Horses + traffic = danger ahead

Six blocks from the place where the carriage horse Spotty died in a horrific spooking accident in 2006, the white horse (in front of the building) is seen yesterday sandwiched in between parked cars and moving taxicabs.

A recipe for trouble, considering how easily horses spook and the consequences when a 1,500-pound animal runs wild.

This is business as usual for the carriage horses who live in the cramped and substandard stables at West Side Livery and Central Park Carriages. Both of these are on the far west side of Manhattan, below the Lincoln Tunnel. At 42nd Street, the scene is chaos--two bus lanes feeding eastward into the Port Authority, cars coming up Tenth Avenue, either via the tunnel or from lower Manhattan. This video from "HorsesinNYC" tells the story and shows the traffic and dangerous conditions that are a fact of life for the horses.

I'm back, things are worse than ever

Be the horses' eyes and ears
The mistreatment of New York City carriage horses is getting worse by the minute, now that the drivers and owners are being rewarded for fraudulent and reckless behavior. At least two carriage accidents have happened in the 2 weeks or so since the diminutive mayor bloomberg signed into law the crappy industry bill. No surprise that it was pushed through by the corrupt Council Speaker Christine Quinn.

No media coverage of the crashes, and no word on the condition of the horses. The useless ASPCA, once again, does nothing. It could have done a lot to end this dangerous and inhumane industry, but instead it did ... NOTHING.

The pics tell the story. Thanks for the photographic evidence. Keep it coming.











Top photo: Hell's Kitchen correspondent, May 13, 2010, at Shamrock Stables in NYC;
Bottom 2 photos: NYC tourist, May 1, 2010, at Columbus Circle, after a horse-spooking accident.

'Twas the night before Christmas

no break for the horses
Another busy week for carriage horses, who in New York City were getting a lot of attention after a video from filmmaker Donny Moss showed them trotting on icy streets during a snowstorm, getting soaked by sleet, and eating wet food, while the ASPCA did little but wring its hands. If you haven't already done so, watch the video--it's a real eye-opener.

Also causing a stir are two videos from "HorsesinNYC": one showing a driver gone wild and the other documenting tourists being overcharged. All of these were much talked about. The kind souls on Care2 circulated the storm story widely, the Central Park Blogger commented on the cruelty of this outdated industry, and described the ASPCA as "woefully out of touch." Gothamist weighed in on the story and so did the Pony Tales blog. Meanwhile, two carriage crashes in South Carolina have sparked outrage (people were injured, but the cub reporter didn't see fit to tell us the fate of the horses). In Michigan, a 15-year-old boy was at the reins of a carriage that was struck by a car, a crash that injured the horse so badly it had to be euthanized.
Photo credit: Donny Moss

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