Story taken from Newsday.com

Judge knocks down New York bicycle taxi registration rule


NEW YORK - A judge, finding that city law permits only bicycle taxi owners to apply for registration plates, has killed a city agency’s rule that would have let operators who don’t own the pedicabs apply for registration.


State Supreme Court Justice Edward Lehner ruled for the New York City Pedicab Owners Association. He said the Department of Consumer Affairs rule conflicted with Local Law 19, which allows only pedicab owners to obtain the licenses.


Local Law 19, passed April 23, 2007, reduces the city’s fleet of 600 pedicabs to 325. To limit harm to the investments of existing owners, the law says that only pedicab owners are eligible to receive the 325 plates.


The DCA’s regulations, which the pedicab association challenged, would have allowed anyone who had been involved in the pedicab industry in any capacity to complete equally for the limited plates.


The regulation also permitted all pedicab owners, regardless of the number of pedicabs they owned, to apply for up to 30 plates. This also violated Local Law 19.


After the DCA passed its regulations, pedicab owners sued, complaining that the new rules would let pedal-come-lately types destroy their businesses.


The judge agreed. He said the new regulations “would entirely eviscerate the (pedicab law’s) statutory framework … and create a hardship to businesses that had previously invested in the industry.”


A lawyer for the pedicab owners, Chad Marlow, said Thursday that after “the City Council law put the pedicab industry on life support and the Department of Consumer Affairs pulled the plug,” the court “threw the pedicab industry a lifeline, and we are very grateful.”


The pedicab association’s president, Peter Meitzler, who owns the Manhattan Rickshaw Co., issued a statement saying, “This decision does nothing less than save our industry” and “it prevents all those who invested in our green industry over the years from facing economic ruin.”


City lawyer Gabriel Taussig said he believed the judge’s decision was “legally wrong” and the DCA would appeal. He said its rule “treated all pedicab industry participants in an evenhanded manner.”