Mayor de Blasio says the livery driver who blocked the Central Park West bike lane and forced an Australian tourist to veer into the path of a garbage truck was reckless and should be summonsed.
“There’s got to be consequences, for this case for sure in my opinion,” de Blasio said Monday during an appearance on NY1.
De Blasio, who was attending an event nearby, visited the crash scene as officers were still investigating on Friday afternoon.
“The officers there went through the situation with me. This for-hire vehicle driver was in a bus stop,” de Blasio said.
Because the driver was in a bus stop, he “should have been summonsed right there,” de Blasio said. “We don’t know the facts, but it does appear a reckless action by the (livery) driver then set everything else into motion.”
Madison Jane Lyden, 23, was bicycling uptown on Central Park West near W. 67th St. when the parked livery car forced her to veer left from the bike lane into the vehicle lane.
There she was run down by a garbage truck driven by Felipe Chairez, 44. Prosecutors say Chairez admitted he drank two beers before the crash. He faces drunken driving and other charges.
So far, the livery driver has not been charged. The initial police report refers to the livery car as “an uninvolved vehicle, which was stopped at a bus stop, partially obstructing the bicycle lane,” a law enforcement source said.
Police would not provide the identity of the livery driver.
“This fatal accident is still under investigation,” said Sgt. Brendan Ryan, an NYPD spokesman.
De Blasio said the crash hit home, because his daughter Chiara is the same age as Lyden.
“I have a daughter who’s 23. I mean, humanly, there at the scene, I just felt this horrible sinking feeling that her parents must have felt when that phone call came in,” he said.
“She was minding her own business, she was in a bike lane, a young woman visiting us as a tourist, now she’s gone. Why? Because of reckless driving, is what I think. I don’t have all the facts, but that’s what I think. There have to be more consequences.”
