Mayor Adams: I, Too, Want To Ban Horse Carriage Trade

The movement to ban the use of carriage horses has gained an interesting high-profile ally: Mayor Eric Adams. On September 17, Adams announced on social media that such a ban is “humane.”

Adams is now in agreement with a number of local politicians and animal rights activists looking to pass a bill called Ryder’s Law, named after a carriage horse that died shortly after being publicly whipped by its driver back in 2022.

The bill would effectively end the carriage trade, perhaps best known as the distinctive clip-clopping transit system that has graced Central Park’s boulevards (among other city streets) since 1863.

The coach driver at the center of the Ryder Law controversy, Ian McKeever, was acquitted this July after a jury bought his defense about his otherwise steadfast care for Ryder—which was later determined to have undetected illness at the time.

Animal rights activists were doubly infuriated, however, when another carriage horse perished on Eleventh Ave. in early August; a bipartisan spectrum of politicians, ranging from GOP mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa to Democratic City Council Member Erik Bottcher, held an indignant rally in front of the horse’s nearby stable shortly thereafter.

During a Sept. 22 appearance on PIX11, Mayor Adams discussed why he had settled on supporting a ban, citing a carriage horse that broke loose of its reins and ran amok in Central Park earlier this month: “Watching that horse run wildly throughout streets...thinking about, what is it going to take for us to realize that this is no longer compatible with a densely-populated city like New York? How could I live in good conscience if that carriage, if that horse...would have struck a family member, a child, an elder?”

“It’s time to do what’s right. And we’re doing it in a compassionate way,” he said. He suggested that carriage horses in Central Park could perhaps be replaced by electric cars. Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro, who was appearing alongside Adams, pointed out that a carriage ban has polled well in recent years.

Yet Adams is also putting himself on the bad side of carriage workers, who organize under the Transport Worker’s Union. They’re arguing that pro-ban activists are “extremists” that misunderstand coach driver’s love for the animals, and would abruptly put them out of a job.

In a memorable print ad published after Adams came out in favor of Ryder’s Law, the TWU alluded to Adams’s far-behind polling position in the mayoral race. They also tied him unfavorably to the Central Park Conservancy, which also came out in favor of a ban for the first time after years of staying neutral.

“Good Riddance Eric Adams, AKA Mayor Malfeasance,” the ad read. “You’ve proven yourself to be just another corrupt politician chasing relationships with NYC’s monied elites, from the real-estate developers masquerading as animal rights activists (of which you’re fully aware), to the snarky Cape Codders of the Central Park Conservancy.”

”So we aren’t sorry to see you getting chased out of NYC, you Judas Iscariot,” the ad concluded. “Last place for you seems appropriate, you BACKSTABBER (emphasis in ad).”

The real-estate quip stems from the union’s claim that advocates of the ban want to replace stables with luxury real-estate.

In his initial online video announcement about his support for the ban, Adams—who was wearing a Teamster’s jacket—said that he wanted to “be fair to the drivers.”