I know it's not as good as him just doing what we all know will work, but there seems to be a sort of Streisand Effect to de Blasio's stubborn refusal to open streets to people. More people are paying attention to the issue and why it's important that might have otherwise.

In a way, de Blasio is like the one-man version of those ridiculously named anti-bike-lane groups that says something stupid about why a bike lane will lead to the demise of their neighborhood only to see other people in the neighborhood start to say, "A bike lane? Here? Great!"

It's no substitute for forward-thinking policy, but in a weird way we owe @NYCMayor thanks for elevating what is sometimes seen as a niche lifestyle issue to one that more and more people recognize as a matter of urgent public health. He's winning a battle, but he's lost the war.

We're lucky here in New York that we have an outstanding press corps that is very in tune to issues of safe streets, but it probably wasn't that long ago that a story like this would have only appeared in @StreetsblogNYC. So thanks, Bill! https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/city-hall/story/2020/04/14/de-blasio-takes-heat-for-shooting-down-calls-to-open-streets-to-pedestrians-1275753