Brad Lander, New York City's Comptroller, is our top choice for Mayor.

The city's voters are fortunate to have several mayoral candidates with progressive platforms and noteworthy résumés on street-safety and public transit policies from whom to choose – more about some of them below – but Brad Lander rises to the top thanks to the combination of his expansive vision for New York City's transportation landscape and his past record of advocacy and accomplishment.

When we interviewed Kathryn Garcia before endorsing her in the Democratic mayoral primary in 2021, we were deeply impressed by her preparation and ability to speak knowledgeably and confidently on a host of transportation policy issues. Mr. Lander has taken that to an entirely new level in 2025.

His "Green Light for New York City" transportation platform is by far the most comprehensive blueprint for safer streets and better public transit that we've ever seen from a candidate for any office. It outlines a wide-ranging roadmap for getting Vision Zero back on track, improving and enhancing subway and bus service, reimagining the city's curb space, and bringing a newfound degree of safety and order to the city's streets.

His commitment to working closely with the MTA to get more New Yorkers back on subways and buses includes implementing a true Bus Rapid Transit system, prioritizing accessibility, ensuring the fastest possible rollout of the Interborough Express, and expansion and enhancement of the Fair Fares and City Ticket programs.

Mr. Lander is fully committed to implementing and adhering to the benchmarks of the city's Streets Plan, which has floundered under the current administration. He'll fully fund and staff the Department of Transportation and empower it to implement projects without political interference, and he'll kickstart critical efforts like the stalled secure bike-parking program. He'll restore year-round outdoor dining, and will implement transformative projects like the redesign of Manhattan's Fifth Avenue and the pedestrianization of large portions of the Financial District.

He'll bring order to city streets by regulating the delivery app companies that have prioritized profits and speed over the safety of delivery workers and pedestrians, and will pilot a Reckless Driver Accountability Act-style program to alter rider behavior using an approach based on a restorative justice model.

And he'll remake the city's curbside spaces by expanding the city's Smart Curbs pilot, innovating the use of real-time parking sensors and dynamic pricing, and modernizing the alternate-side parking system to increase compliance while actually making parking easier for those drivers who follow the rules.

Mr. Lander has important management experience having run the Comptroller's office and its staff of several hundred and substantial budget. He has a reputation for hiring and empowering talented staff, and for honesty and integrity. He's smart, a hard worker, an innovator, and a consensus-builder. We're completely confident that he will make a seamless transition to City Hall, and choose a world-class commissioner to run the Department of Transportation.

As a City Council Member for 12 years, he supported and defended the Prospect Park West bike path, a critical bulwark in the citywide fight for safer streets, and he moved quickly and with determination to compel the redesign of Park Slope's 9th Street corridor after a deadly crash just steps from his office. He put his full support behind NYC DOT's plan for protected bike lanes on Brooklyn's 4th Avenue. And he authored the legislation that created the Dangerous Vehicle Abatement Act to try to remove chronically dangerous drivers from city streets without needlessly putting them into the criminal justice system.

As Comptroller, Mr. Lander last year led the city's fight against Governor Hochul's congestion pricing "pause," assembling a legal team and filing a lawsuit. This year, he's defended the program against the Trump administration's threats to undo it. He's also produced several thoughtful transportation-related audits and reports, including assessments of how the city's bus service and bike share system can be improved, and a detailed plan for improving safety and accountability around the use of micromobility devices.

His passion for and knowledge around street-safety and transportation issues stands in stark contrast to Andrew Cuomo, the perceived front-runner, who has not issued a transportation platform, brought New York's straphangers the "Summer of Hell" in 2017, and did not participate in our endorsement process.

New York City has unfortunately squandered several years of opportunity thanks to lack of political will and a trail of broken promises while we've watched peer cities like Paris embrace a truly transformative transportation vision. Brad Lander is best equipped to lead us forward in closing that gap, and we're excited to put him at the top of our ballot for New York City Mayor. You should be, too.

A Note About Ranked Choice Voting

While Brad Lander is our #1-ranked candidate for Mayor, we are putting five candidates on our mayoral ballot, and urge you to do the same. Gothamist has published a great explainer about ranked-choice voting, which underscores the importance of filling out a complete ballot – and NOT ranking a candidate you oppose. Now on to the rest of our mayoral endorsements.

Zohran Mamdani, Ranked Choice #2 – Zohran Mamdani, who has represented Queens's 36th District in the New York State Assembly since 2021, has earned the #2 spot in our mayoral ranking.

Mr. Mamdani is a strong supporter of public transit, and has made "fast, free buses" one of the central tenets of his campaign, an idea that no less of an authority than economist Charles Komanoff thinks could pay for itself in increased efficiency and operational savings. In the Assembly, he won a fare-free bus pilot program that resulted in more than a 30% increase in ridership along the pilot routes, and increased discrete new ridership by double digits. He's been a staunch supporter of congestion pricing, and his "Get Congestion Pricing Right" campaign called for more investment in bus service, six-minute headways for subways, and expanded camera enforcement for bus lanes.

He's been a committed supporter of safer street designs, galvanized by the death of a constituent in Astoria's Crescent Street bike lane, for which he had advocated, not long after he took office. He joined colleagues in city and state government to develop the Western Queens Street Safety Plan in 2023, which was a precursor to calls for universal daylighting, amplified the demand to pedestrianize the Queensborough Bridge's South Outer Roadway, and proposed the 31st Avenue bike boulevard. He can often be spotted riding a bike around his district.

Mr. Mamdani has run a joyful and exciting campaign that has energized an enthusiastic army of volunteers, and his TikTok videos, many filmed as he rides on buses and subways, have drawn millions of views. While he has not presented the kind of detailed transportation plan that Mr. Lander has, his questionnaire response was thoughtful and thorough, and he has consistently shown up on the issues important to us. We have no doubt he would appoint a top-notch DOT commissioner and work closely with advocates if he's elected, and would be a catalyst for positive changes to the streetscape and transit system. Given all that, and the fact that he has steadily risen in the polls and may have the best chance to defeat Andrew Cuomo in the Democratic primary, we urge you to rank Zohran Mamdani #2 on your mayoral ballot.

Zellnor Myrie, Scott Stringer and Adrienne Adams (Co-Endorsement), Ranked Choice #3 (Tie) – Zellnor Myrie, Scott Stringer, and Adrienne Adams all participated in our endorsement process, and they are all serious and experienced elected officials whom we believe would bring stability and competence to City Hall on many issues, including transportation. They are all committed to getting the city back on track with Vision Zero, implementing the mandates of the Streets Plan, defending congestion pricing against meddling from Washington, and hiring and supporting an innovative DOT commissioner.

Mr. Myrie, who's served in the State Senate since winning election in 2018, would make implementing better BRT-style bus service a priority, and says he would pedestrianize streets around the city's schools. He will advocate for creation of a Brooklyn-Queens Expressway Authority to better address urgently needed maintenance and to plan for better future alternatives. Mr. Myrie, who doesn't drive and relies on public transit to get around, has won support from many pro-housing groups for his plan to build one million new homes across the city.

Mr. Stringer, who served two terms as the city's Comptroller after two terms as Manhattan Borough President, has earned his reputation as an innovative and hard-working elected official. He's committed to restoring year-round outdoor dining and to using Queens's Paseo Park as a model for more robust Open Streets across the city. He'll work to implement the innovative plan for remaking the BQE that he issued as Comptroller in 2019. Mr. Stringer will also make regulation of delivery apps a top priority.

Ms. Adams, the Speaker of the New York City Council, will prioritize expansion of the Fair Fares program, which she has championed in her current role, and invest in street redesigns in under-resourced neighborhoods that suffer from high rates of traffic violence. She's committed to working with the MTA to improve and expand service with a focus on transit deserts, which is an issue in her southeast Queens district. Ms. Adams played a critical role in passing the City of Yes rezoning package largely intact.

We're somewhat agnostic about in which order you should rank Zellnor Myrie, Scott Stringer and Adrienne Adams on your mayoral ballot, but we urge you to rank all of them after Brad Lander and Zohran Mamdani.

[Note: State Senator Jessica Ramos, who completed our endorsement process before endorsing Andrew Cuomo last week while remaining in the race, likely would have found her way into our rankings before that inexplicable decision.]