Mayor v mares

THEY are quaint, gilded, adorned with plastic flowers and lend a pungent aroma to Central Park South. Tourists happily fork out $50 a time for them. But Bill de Blasio, New York’s mayor, wants carriage horses off the city streets. At his request two councilmen introduced legislation on December 8th to ban the city’s horse-carriage trade. Animal-rights supporters are happy, but the drivers are furious—as is the (aptly named) Teamsters union, which represents them.

The horses, drivers say, are treated well. They get five weeks’ holiday a year, more than most New Yorkers. By law, they cannot work when it gets too cool (below minus 8ºC) or too hot (above 32ºC). They eat “free choice” hay, are groomed daily, and get hoof-and-tooth care. Their spacious stables are inspected and mucked out regularly, unlike the city streets. Indeed the stables sit in so choice a bit of Manhattan that some say the property developer behind the ban might have an ulterior motive, though both he and the mayor deny it.

Mr de Blasio wants to bring in $170,000 vintage electric cabs instead, putting 300 drivers out to pasture. Ex-horse drivers will not have to buy a $6,000 medallion, should they wish to switch. But yellow-cab drivers are begging the mayor to hold his horses as, already plagued by Uber, a popular taxi app, they do not want more competition.

Polls show that two-thirds of New Yorkers disapprove of a ban on the horses. So far, no matter how much people nag him, the mayor is unmoved. The mares, however, may be.