Former Mayor Bill DeBlasio campaigned on the promise that he would get rid of the carriage horses in Manhattan, and replace them with electric antique cars that the former carriage horse drivers could use to take tourists around Central Park and the city. But he never did.
And this is the result.
According to eye witnesses. the carriage driver was whipping the downed horse, trying to get him up. Fortunately, the NYPD mounted unit arrived and sprayed the heat-exhausted horse with water and eventually were able to get him up. Not only was he suffering from heat exhaustion, the veterinarian said the horse had contracted EPM, a serious disease that is treatable, but the horse should not be in work during treatment.
Horses in the carriage industry are often castoffs from the harness racing industry or from Amish communities and come to the city with pre-existing health problems. They develop further health issues from walking on pavement all day and breathing exhaust from trucks, cars and buses. They work all day in freezing cold and scorching heat and they’re stored in warehouses at night.
Incidents like the one above are not all that rare.
According to NYCLASS.ORG NYC carriage horses routinely work at least 9 hours a day (though many work longer as the rule is not enforced), pulling a vehicle that weighs hundreds of pounds not counting the passengers, on hard pavement, while breathing exhaust fumes from cars, buses and taxis. Unaccustomed to the urban environment, horses can be “spooked” easily and cause accidents that inflict great damage on vehicles, drivers and most often, the horses themselves.
Yes, spooked, and anything can spook them – flashing lights, loud noises, masses of people. Sounds like all the elements of a city, right? Like, exactly where they should not be. Oh and get this. When they can’t work anymore  they’re auctioned off and inhumanely slaughtered into horse meat and sold in Mexico and Canada.
The horses suffer and people are endangered too. Horses get spooked easily and can run into traffic. In New York there have been more than 18 accidents involving horses in the past two years. It’s a largely unregulated industry. It’s a half-hour ride for patrons, but it’s a lifetime of misery for the horses.
These beautiful creatures are not housed in barns or anything else that would actually make sense. NO – they’re housed in old tenement buildings where they’re forced up stairs (yes, stairs) and into small areas where they are unable to lay down to sleep.
Below video shows a carriage horse collapsing in New York Citys Central Park . She was later euthanized and her death has reignited calls to ban horse carriages in the city.
Some of the carriage drivers are abusive as well, like the woman driver heard in the below video:
“He (the horse) is a little shit. Like he’ll get the the point where I ask him to walk, you know, to step up and walk on, and he’ll get like “no” and he’ll start to jack knife on me. And I gotta hit the brake and whip the shit out of him.”
ANIMAL CRUELTY IN NEW YORK CITY:
Classy Infidel says
The poor horse. Diagnosed with some type of encephalitis, forced to breath in exhaust fumes, I cannot imagine the pain it was in. The driver needs to be charged with animal neglect and animal cruelty.
I blame the people who pay for these rides. Without them, the horses might be living in a suitable environment.
Daniel Erbstoesser says
This must stop andThis i thought as a child living awhile in brooklyn, that was back in the early 70s. I also refused to ride in one with my adoptive parents and for that i got the living daylights beat out of me but i did not ride. Animals are the real humans and not we. A Animal will never lie cheat or steal from you and all they give is freely and gladly. Why do we missuse this… because we earn money or we see them as things wich they definetly are not. I have turned my back on humanity many years ago and i live with animals and im happy.
Rob R says
I thought they were gone years ago. Really.
In a city like NY, as soon as a leftie gets an idea in their head about something that should be banned, its gone for good…… right?
I get that caring for animals is not exclusively left-wing, and you’re concerned for these horses but Im just saying.
Bugsy278 says
Thanks Bonni, for enlightening us on the atrocious way these noble animals are treated. Where are all the animal rights organizations on this issue?
BareNakedIslam says
Animal rights groups have been trying to stop the carriage horse business in NYC for years. DeBlasio made it part of his first mayoral campaign the first time, but not out of concern for the horses. Some real estate mogul wanted to build condos on the site where the stable is. But nothing ever happened.
Bugsy278 says
So in layman’s terms…political promises made to appease a certain voting bloc, but once in office having no intentions to fulfill.
President Trump was the ONLY president in my living memory that kept every election promise made, which shows a LOT of his character.
BareNakedIslam says
He sure did.
Muslimmadness says
I hate humans. I hate humans
andrewblackadder says
I always thought these Horse Drawn Carriages stayed inside Central Park and not on the streets of Hells Kitchen or Central Manhattan as I lived there in the early 1980s, W 88th Street and Amsterdam/Central Park and E 9th Street and 2nd Avenue and only ever seen them in the Park.
They should not be in the middle town traffic.
BareNakedIslam says
They’re supposed to stay in the park. But the stable is quite a distance from the park so they have to travel through the streets to get back and forth.
Linda Rivera says
The precious horses spend their lives suffering to the extreme. The HOLY ONE, our Wonderful, Precious, Merciful Creator, created each animal and human with infinite LOVE and CARE.
Horses are meant by our Kind, Compassionate Creator to run free in peace and happiness in verdant meadows and flower filled fields.
May the precious horses that suffered so much be re-born in God’s Bible promised coming Kingdom on Earth where the lion will lay down with the lamb.
Pray Hard says
What a bunch of shit!
Grace Joy says
I first learned about this in the book Black Beauty. It’s another example of Psychopaths Rule the World.
Greg says
Sad!
55surfire says
these horses live and die without ever knowing free range and that makes me feel very sad when I see those who have and think about those who have not
Donna Snyder says
This needs to be stopped immediately!