A Year in Review :: NYC CM Timeline

August 2004:

• TIME’S UP! holds a Bike National Convention (BNC) the week before the RNC. The BNC is over a week of bicycle-related events including bicycle workshops, a bike lending library, protest rides, BBQ’s, Eco rides, Bicycle carnival and a festive Critical Mass after-party. Thousands participate in the events.
• Three days before the start of the Republican National Convention, a record 5,000-6000 cyclists participate in NYCM. Cyclists jam Midtown stretching 20 blocks or more. Police make arrests at several points along the route. Helicopters circle overhead and police entrap cyclist by wrapping large orange netting around riders. More then 250 are arrested for traffic violations and disorderly conduct. Bikes of those arrested and even many who are not arrested are confiscated by police and held as evidence.
• Police cancel the after party at the Frying Pan, a space on the westside piers, the day before CM. They tell the owners that anarchists will attack by sea if CM is allowed to end there. TIME’S UP! has held several after parties at the Frying Pan before, and the group is stunned by the false and far fetched claim. Luckily St. Mark's church allows TIME’S UP! to co-opt a party at the church. Despite the venue change, police show up and arrest many people trying to enter the party. Police aggression is caught on video, and later much of the violent footage seen in the documentary, Still We Ride, is from St. Mark's church.

September 2004:

• A letter is sent to the people the police believe to be organizing the Critical Mass ride, Michael Scagnelli. The Police Department's Chief of Transportation warns of more arrests. “I suggest that you work with the framework of our law and apply for a permit for a ride which may then be sanctioned by the police department”. Matthew Roth, a regular Critical Mass participant and TIME’S UP! volunteer, is not persuaded by the letter. “Applying for a permit wouldn't mean anything," he says. "There is no organization to apply.”
• Over 1000 attend the CM ride. Police confiscate 40 bicycles. Nine people are arrested on minor charges such as disorderly conduct and obstructing traffic. Officers use power saws to cut the chains securing bikes to sign posts, despite the owners offers to unlock them.

October 2004:

• Five cyclists, who had their bikes confiscated during the RNC , go to court on the grounds that their fifth amendment right to due process has been violated when their property is seized without any charges being brought against them.
• A federal judge rules that cyclists do not have to get a parade permit for the rides, and that the city cannot seize bicycles unless riders are charged with a crime or violate the law. The Judge also denies the city's request for an injunction blocking the monthly ride from occurring unless it receives a permit.
• Police arrest 33 people during the Halloween CM, a day after the ruling, where again over 1000 attend. Most of the bicyclists are arrested on charges of disorderly conduct for blocking automobile traffic, a police department spokesman says. The police dictate a preset route, and some riders claim to be purposely led off route by police and then arrested for not being on route. Despite the arrests and attempted control of the ride by the police -- blocking side streets and using motor scooters to herd wayward cyclists -- many splinter groups are formed and the police lose control of the ride route they had imposed. Many of the riders also consider the ride still to be a great success.
• At the CM after party held at the TIME’S UP! headquarters, an undercover officer infiltrates the party and claims that she has been struck in the face when she confronted people with open containers. Reinforcements close down Houston St. and the sidewalks for several blocks. Undercovers try to enter the building but are kept out by revelers blocking the door. Hours later, negotiations allow people to leave, but as they do, police shove and intimidate and make unwarranted arrests. At 1:30 AM TIME’S UP legal council Norman Siegel arrives and negotiates with the police to allow the last of the citizens to leave the building unmolested. When TIME’S UP! is empty and locked, Police officers clip locks off bikes parked on the sidewalk and confiscate them. Police later say they were responding to reports of overcrowding.

November 2004:

• Citing the issues with Critical Mass and her own negative encounters with reckless cyclists, Bronx City Council member Madeline Provenzano proposes a bill (Intro 497) that would require bike riders over the age of 16 to register their bike with the Department of Transportation, and pay a fee of no more than $25. The bill stipulates that those who do not display such tags on their bicycles would be subject to up to 15 days imprisonment, fines, and bike seizure. Previously she had attempted to have a bike lane removed from her own neighborhood.
• The city once again asks a federal judge to block cyclists from riding without a permit. The city also goes a step further, asking that they be prohibited from gathering in Union Square Park before the ride.
• Around 500 cyclists gathered in Union Square Park for CM, but police say they will be arrested if they ride in a group. Some riders walk their bikes away from the park and begin riding a few blocks away. Some regroup in Washington Square Park, and others go to Times Square. Seventeen people are arrested on various charges including disorderly conduct and obstructing traffic.
• After the ride nearly two dozen officers,on bicycles, wait across the street from the Time’s Up headquarters as about 100 riders dance and socialize inside. No arrests are made.

December 2004:

• New York magazine chooses the Critical Mass ride as one of the top 25 ways to celebrate New Year's.
• A week before the monthly CM ride is to take take place, District Court Judge William Pauley III denies the request of the New York City Police Department for a federal injunction to stop the monthly Critical Mass rides in Manhattan unless they get a permit. Pauley also rules against the city’s request that the riders get a Parks Department special events permit to gather at their usual departure point, Union Square’s north plaza.
• Cyclists gather at the north end of Union Square Friday evening while police on motorcycles line up on the south side. Community Affairs officers, once again, hand out fliers that threaten cyclists with arrests if they ride in procession. The ride departs at 7:30 PM, and no arrests are made. It is the only time since the RNC that riders are not arrested, and this remains true even to this day.

January 2005:

• Despite extreme cold weather conditions described by one rider as “freaking-freezing that night!!!”, 60-80 riders still meet up and participate in CM. Eight arrests are made. Charges include parading without a permit, and 2 counts of disorderly conduct -- one for blocking traffic and the other for failure to disperse upon lawful order of the police. The arrestees dispute these claims as being bogus and proceed to hearings in criminal court to defend themselves. Court dates are set and then twice postponed by the city. The new court date is set for October 17th, 2005. Those arrested wonder if the postponements are part of a 2 part strategy by the city to 1), demoralize the riders and drain their financial resources, and 2), pressure the riders to drop their fight saving the city from possible embarrassment if the city loses yet again.

February 2005:

• Regardless of the court ruling in December by a federal judge that denies the city’s request for an injunction barring the monthly rides from occurring without a permit, the police hand out fliers stating “No permit has been issued for a bicycle procession. If you choose to ride in a procession this evening, you will be arrested and your bicycle will be seized.”
• The ride starts with over 100 bicyclists braving the cold, but the ride is promptly cut short one block later at Fifth Ave. Six riders, including a legal observer from the National Lawyers Guild, are arrested. They are escorted onto the sidewalk, where they are handcuffed, photographed and loaded into a police van. Another police truck removes their bicycles. The cyclists are charged with parading without a license, and disorderly conduct and are issued desk appearance tickets.

March 2005:

• Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, Commissioner of the Department of Parks and Recreation Adrian Benepe, and the City of New York file a fresh complaint to shut down the ride. The new complaint, names four TIME'S UP! activists Bill DiPaola, Matthew Roth, Leah Rorvig, Brandon Neubauer, and those “in concert” with them, and seeks to prohibit any of them from promoting or advertising Critical Mass in any way. It also states that any gathering of 20 or more people requires a permit.
• New York Press sarcastically retorts by compiling a list of groups that meet every day in New York City in numbers greater than 20 that must be reined in to preserve the peace. The list includes kiddie soccer matches, jogging groups, school field trips, large family picnics, bird watching groups, and all those shrieking kids on the sidewalks, subway cars and playgrounds after school lets out.
• FreeWheels Bicycle Defense Fund is started by a group of people who had been arrested at the February CM ride. The all volunteer-run advocacy group for arrestees, works to raise money for arrestees' legal expenses, and provide arrestees with resources, information, and support in defending their Constitutional Rights.
• Police surround the entire CM meeting area with metal barricades and large orange plastic netting preventing the ride from taking place. As people try to disassemble, either on their bikes or by walking their bikes, some are ushered along 17th street where police then block them in and end up arresting 37 people. Some lock their bikes up to scaffolding, or public street posts and leave the area on foot. The police go through and systematically cut the locks of every bike in the area with power saws. One tourist, who is not even aware of NYCM, comes out of a bar to find that his bike has been confiscated, and receives an $80 summons.

April 2004:

• Alexander Dunlop, having been arrested while going to pick up sushi at the unfortunate same time of the RNC Ride arrests, is accused of pushing his bicycle into a line of police officers on the Lower East Side and of resisting arrest. It is discovered during his trial, that there are two versions of the same police tape documenting his arrest. The one that is to be used as evidence against him, has been edited at two spots, removing images that show Mr. Dunlop calmly approaching the police line, and later submitting to arrest without apparent incident. When a volunteer film archivist finds a more complete version of the tape and gives it to Mr. Dunlop's lawyer, prosecutors immediately drop the charges and say that a technician had cut the material by mistake.
• Soon after the ride begins, a freelance reporter for The New York Times, Colin Moynihan, is standing on a sidewalk at Sixth Street and Avenue A interviewing people when he is briefly detained and handcuffed. He is later released by the police without charges
• The Green Party of the United States calls the suppression of Critical Mass and the New York City lawsuit to gag Time's Up! part of a larger campaign to criminalize protest.
• Community Board No. 2, Manhattan, passes a resolution: where they express profound concerns with the City Administration’s decision to violate citizen’s constitutional rights to free speech, free press and freedom to assemble. They also ask for the halting of the unconstitutional attacks by the city on their fellow citizen’s, mentioning TIME’S UP! and Critical Mass as grave examples of these gross attacks.
• Visual Resistance, a collective of artists and independent media activists facilitate a street art campaign in support of Critical Mass.
• The FreeWheels Steal It Back! program begins. It provides arrestees with a bicycle on-loan, usually the same night they are arrested. By ironically purchasing bikes sold by the pallette-load at police auctions, FreeWheels volunteers fix the bikes up, and lend them to Critical Mass arrestees free of charge—provided that they pass them on to the unlucky ones at the next ride. FreeWheels, at the same time, aids arrestees in reclaiming their confiscated bikes, an often expensive process that can take weeks or even months.

May 2005:

• Prosecutors move to dismiss the case against Ms. Wyka, who had been charged along with a city school teacher who Ms. Wyka says she only met while in police custody. The two were accused of riding together and obstructing government administration, engaging in disorderly conduct and parading without a permit. Barbara Thompson, a spokeswoman for the Manhattan district attorney’s office, states that a videotape has turned up, showing that Ms. Wyka had not been riding with the teacher. Moreover, charges had already been dropped against the teacher. Ms. Thompson states “The video casts doubt on whether the incident happened the way the officer said.”
• STILL WE RIDE premieres at the Bicycle Film Festival in New York City. The documentary captures the joyous atmosphere of the August ride before the arrests begin and the chaos that follows. It recounts how the CM ride first began in San Francisco over 10 years ago, and chronicles the violent police crackdown and the resulting court battles in New York over the last seven months. The movie takes on issues of civil liberties, surveillance, the power of the mainstream media, and the benefits of an alternative means of transportation.

June 2005:

• The Wall Street Journal’s Senior Art Director, Liz Shura has her court case is dismissed after it is found that a statement by the arresting officer, claiming he had witnessed Shura riding with 100 other cyclists during the Halloween CM, is found to be false. He admits under questioning that Shura had only been handed off to him for processing.
• 32 others who were arrested along with Shura, have their cases dismissed with adjournments in contemplation of dismissal, or A.C.D.'s. If the defendants are not arrested within the next six months, their records will be sealed.
• Critical Mass ride sees only a handful of police in Union Square, unlike previous rides when squads of helmeted riot police surrounded the park and helicopters hovered overhead. As hundreds of cyclists congregated for a rally before the ride, Norman Siegel, a candidate for public advocate, who also represents bicyclists in court, kisses a copy of the First Amendment to emphasize the concept of the freedom of expression by the bike riders. A dozen arrests are made around Times Square and the 59th St. Bridge.

July 2005:

• 500 riders take part in CM. The riders make a point of stopping at red lights and obeying all traffic laws. Even though these precautions are taken, police on motor scooters corral riders, and officers on foot tackle people off of their bikes; one of those tackled is 5 months pregnant. In total 33 people are arrested. Video footage taken on the ride, captures unmarked police cars driving into the crowd from the back at high speeds in what is assumed to be an attempt to scare the riders into running red lights, and forcing riders into breaking traffic laws.

August 2005:

• TIME’S UP! Hosts the 2nd BNC-- August 12th through the 28th. Over two weeks of events and rides, to commemorate a year of bicycle activism and enthusiasm. The BNC provides residents and visitors a chance to participate in rides that showcase New York’s unique environment and the communities of cyclists who inhabit and support it.