Steven Hayward posted an article at Power Line today about taking the horse-drawn carriages out of Central Park in New York City. In January New York Mayor Bill DeBlasio promised that he would remove the horses from Central Park (honoring the wishes of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). Mayor DeBlasio has now stated that he will introduce legislation this month to eliminate the horse-drawn carriage industry in Central Park.

Last January I posted an article explaining the financial gain involved in this move (rightwinggranny). It really isn’t about the welfare of the animals:

The bad guy in this drama, according to the carriage drivers, is  Steve Nislick, chief executive officer of a New Jersey-based real-estate development company, Edison Properties. The company “employs legions of lobbyists to influence city decisions on real estate and zoning in its favor,” journalist Michael Gross reported in 2009, pointing out that two of Edison’s businesses “have multiple locations in the same Far West Midtown neighborhood as the stables where the Central Park horses are housed.” An anti-carriage pamphlet Nislick circulated in 2008 made this interesting observation: “Currently, the stables consist of 64,000 square feet of valuable real estate on lots that could accommodate up to 150,000 square feet of development. These lots could be sold for new development.”

The Teamsters Union represents the Central Park carriage drives, and the union has already released a statement that they are unhappy with the proposed legislation.