New York City is rolling out a new intersection design aimed at better protecting pedestrians and cyclists at crash-prone locations. Unveiled Wednesday by Department of Transportation Commissioner (DOT) Ydanis Rodriguez, the design uses “hardened daylighting tools”—such as concrete barriers, planters, and other structures—to improve visibility at intersections, where roughly half of all traffic fatalities occur. The DOT plans to implement the design at select high-crash intersections alongside new and existing bike lanes across the city starting this year.
Hardened daylighting aims to improve visibility at intersections by placing barriers, granite blocks, planters, and other objects to prevent vehicles from parking too close to the corner. While DOT already implements daylighting at hundreds of intersections each year, this new design is specifically tailored to corridors with conventional bike lanes.
In a first-of-its-kind daylighting study, the DOT recently demonstrated that hardened daylighting significantly improves intersection safety. The agency said it will monitor the new installations to evaluate their effectiveness.
Locations to be redesigned in 2025 include Ocean Avenue at Church Avenue, Avenue J, Cortelyou Road, and Foster Avenue, as well as Avenue J at Bedford Avenue, and Rugby Road at Foster Avenue.
The intersections were selected based on several criteria, including their location in Tier 1 and Tier 2 Priority Investment Areas as defined by the Streets Plan—neighborhoods that have historically lacked investment in safe street infrastructure.
Sites with new or existing conventional bike lanes and a history of turning crashes, as well as locations with a high volume of truck turns, were also prioritized.
“Redesigning our streets under Vision Zero has helped us reduce traffic deaths to historic low—but we are always looking for new ways to keep people safe,” Rodriguez said. “Using barriers to clear space at the intersection will help ensure pedestrians, cyclists and turning vehicles can see each other and enhance safety.”
The intersection redesign continues DOT’s broader effort to improve bike infrastructure safety for cyclists, pedestrians, and drivers. Over the past three years, the agency has installed 87.5 miles of protected bike lanes, more than during any previous three-year span.
The expansion reflects the growing number of New Yorkers who bike daily—now over 600,000 trips each day, a 158 percent increase since 2008, when the city recorded 240,000 daily cycling trips.
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