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New York City moves to ban horse-drawn carriages (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 3 days ago by Corvidae@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

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Mayor Zohran Mamdani and the leader of the New York City council have agreed to ban horse-drawn carriages from the city, a popular tourist attraction that has faced widespread scrutiny.

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[-] dogslayeggs@lemmy.world 59 points 3 days ago

Fucking awesome.

While some of the coach drivers treat their horses well, many do not. The horses mostly look miserable. Imagine you are constantly outside, exposed to loud noise of traffic in NYC. Not fun. Now imagine you are a horse who has no idea what all that craziness is, but you are forced to be out in it while stomping your hard toenail feet onto concrete for long days while pulling fat tourists.

[-] ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works 14 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

But what happens to horses who aren't working anymore?

The bill also requires the city to implement a program to assist drivers in getting rid of their horses humanely – prohibiting the horses from being sold or transported for slaughter or sold for horse-drawn carriage industries elsewhere.

Who wants horses on those terms?

[-] gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world 30 points 3 days ago

I bet there are therapy farms that would love having older and more chill horse to work with

[-] FerretyFever0@fedia.io 15 points 3 days ago

"The bill also requires the city to implement a program to assist drivers in getting rid of their horses humanely – prohibiting the horses from being sold or transported for slaughter or sold for horse-drawn carriage industries elsewhere."

Well, they won't be shot.

[-] crank0271@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago

Technically according to this (not like I've read the proposed bill or anything), they just can't sell or transport the horses to be shot. Presumably they could be shot in place.

[-] Omgpwnies@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago

I would hope that the bill included language that restricted the sale to a vetted list of stables that will not immediately re-sell the horse to slaughter.

[-] toxicbubble@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago

sanctuaries exist

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 days ago

The reality is there are a lot of neglected horses across rural America. They are expensive to properly maintain.

[-] dogslayeggs@lemmy.world 4 points 3 days ago

The same thing that happens to horses that are too old to work anymore? Do you expect these horses to work until they are dead? That does happen, but it isn't normal.

[-] Psythik@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago

Also, where the fuck do you store the horse when the day is done? A horse is not going to enjoy hanging out in a barn in the middle of the city, nor will it enjoy the multi-hour journey out of the city to go back to the farm.

[-] aSaabD00d@lemmy.today 7 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I used to have fun going down to pet the carriage horses in downtown Charleston, SC when I was younger and lived there but as I grew up and learned about the abuse they endured I can only look back and wonder if my petting them was one of their favorite times too. They need to shut that one down too. Maybe it will happen someday with how many New Yorkers have moved there.

[-] HubertManne@piefed.social 17 points 2 days ago

My city did this. Kinda miss the look even if you where not riding in one. The issue was animal welfare but I kinda wish they would just make it a city run service so they can make sure the animals are treated well. Price would be high but I feel it has knock on effects because of again the kinda look it gives and is kinda an attraction. There is a zoo in the city so I wonder if it might be nice to integrate it. Have them start and stop from there and would give them a chance to get some excersise and get some stimulation.

[-] David_Eight@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago

I think the horses find doing it stressful in general and there might not be a humane way of doing it in general, at least not in NYC. The horses even get a mandatory 5 weeks of vacation on a farm upstate for their mental health.

[-] searabbit@piefed.social 6 points 2 days ago

I can't imagine anyone in nyc being sad about this. They're really only there for the tourists. They smell horrible, look miserable, and get in the way in an already crowded city. I think we can leave the horse attractions for the western states.

[-] HubertManne@piefed.social 2 points 2 days ago

my metro had them and I liked them well enough. Im not exactly mad we got rid of them but that is because I just don't have confidence the places running it were treating the horses well enough.

[-] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 12 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

"Don't worry, you won't have to do this any more in 44 years."

[-] undeadotter@sopuli.xyz 10 points 2 days ago

Interesting in-depth article about this from the New Yorker. It's amazing how much of an impact this seems to have had on city politics over the last 30 years or so.

[-] Elshender@sh.itjust.works 12 points 3 days ago

How will these horses pay off their art degree loans now that they cant draw?

[-] Raiderkev@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

Surely they'll work it off at the glue factory

[-] threeonefour@piefed.ca 3 points 3 days ago

They just can't draw carriages anymore. They'll have to branch out. Maybe some landscapes? Caricatures?

[-] MountingSuspicion@reddthat.com 7 points 3 days ago

Apparently there are 200 or so drivers and horses. I think we should definitely do better about animal welfare, but it's strange that the city can prohibit them from selling their horses to other carriage companies. I also think it's strange that the city is not required to really do anything for the workers. Basically they just have to offer bare minimum career counseling which most cities offer to anyone anyway.

I support getting rid of the practice, but this does feel a little one sided. 200 people will have to find new jobs after potentially having owned and run their own business for years and have to sell their horses with additional restrictions imposed by the city. The city is giving them some time, but I'm sure it's still impacting everyone. Hopefully this leads to better long term outcomes for both the horses and the workers.

[-] Soggy@lemmy.world 8 points 2 days ago

200 people is a rounding error in NYC. Making sure a piece of legislation has literally zero negative impact is the same as making sure no legislation is ever passed.

[-] MountingSuspicion@reddthat.com 3 points 2 days ago

I'm not asking for no negative impact. I was just suggesting that it'd be nice if they offered maybe some dedicated upskilling or something. A lot of these people might not have other references or directly translatable skills. They I guess worked in customer service, but how many were regularly using computers? I was just bringing this up elsewhere but there is a huge overestimation of tech literacy people assume of others and it just makes me concerned. I don't know the industry, maybe it's tech heavy and full of tech savvy people, but I am used to interfecing with tech noobs a lot and it can be an uphill battle. I don't know that they'll be as easily absorbed into other customer service or hospitality careers. A lot may not need or take advantage of dedicated upskilling offers, but it'd be nice if it was there. Mind you, I'd like to see those things offered for free to everyone, but if you're telling someone their entire career is illegal now, I'd hope we could compensate them with at least something like a free skills class.

[-] bluefootedbooby@sopuli.xyz 4 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Would you imagine that when they abolished slavery, the poor slave owners were also prohibited from selling their slaves to other plantations! Also all the slave traffickers loosing their careers like that with no counselling. I think we should do better on human walfare, but that certainly was strange.

[-] MountingSuspicion@reddthat.com 3 points 2 days ago

Comparing this to slavery is certainly a take, but yes, some slave owners were compensated: https://aas.princeton.edu/news/when-slaveowners-got-reparations

I just think we can do more to help everyone, and that includes people who do this work.

[-] bluefootedbooby@sopuli.xyz 3 points 2 days ago

What was normal 200 years ago, we now see as disgusting. If the civilization progresses, I'm sure in 200 years they will also find disgusting how we treated those horses.

[-] Zoot@reddthat.com 0 points 2 days ago

Losing*

[-] Hueristic_Autistic@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago

Good! These never seemed to make sense.

[-] jtrek@startrek.website 4 points 2 days ago

I don't mind this. I've never ridden one of the horse carriages. They seem expensive aside from the animal welfare concerns.

[-] itsgroundhogdayagain@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 days ago

RUSTY!!!!

[-] Lor@leminal.space 1 points 3 days ago

GOOD

[-] Pratai@piefed.ca 0 points 3 days ago

This is big news!

[-] BrianTheeBiscuiteer@lemmy.world -1 points 3 days ago

I don't find them inherently bad, and much of the reasoning I hear could apply to horse ownership in general, but the cost and effort of regulation is probably not worth it.

[-] impairedimperator@lemmy.zip 7 points 3 days ago

Something a bit more city life specific: an average horse produces some 40 pounds of poop per day. That's why most of those carriages have large poop bags behind every horse. Also why they tend to smell like shit.

Also, have you ever seen a horse just stop in the middle of the street and take a piss? They just stop and do it. And there's like a ten foot splash zone, not to mention the smell and the resulting (large) puddle.

[-] stephen01king@piefed.zip 1 points 2 days ago

I don't know, I think forcing horses to work on hard concrete while being surrounded by loud vehicles all day isn't really an issue shared with horse ownership in general.

this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2026

202 points (99.0% liked)

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