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Johnnadawearsglasses t1_iwzezua wrote

Reply to comment by yankuniz in Council seeks steep fines for NYC chain stores that fail to shovel snow by King-of-New-York

I’m confused by your last two sentences? Can you explain?

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yankuniz t1_iwzfsd5 wrote

Just that in my experience in nyc businesses do a pretty good job of shoveling the snow. They are already incentivized by wanting customers to come in but not wanting them to fall and hurt themselves and possibly sue. There are certainly weather events that test our abilities but generally it doesn’t seem to be a major issue in nyc.

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Johnnadawearsglasses t1_iwzgqwd wrote

That is often true for businesses that are open.

However, the storefront vacancy rate is 12% in NYC. It is 25% in my neighborhood. Couple that with office vacancies, and you have anywhere from 1/4 to 1/6 office/retail properties where there is no tenant. In those situations you often see these problems. If a single property on a street is unshoveled, that entire street is dangerous for the disabled and elderly. In my own neighborhood, there is never a sidewalk block that is 100% shoveled.

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yankuniz t1_iwzigxa wrote

This is true and I hadn’t considered unoccupied spaces when we were talking about businesses. And it’s true that when one area of a sidewalk is not shoveled it creates a hazardous situation where your forced to wither double back or climb into the street or continue over the snowed area. When there are areas left unshoveled they often turn into uneven icy pathways from people walking over them, which creates a hazard that remains long after snow is melted

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Phaedrusnyc t1_ix2ns9z wrote

My experience is that their incentive for customers to come in often leads to them making a path from the street directly to their door and screw anyone who is a pedestrian and actually just wants to walk past the building.

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