9 replies to this topic

[WildcatsMike]

I have to let this out. This makes me pretty mad for a lot of reasons.

 

So I was just watching some response videos in NY, and I stumbled across this:

 

 

In this video E1, E34, T21, and another Engine Company are responding to a call. They are passing through times square and this happens.

 

WHY DO CIVILIANS IN NY NOT MOVE FOR ANY EMERGENCY VEHICLES?!?!

 

Side note: 42nd to 57th was closed for the 8th street festival.

 

This looks like me trying to play the manhattan mod. Not knocking it, I just suck at it

 

Honestly, if I were them, I would just lay the airhorn on the WHOLE time. Not stop once. (Imagine if it was Rescue 1 O_o)

 

If you ever see anybody knock response times in NYC, link them to that video.

 

They moved about 300 feet in 5 minutes. 300 feet.

 

I know not all of the cars could have moved, but some of them just pulled right out in front.

 

Plus, there were NYPD officers right there, who did NOTHING to help.

 

Phew. Rant over now. Sorry for my rambling. Just really made me snap. :/

 

Screw NYC Traffic. Lol. 

[RCMPDude1337]

It's not only New York City that has the issue of vehicles failing to yield for emergency traffic. It's been noted in various other videos and news outlets of vehicles that don't yield. In fact I recently saw a news coverage of an Ambulance in Edmonton trying to get through rush-hour traffic with a police escort and vehicles just froze right in the middle of the lane. The ambulance had to go off the road just to get around the vehicles.

 

The common issue is that most drivers just don't understand what they need to do when an emergency vehicle is approaching. Unfortunately it just seems to be a topic that's not covered in drivers training or that's not payed much attention to.

[Fred03]

Its a problem everywhere that can only be solved through public education.

[WildcatsMike]

Its a problem everywhere that can only be solved through public education.

It just seems like it's something they should teach in Drivers Ed. It's not rocket science.

 

I think people try a little bit to move for rescue 1 at least because they'll go deaf from that beast of an airhorn.

[LAD23DER]

It just seems like it's something they should teach in Drivers Ed. It's not rocket science.

 

I think people try a little bit to move for rescue 1 at least because they'll go deaf from that beast of an airhorn.

And they just got a Q... Watch out drivers of Manhattan! 

 

On a side note, I'm not really sure that there was anything for those cops to do...

[Dyson]

This is the extreme though, one of the most heavily densely populated places on the planet. But which is why there's such an extreme amount of firehouses especially in Manhattan, the average response time in 2013 was still 4 minutes. 

 

But just like in our mods, it's all about traffic management, the better the traffic flows the quicker units can get across the city

[MikeyPI]

The most common reason people fail to move for emergency vehicles is that they simply can't move their vehicles out of the way.. The person who is at the intersection refuses to push forward and out of the way allowing the others behind to pass.  Most people don't realize you can bypass the "law" of the land when an emergency service vehicle is on your bumper, but then again with the advent of the red light camera, you can't blame people for giving pause to wanting to run the red light to move out of the emergency vehicle's path.  The issue is more common with EMS/FIRE because let's face it, whens the last time either of them pulled you over and cited you for anything, let alone failure to yield to their vehicles?

 

In the end this problem persists in the north east quite often because the roads are very very narrow, in most cases there simply isnt anywhere to go if you are in line behind other vehicles, so you're stuck there whether you want to be there or not.  It aint just a NY problem, unfortunately through the whole northeast due to cities being poorly designed traffic flow is dismal at best under "functional" uses, when it is impaired by closed routes and/or emergency operations it can turn to gridlock in a hurry.

[LAD23DER]

Yeah, I think that most people are uneducated about when an emergency vehicle comes up behind them at a red light. No one knows what to do... Around here you're supposed to wait for the light to turn green and most of the FD units have the traffic light changer (I forget the name of it) anyways...

[youdotoo]

Half of the time I have to drive over sidewalks during rush hour because people can't get out of the way.

[WildcatsMike]

It just looked like a lot of the Civilian drivers made no attempt to even try to move.

 

It's understandable as to how they got stuck with traffic being backed up so badly, but I've seen a lot of cases where people  just don't care about the Emergency Services.

 

Here's another example of people preventing the FDNY from responding:

 

 

I don't personally live in NYC, but I went in around 2005, and I think we tried to get to Yankee Stadium for about 1.5 hours from our hotel in Manhattan.

 

Traffic would be one of the few things that would keep me from trying to join the FDNY at some point in my life.

 

(Also if you want to watch NYC emergency services for some reason, This guy is your guy.)