Williamsburg - Yeshiva 'move' no-parking sign, squeezing out city bus stop

Let my people go . . . on the bus.

A furious bus driver says two Hasidic scofflaws have moved a city no-parking sign, cementing it into the sidewalk in front of a Williamsburg yeshiva — and squeezing out an MTA bus stop.

“There was no way I could park at the bus stop,” fumed Jamar Perry, who spied the sign heist on Franklin Avenue while driving the B48.

“Two Jewish guys were moving the pole. I saw them resetting it. They had fresh cement and made it look professionally done.”

The relocated sign stands about 30 feet from the bus stop on Franklin just north of Flushing Avenue. It prevents cars from parking in front of Yeshiva Bnos Ahavas Israel so the religious school’s yellow buses can illegally park at the curb.

But what burns Perry, 39 and a four-year MTA employee, is the obstacle course it has created for his riders. Because of the parked yellow buses, city buses can’t pull into the stop and instead must idle in the middle of the street.

“When you’re in the middle of the street, bicyclists and motorcycles fly through there,” he said. “You’re also unable to pick up a wheelchair at that stop because you can’t pull in. We’d have to nose in, and that’s against the law.”

Passengers are also fed up with the chosen parking.

“There’s a school bus that parks here every day,” said Mohsen, 26, an engineer who commutes to Bed-Stuy and would only give his first name. “To catch the bus, you have to go to the middle of the street and shake your hands. All the people are having the same problem.”

Perry suspects the sign stealers he saw in October had the chutzpah to grab the sign from around the corner on Flushing Avenue after a car knocked it down.

“I informed the union about it. I made a few complaints,” he said. “Nobody’s done anything.”

Tommy McNally, a safety officer from the Transit Workers Union, says sign-swapping “is a common problem in the Hasidic community.”

“These guys are just constantly moving these signs,” he said.

McNally conveyed Perry’s complaint to several city Department of Transportation officials but hasn’t received a return call.

A DOT spokesman declined to say whether the no-parking sign should be posted on Franklin Avenue but said an agency inspector will look at it.

“We haven’t received any customer complaints, but we do realize there’s a problem on that block,” MTA spokesman Adam Lisberg said. “We have a supervisor assigned to the area to check into doing whatever’s possible to improve the situation.”

Bus drivers for the yeshiva on Franklin Avenue contend they’re not the ones to blame.

“We keep getting tickets,” said driver Yoel Felberbaum. “It doesn’t make sense. They should move the [city] bus stop.”

Yeshiva drivers say they have no choice but to park in the makeshift no-parking zone in front of the school, because if they don’t, students would have to walk in traffic.

Hasidim have flouted city rules before in their Brooklyn enclaves.

They drew criticism in October 2011 when a female rider on the B110 bus was ordered to the back by male riders enforcing Orthodox separation customs.

Scantily clad hipster cyclists prompted them to successfully lobby the city to close Bedford Avenue bike lanes, which in turn prompted bike advocates to repaint them. They were stopped by the Shomrim, a Hasidic neighborhood watch group.

Police Commissioner Ray Kelly has criticized the Shomrim for failing to notify the NYPD quickly to reports of an emergency — such as when 8-year-old Borough Park boy Leiby Kletzky was kidnapped in July 2011.

NY POST