Mamdani and City Council Speaker Julie Menin reach agreement to ban New York’s horse-drawn carriage industry

NEW YORK — Mayor Zohran Mamdani and president of the New York City Council Julie Menin have reached an agreement to abolish the horse-drawn carriage industry in the city – a crucial step forward in a politically fraught, decades-long effort to ban the tourist attraction.

Since 2010, local mayors and lawmakers have tried to ban horse-drawn carriages from operating in Central Park, citing concerns about the animals’ safety, with several having died in accidents and from exhaustion. But despite broad popular support, the effort failed, largely because of political pressure from New York’s powerful transportation union, which defends the hundreds of horse-drawn carriage drivers who make their living ferrying buggy tourists around the park.

Today, this impasse seems closer than ever to being broken.

In an announcement shared exclusively with POLITICO on Tuesday, Menin said Mamdani agreed to support a bill that would make it illegal to drive horse-drawn carriages in the city, starting in June 2028.