on the larger issues at play—including why Deliveristas are using mopeds and riding in the bike lanes—and Charles Lane, WNYC and Gothamist reporter, reports on the crash and what advocates are hoping will change.

By Daniel Krieger on June 26, 2023

On a recent evening, several dozen members of the E-Vehicle Safety Alliance gathered on the corner of West 88th Street and Columbus Avenue for the group’s first in-person get-together. They had turned out in pursuit of their mission to advocate for street safety at a monthly meeting of the West Side Democrats at Goddard Riverside Community Center that was devoted to the issue.

By Daniel Krieger on June 12, 2023

Last fall, Janet Schroeder decided that something had to be done about all the e-vehicles driving every which way in her neighborhood and putting pedestrians in danger. (“e-vehicles” cover all personal mobility devices that are battery powered, such as e-scooters, e-bikes, hoverboards, and mopeds.) She had been actively involved over the years in causes she cares about, but grassroots organizing was new for her. The turning point came in September when she read about Pamela Greitzer-Manasse’s grievous brain injury, after having also been horrified by the death of Lisa Banes a year prior to that.

By Daniel Krieger on May 25, 2023

Pamela Greitzer-Manasse has slowly been getting better since she suffered a catastrophic brain injury last July, at least in a few ways. She can now open and close her right hand. She can walk with a cane, limping, but without a foot brace or her husband spotting her. And another milestone on her long and winding path to recovery: she can tie her shoelaces.

By Daniel Krieger on September 16, 2022

It was a warm July afternoon, sunny with a blue sky, and Pamela Greitzer-Manasse was walking on the Upper West Side with her husband, Jon Manasse, and a friend, Chris Pell. […] It was a Tuesday, around 12:30 pm. The light signaled to walk, and as they were crossing the street, just a few steps from a small triangular median on 65th Street, at the point where Columbus and Broadway intersect, an electric moped that was cutting across the median collided head-on with Greitzer-Manasse, throwing her into the air.