The city is getting an $805,000 federal grant that it will use in part to get young men to drive safer, targeting them though social media and ads, officials said Friday.
The Department of Transportation will use Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr to reach young men, who are most likely to crash into pedestrians.
They also will place targeted ads on news, sports, and nightlife Web sites with the money from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The campaign will start this summer.
The DOT will split the grant with the NYPD, which will ramp up enforcement in high-crash areas.
Other grant money will be used to educate pedestrians at 40 schools and senior centers.
New York, Philadelphia and Louisville were the three cities chosen for grants as part of a national campaign to fight increasing pedestrian deaths.
Last year, 127 pedestrians were killed in New York City, and this year 36 have been killed as of April 20, police said.
Mayor de Blasio has vowed to end traffic deaths within 10 years as part of his “Vision Zero” plan.
“This funding lets us reach more people with Vision Zero’s message about the responsibility we all share to keep streets safe today,” said DOT Commissioner Polly Trottenberg.
Other recent DOT and NYPD initiatives have included lowering the speed limits on major streets to lower fatalities.