City Council Votes 40-7 to End Central Park Carriages by 2028

The New York City Council voted Thursday to end horse-drawn carriage rides in Central Park by June 2028, closing out a fight that has divided animal rights advocates and organized labor for more than a century.

The bill passed 40 to 7, a veto-proof margin, as expected. It was drafted with the cooperation of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s office. A spokesperson for the mayor, Sneha Choudhary, told the New York Times: “The mayor will sign this bill, and the Mamdani administration is working every day to ensure we can do so while providing the strongest possible protections for the owners and workers in this industry.”

The measure traces back to 2022, when Council Member Christopher Marte sponsored an earlier version known as Ryder’s Law. It was named for a horse that collapsed in Hell’s Kitchen and was later euthanized. After that incident, the Animal Legal Defense Fund showed that 71 percent of city residents supported banning horse-drawn carriage rides.

The debate returned to the forefront in June, when a visiting teenager died after being thrown from a carriage. Before a Council hearing on the bill that month, the Central Park Conservancy backed its passage, citing eight horse-related incidents in the park over the previous 13 months.

Animal rights groups claimed a major win. New Yorkers for Clean, Livable and Safe Streets, which has opposed the carriages for years, called the bill a “long-overdue ban on cruel and dangerous horse-drawn carriages.”

The industry’s labor representatives see it differently. Transport Workers Union Local 100, which represents carriage operators, argues the law fails to protect workers. The industry includes 150 active, licensed drivers who hold 68 medallions for horse-drawn carriages. On Wednesday, lawyers for the union sent a letter to city officials saying they would challenge the legislation in court if the Council passed it.

City Council Speaker Julie Menin said Wednesday that the 2028 effective date gives the city enough time to help anyone employed in the industry find new work. She said she would work with the Mamdani administration toward that goal.

For City Hall, the next phase is as much about workforce policy as animal welfare. The roughly two-year runway sets up a test of whether transition support for drivers and medallion holders can satisfy the union before or during an expected legal fight. Details of what that support will look like have not been spelled out in the reporting so far.

For now, the carriages remain on the park’s southern edge, but the clock is running on an institution as old as the park itself.