Chicago Cracking Down on Pedicabs

Chicago’s City Council is enacting a series of tough new restrictions on the city’s pedicab industry.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports aldermen voted to approve a series of limits on the pedal-powered, three-wheeled bicycles.

The new rules cap the number of pedicaps at 200, prevent the pedicabs from using the city’s busy State Street and Michigan Avenue and ban them outright from areas of downtown during rush hour.

Pedicab owners say the restrictions will put them – and their environmentally friendly transportation method – out of business.

But Mayor Rahm Emanuel says the rules give the city a “regulatory architecture that provides some safety and a clear set of rules as it relates to safety.”