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A few nights ago, there seems to have a really nutty car chase involved a minivan with a family in it. WABC 7 says the chase started in the LES, when police wanted to pull over a a blue minivan that hit a couple cars at Essex and Delancey. But the driver decided to keep driving, heading over the Williamsburg Bride, until he crashed into more cars at South 5th and Havemeyer! It sounds like a bad movie (or funny comedy) - luckily the injuries suffered by eight people (six from the minivan, two cops) were not too serious.
Car chases are big business for some news stations - when they broadcast them, their ratings go up, as they did during this Houston car chase. Has there been a car chase broadcast by any local NYC stations lately? We can't recall any - perhaps because traffic sucks or maybe because news stations don't want to encourage that kind of behavior.
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There was a televised police chase last year in NJ. I covered it when I worked for Shadow Traffic in their traffic helicopter. The chase started as a carjacking in Newark, NJ and it was broadcast live on WABC-TV. The state and local police followed the chase on Channel 7 and said we helped them catch the carjackers.
It's rare to see police chases like that. Most highways are not wide open, like in other parts of the country. In addition, NY and NJ police usually manage to stop drivers before things get out of control.
Brian McKinley's right - there's not much room for wide-open chases here. You can't just get on the freeway and cruise unimpeded for half an hour here.
And that's a blessing. The California tv news channels all slashed their Sacramento political bureaus and used the money to buy helicopters to cover car chases. Complete dumbing-down.
local tv doesn't want to encourage car chases? sorry, but that theory is, sadly, so much wishful thinking ... as a former employee of a nyc local station i can say quite confidently that even the hint of a car chase, most often in new jersey, leaves most producers cumming themselves with joy, in fact i've attended several editorial meetings which were paused so everyone could drool with envy over chases in l.a. and houston
Cars+speed+Cops giving chase=Higher Nightly News Ratings