00:02This past summer, I started noticing a lot of headlines about accidents involving carriage
00:07horses, tragedies involving carriage horses, and there's been this very operatic political battle
00:16over whether to ban the carriage horses. It is shocking that this is allowed to go on. Shocking.
00:22There's always been a small cabal of vegans who wanted us gunned.
00:26We were warning and warning before the fatality, someone is going to be killed.
00:32We knew this was inevitable.
00:34We want horses, they want no horses. You can't have half a horse.
00:38Carriage horses share Central Park with thousands of species, but they're not wildlife and they're not on display.
00:47They're not pets, they're not pests, they're workers. And I think that's why our relationship with them is so fraught.
00:54So I wanted to look into what was going on, who's involved, and what are the politics that may bring
01:03about the end of the horse-drawn carriages in Central Park.
01:14You're looking very far in writing about this topic without coming across by the name Christina Hanson.
01:19We're safe in the carriage, right? You're safe in the carriage. Sherman's safe.
01:23But it's been an absolute disaster for everybody else in the parking lot.
01:27It's been turned into an e-bike superhighway that we've been told that we're in the way.
01:33Oh my God, look at this guy! Jesus!
01:38From one perspective, that makes the carriages more dangerous because the horses can get spooked, so you should ban them.
01:44From another perspective, why aren't these other things being regulated? Why aren't the heady cabs being banned?
01:50The park was designed for carriages.
01:57The idea that somehow this city has become a place that isn't for horses doesn't make any sense.
02:05Horses have been living here in New York City since the summer of 1625, so over 400 years.
02:11We are a part of that original design, that original vision for the park to connect the city and urban
02:19life with nature.
02:22The 19th century was really the century of the horse. Horses did everything.
02:27They hauled food and coal and ice and bricks.
02:31They were used in construction, including of Central Park, which opened in 1858.
02:37They pulled trolleys and streetcars and omnibuses.
02:41That was the reason why New York City could expand and grow and sprawl.
02:47Not everyone saw horses as living machines.
02:50In 1866, a New Yorker named Henry Berg founded the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, for
02:55the ASBCA,
02:57which jump-started the animal welfare movement.
03:00Around the turn of the century, New York City started converting their horsepower to steam engines.
03:06In 1900, there were something like 130,000 horses in Manhattan.
03:12By 1931, there were little over 8,000.
03:17And carriages became throwbacks to the old New York City that used to be.
03:23There were more collisions between horses and traffic.
03:27Horses were dying in heat waves.
03:30And suddenly it became an issue before city council.
03:36New York City's carriage horses are heavily regulated.
03:40We are overseen by five city agencies.
03:43And so by law, the horses can't work more than nine hours out of the day.
03:48Sherman left the stable at 941 today.
03:51So he's got to be back by 641 or else he turns into a pumpkin.
03:54There's a thrill feeler again!
03:58Go!
03:59Shame!
03:59Shame on you!
04:01Go!
04:02Our horses can't be out when it's above 89 degrees or below 19 degrees or in blizzards, hurricanes, tornadoes or
04:10hail.
04:10We have 24-hour-a-day stablemen.
04:13They have to be seen by the vet twice a year.
04:16Plus, they also have to go on vacation at least five weeks out of the year outside the city where
04:22they have daily access to pasture.
04:24So Sherman goes to Pennsylvania.
04:27These are all regulations that have been put in place over decades of this issue being in contention.
04:33To the animal rights people, the horses are both 2,000-pound hazards to public safety and victims themselves.
04:43Indentured servants forced to carry tourists on a Sisyphean loop.
04:49One of the most tenacious opponents of the carriage industry is an animal rights advocate named Adita Burkrant.
04:57She often comes here to document infractions.
05:00I've been keeping my distance the past couple months, but now that their bogus lawsuit was dropped, I feel more
05:08comfortable in doing so.
05:10She's the executive director of a very influential group called New Yorkers for Clean, Livable and Safe Streets, or NICLASS,
05:18which has been trying to ban the carriages for 20 years.
05:23COVID is when the population of park users really exploded because people had nowhere else to go, but they could
05:30all come to the park and at least be around other people.
05:33We have pedicabs, we have more e-bikes, all of these changes in the park coincides with an increase in
05:41spooking and runaway incidents and crashes.
05:44And there's a way you can desensit-
05:48Oh my God, what happened? Oh my God, the cart fell over.
05:51Jesus.
05:52Is it? The cart is running loose. It's a runaway fucking cart. Do you believe this? What is happening?
05:58Oh my God.
06:01That could have startled a horse, see? I mean-
06:04Specifically speaking, we're still the safest way to travel.
06:07Well, a teenager was killed here a few months ago, so I wouldn't be so flippant.
06:12It was a tough, tough day.
06:20This past June, an 18-year-old named Romanch Mahajan visited New York from India with his family to celebrate
06:28his high school graduation.
06:30On their third day, they came here to Central Park and took a ride on a horse-drawn carriage.
06:35When the driver stepped out to take a photo of the family in their seats.
06:39This is a common spot where horse carriage drivers will stop and people will take photos.
06:45But in doing so, you're leaving the horse unattended, which is a violation of law and obviously unsafe.
06:52There was signs that something was wrong. The horse was acting a little agitated and moving forward a little bit.
06:57So the horse was scared, so he just took off running. That's an instinctual thing.
07:03You see there's a little curb where that man is standing. Priya, Romanch's mother, fell out.
07:09And then a few seconds later, you see Romanch falling out.
07:12That horse kept going panicked, sprinting through the park until it crashed into another carriage
07:18all the way over at Tavern on the Green, which is a pretty good distance.
07:20The family suffered minor injuries, except for Romanch, who was brought to a hospital and pronounced dead
07:26hours later of blunt force trauma.
07:30It's difficult to know how to respond, especially since, I mean, really, it's taken, you know, weeks and weeks
07:38to kind of figure out what even happened.
07:40I was the one who actually was left with the horse, you know, because I happened to be in the
07:47park
07:48watching the animal rights activists leaping in front of cameras to start speculating.
07:52I was like, this is why, this is why we need to ban, you know, to make it their agenda
07:55right then and there.
07:57We were there trying to get more information. There was a lot of news crews there.
08:01And I just started sobbing. I just started walking through the park sobbing.
08:06And it's heartbreaking to know that had the legislation not been blocked for the prior four years,
08:15horse carriages would have been banned starting June 1st of this year.
08:20And Romanch was killed June 17th.
08:22The amount of responsibility in this business to take care of all these families and their horses is,
08:30and to have it be under assault from people that have a lot more money than we do.
08:35The movement to ban the carriage horses has been bankrolled by a parking lot mogul named Steve Nislik
08:42when a horse ran into traffic in 2006 and had to be euthanized after crashing into a station wagon.
08:50Nislik co-founded NYCLASS soon after that.
08:53In 2013, he decided to take down the city council speaker, Christine Quinn,
08:58who was leading the mayoral race because she was supporting the carriage industry.
09:02Nislik helped elevate Bill de Blasio, who came from behind and became New York's mayor.
09:09And I don't care whether or not they are after the land where the stables are,
09:16or if they have friends in the real estate business who want it.
09:19They have spent tens of millions of dollars over the last, you know, 15, 20 years to attack working people.
09:30That's where we're in TW Local 100.
09:32We are, you know, the yellow cab guys.
09:35We're the ones being squished by some tech bros, right?
09:39We can respect our history and traditions without being trapped by them.
09:43You know, we also no longer have dog fighting and cock fighting, and that was a part of tradition when
09:49the park was created.
09:50What's your feeling about the carriage horses?
09:52I think there are other ways that people can tour around the park that's, like, safer for the animals and
09:56for the humans.
09:57You know, if you introduced it as a new idea in 2026, would horse-drawn carriages be super popular? I
10:03don't know.
10:03It would be a shame to see the tradition go.
10:06It slows you down. It allows you to smell the roses and the other stuff.
10:11Keep the horse and carriage. I'll be back.
10:14The horse has been a part of Central Park since the beginning of the park, but in 2026, I think
10:19it's time to change what we've been doing.
10:22I'm sure that they could work that out because they hired 50,000 Uber drivers and they weren't worried about
10:29the yellow medallions.
10:31So they'll find something else for them to do.
10:33But that's 12 loud people. The reality is New York is on our side. Always has been.
10:39Well, except that the mayor's office, the Central Park Conservancy, the city council speaker are all lining up to enact
10:49a ban.
10:51Hogwash! Hogwash, I say.
10:56If the ban goes through for better or worse, if we got rid of them after 160 years,
11:04Central Park will be one step closer to everywhere else in New York City.
11:09A place where once there were horses.
