NYC lowering speed limit to 15 mph near hundreds of schools

New York City will lower the speed limit to 15 mph at 800 more locations near schools by the end of 2026, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said Monday. That will bring the total number of school zones with the lower speed limit to 1,300.

By 2029, he said, all 2,300 school locations will get adjacent 15 mph speed limits.

The new limits, set for exact locations to be determined by the city's Department of Transportation, are possible under a 2024 state law that authorizes the city to set lower speed limits in certain areas. The city plans to set the lower limits near every eligible school as allowed by law.

"No longer will the lives of pedestrians and children playing outside be treated as an afterthought," Mamdani said at a news conference inside a Flushing, Queens, school gym, with families of those killed in traffic crashes.

The reduced speed limits will be in place even when school is not in session, said the city’s transportation commissioner, Mike Flynn. Department planners and traffic engineers, Flynn said, would scrutinize the streets around schools to identify where the 15 mph limits would be imposed. Eligible areas include those near kindergarten through 12 public, private, parochial and charter schools.

"We really have to look at each school in its own context," Flynn said.

As Mamdani spoke, a transportation department work crew was preparing to install a new 15 mph speed limit sign outside the school, on 147th Street between Barclay and Sanford avenues.

New York City’s speed limit is 25 mph unless otherwise posted.

Speed limits are enforced via speed cameras and police stops. Speeding tickets can range from $50 if issued by an automatic camera — which activate if an automobile exceeds the limit by more than 10 mph — to hundreds of dollars and, potentially for egregious cases, a license suspension or revocation, if issued by a police officer.

The punishment for speeding in a school zone can be more severe than speeding elsewhere, according to Walter McClure, a spokesman for the state Department of Motor Vehicles.

Jumaane Williams, the city's public advocate, at Mamdani’s news conference, described himself as a reformed speeder who has seen the errors of his ways.

Lower limits, Williams said, protect children. Williams acknowledged that some drivers will be upset by the new limit, but "this is not about ‘gotcha.’ "

"As a parent, I worry about sending my kid to school," he said. "I don't want to worry about my 4-year-old every time she gets a little aggity around the sidewalk. I get nervous that she's gonna jet into the street."

In 2024, the latest year for which complete statistics are available, there were nearly 78,000 speeding tickets issued in New York City, and more than 50,000 on Long Island: about 21,000 in Nassau and 33,000 in Suffolk, according to the University at Albany-based Institute For Traffic Safety Management & Research

Speeding in a school zone can be charged as a separate offense under state law.

On Long Island, speed limits in school zones vary but generally range between 15 mph and 25 mph.