The city’s policy requiring commercial vehicles to idle for one minute near schools and parks will now also apply to vehicles parked next to, across from, or on the same block as those schools and parks, thanks to a U-turn by the Department of Environmental Protection on a proposal that would have required idling only for drivers parked in a lane immediately adjacent to the school or park.
DEP modified the proposed rule in response to feedback from advocates who were concerned that the original language would reduce the space covered by the one-minute rule.
“We think this expands the area subject to the ‘one-minute rule’ much better than the draft regulation we proposed earlier this year,” DEP Commissioner Rohit Aggarwala told Streetsblog. “This final rule almost doubles the area where the one-minute rule will apply compared to the draft regulation DEP had previously submitted.”
Under the new rule, a vehicle parked on the same block as a school or park would be exempt from the one-minute idling limit only if there is a concrete strip between the school or park and the vehicle. Cars parked on the opposite side of a cross street are also exempt. These exceptions reflect previous decision-making by judges in the city’s Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings, Aggarwala said.
According to the city ordinance, professional drivers are allowed to idle for up to three minutes in places not covered by the one-minute rule.
DEP’s original proposal drew strong criticism from advocates and participants in the agency’s Citizen Complaint Program, which allows the public to report idling in commercial vehicles and receive a small reward if OATH finds the violator guilty. The proposal would have exempted any vehicle parked across from a school or park, as well as any vehicle parked on the same side of the street but not directly in front of the school or park.
The final compromise draft, released Tuesday, was written by the nonprofit Natural Resources Defense Council. In a letter to the agency, the council said the DEP’s original clarification of the one-minute rule was “illogically narrow.”
“It makes sense to change the final definition of ‘adjacent’ to apply to motor vehicles parked, stopped, or stationary on the same block as a school or park, regardless of which side of the street the vehicle is on,” NRDC lead attorney Eric Goldstein wrote, citing an OATH decision that said the one-minute rule applies “only to a side of the block on which the school has an entrance or exit.”
Therefore, the change in wording is “a victory for common sense and public health protection,” Goldstein told Streetsblog. “The old definition … was not precise enough.”
Clean air advocates welcomed the compromise, but noted that it would exempt areas in the immediate vicinity of schools and parks from the one-minute monitoring zone.
“I’m glad the DEP has reversed its original, terrible rule, but New York City students are still at risk,” said Aaron Jacobs, a teacher and member of the New York Clean Air Collective. “Many schools are located on streets with medians – which do not stop air pollution – and the Adams administration’s new rule leaves them unprotected.”
New York City’s idling ban dates back to 1972, but enforcement was delayed before the Citizen Complaints Program. The number of citizen complaints has grown exponentially in recent years, from 9,070 in 2019 to around 80,000 in 2023.
About two-thirds of the complaints involve violations of the DEP’s idling regulations, with each ticket being adjudicated by OATH judges. The DEP, in turn, uses the idling regulations as leverage to force companies to convert their fleets entirely to electric vehicles in exchange for an exemption from the no-idling law – much to the chagrin of citizens who are frustrated that idling continues unchecked for now.
A proposal in the City Council – Intro 941 – could further curtail the power of citizens who crack down on idling, advocates warned. The bill, which is on the agenda for a Sept. 18 hearing despite a lack of co-signatories, would prohibit violators from receiving more than one ticket for the same location per day, require school buses to idle for 15 minutes every hour, provide discounts to violators who install “anti-idling technology” in their vehicles and give the DEP a way to pull citizens who violate a yet-to-be-determined “code of conduct.”
Patrick Schnell, a Brooklyn pediatrician who participates in the citizen enforcement program, praised the DEP for changing the language on the one-minute rule but cautioned against Intro 941.
“(The new) rule would become meaningless if Intro 941 is adopted,” he said. “This new law would undermine citizen enforcement and undermine the achievements of the Citizens Air Complaint Program.”
