‘Fuck You and YOUR CITY!’ Driver of Illegally Oversize Truck Rages after Collision, Allowed to Continue

MANHATTAN – Second Avenue is clogged with traffic from dawn til dusk— a crush of commuters, cabs, buses and double- parked delivery trucks— a powder keg ready to burst. 

This morning it did, when the driver and passenger of a Lexus SUV– a couple from Westchester on their way to a doctor’s appointment– says the illegally oversize tractor-trailer came into their lane near the corner of East 88th street and Second Avenue, clipping the rear of the SUV, leaving the fender crinkled and the rear passenger-side tire flat. 

The truck driver, they say, immediately claimed it was their fault and that he was actually the one who was injured.

“He claimed it was our fault. Scammer!” the passenger in the SUV told Upper East Site. 

The truck’s driver was evaluated by paramedics on the scene and appeared to be just fine, walking around the area in black sweatpants and flip-flops, taking photos and apparently talking on the phone with someone. 

At one point, the couple says the irate truck driver held up his middle finger at them from inside the cab of the truck—  flipping the bird at the two whose SUV was involved in the fender-bender. 

Again, later on, the truck driver showed his middle finger to us.

We asked officers on scene whether the driver would be cited for the oversize truck— which is not only against the law but also poses a significant safety risk on narrow city streets— or whether the driver would be turned around and sent out of NYC for being too large. 

“I’m just concerned with the job I was given,” one officer told us, referring to the accident itself.

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When asked whether we should call 911 to report the illegally oversize tuck, the officer noted that we should call 311 to report the tractor-trailer. 

So what’s the big deal with oversize trucks, you may wonder?

Well, the issue is so big there is an entire Twitter account, @Illegal53nyc, dedicated to exposing the dangerous situation on our streets and the bad corporate citizens who send trucks with 53 foot trailers to navigate narrow city streets. 

NYC Traffic Rule 4-15(b)(4) states that from bumper to bumper, tractor and trailers combined can be no more than 55 feet in length. 

So unless the truck’s cab is only two-feet long, virtually any truck with a 53 foot trailer is illegally driving on the streets of the five boroughs.

One can typically identify a 53 foot trailer by the large number 53 on or near the front corners of the trailer itself. Just like the big ’53’ on the trailer involved in today’s accident.

“Want to take a quote,” the driver shouted from the open door of his oversize truck at this reporter as he drove away— “Fuck you and your city!”

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Given that this truck, based out of Florida, is oversized and had already been involved in one collision— we asked the NYPD’s Office of the Deputy Commissioner for Public Information whether the driver was cited, since we did not see one given, and why the oversize tractor trailer was allowed to continue south on Second Avenue. 

Upper East Site is waiting to hear back. 

“[The] NYPD needs to address the oversized vehicles citywide as part of their commitment to Vision Zero and focus on the corruption which systematically ignores complaints about illegal tractor trailers,” the operator of the @Illegal53nyc Twitter account told Upper East Site in a statement.

“Every day this issue is ignored is another day where New Yorkers can and are killed by vehicles that are clearly not compatible with an urban setting,” they added.

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