Years Later, Historians And Novelists Pointed To That Precise Point Of His Tenure In Office And Noted, “If Only, If Only”

Expect this to be signed later, far away from television cameras and hysterical pedicab drivers:

For the first time during his administration, Mayor Bloomberg put the brakes on a proposed law yesterday — one that would place tough restrictions on pedicabs — just moments before he was about to sign it into law.

At a bill-signing ceremony at City Hall yesterday, Bloomberg listened intently as angry pedicab drivers pleaded with him to change his mind.

One after one, they told the mayor they thought the bill went against Bloomberg’s plan to make New York more environmentally friendly because they don’t pollute.

“It’s hypocrisy,” said George Bliss, president of the city’s Pedicab Owners Association.

Another pedicab operator told the mayor that signing this bill would “ruin your legacy.”

As the bill sat on a table with several official City of New York pens laying next to them waiting to be signed, Bloomberg then stepped to the podium and said he would hold off signing the bill.

“I want to think about it,” he declared.

“We were screaming at the mayor and he actually listened,” said pedicab driver Melissa von Ludwig.

Wouldn’t it be great if this bill actually did ruin Bloomberg’s legacy? It would read like a Pynchon novel! That said, it’s going to be a tough slog for pedicab drivers to make a dent in Hizzoner’s 73 percent approval rating:

Call him Mayor Teflon, because even when New Yorkers are furious at Mike Bloomberg, they still think he’s doing a good job.

That was the remarkable finding yesterday of the latest Quinnipiac University poll, which showed Bloomberg enjoying a near-record 73 percent approval rating among registered voters.

The strong voter approval — just two points off his previous 75 percent high — came despite the city’s disastrous mishandling of school-bus schedule changes and widespread dissatisfaction with a blitz of alternate-side parking tickets following the Feb. 14 snowstorm.

The poll, which surveyed 1,261 voters between March 6 and 12, found Bloomberg, who lives on the Upper East Side, receiving his strongest approval rating from Manhattan voters, 80 percent of whom gave him thumbs-up.