Congestion Pricing R.I.P.
In what is a very symbolic blow to NYC, the congestion pricing plan was laid to rest even before it was brought to life. The honour for that misdeed goes to “Scumbag Silver” a.k.a. Sheldon Silver the speaker of the NY State Assembly.
The proposal would have brought much needed relief to Manhattan’s chaotic traffic during weekdays.
Mr. Bloomberg and his supporters — including a vast array of civic environmental organizations, as well as key city officials like the City Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn, and other elected officials — viewed the proposal as a farsighted and essential step toward the city’s future growth. [link]
Even though I live in Brooklyn, I was for the congestion pricing plan and was pretty sure that it would go through. Of course I did not factor in the dumb-ass politicians from my own borough and others from Queens, Bronx and Staten Island.
…the plan was strongly opposed by a broad array of politicians from Queens, Brooklyn, and New York’s suburbs, who viewed the proposed congestion fee as regressive and Manhattan-centric.
This is not the first time that Scumbag Silver has derailed major environmental plans for NYC.
…The plan, which would have charged drivers $8 to enter parts of Manhattan during peak hours, was a huge blow to Mr. Bloomberg’s environmental agenda and political legacy, and his second major defeat at the hands of Mr. Silver and the state Assembly, which in 2005 blocked the mayor’s plan to redevelop the West Side railyards and allow a big sports stadium to be built there.
Seriously, if such nonsense continues for political gains, NYC is fast on its way to become a second tier world city lagging behind places like London, Tokyo and Paris. Why do smart people get stupid politicians ?
Being from London, let me assure you that NY has no chance of languishing behind us. We’re pretty great at languishing. Incidentally, the prohibitive cost of entering central London has definitely helped us fall behind. It has hurt the economy, and museum visitor numbers are down. Worse still, traffic is back up – as of 2006 – to pre-Congestion Charge levels.
So don’t bemoan the death of CP quite so much. It might’ve been a blessing disguised in Albany’s wretched politics.
Born and bred Brooklyn, I’m happy to see congestion pricing fail as it would have been just another push by Bloomberg to out the Bridge and Tunnel middle and lower income riffraff.
Yes, traffic is chaos but congestion pricing is not the solution. Many people who drive in Manhattan loathe it but it’s a necessary evil for those who need to take their cars in the city for numerous reasons — most importantly, lack of options:
Look at a subway map borough-wide and see just how much white space there is where subways don’t even touch certain neighborhoods. For example, it can take someone in Mill Basin, Brooklyn a half hour just to drive to the nearest Brooklyn subway and then another twenty minutes to look for parking nearby. By that time, you’re almost into the city if you decided to drive direct into Manhattan. Same for parts of Queens, and Staten Island.
Know what causes congestion? Double parked trucks loading and unloading. My father was a NYC cabby and can attest to this. And he did…daily. Not fun. Will congestion parking stop the trucks? No, because the big money behind them will front the cause.
In the end, the pricing doesn’t solve the problem but just burdens lower and middle classes.
While this may be named the "congestion tax", I supported this bill for the environmental impact, not for traffic reasons. With one of the best public transportation systems in the world, there is no reason why most people who come into Manhattan need to drive.
I live in Queens and find my subway commute easy and convenient. Yes, I live close to the subway. But I chose to live there because it was important to me to be able to use public transportation. I travel to the NJ regularly to see my family who live in the suburbs and I take the train. But my family likes their cars, and when they visit me, they drive. Maybe if they, and people like them, had to pay a tax to do so, they’d take the train.
I do agree that it’s lame that the subway doesn’t extend farther into outer boroughs. So maybe we should argue for more subways – not sanction the unnecessary use of polluting cars.
I saw this proposal as a step towards encouraging people to be more environmentally responsible. I think its death shows that most politicians and people are still too ignorant and too selfish to take that responsibility.
"I live in Queens and find my subway commute easy and convenient. Yes, I live close to the subway. But I chose to live there because it was important to me to be able to use public transportation. " Sweetie, there are only so many places near trains and when people already live there, its kind of hard to get them to move because i want to live closer to a station. And did you ever stop to think that maybe not everyone can afford to live near a train? I live in brooklyn and any place i looked at that was anywhere near public transportation was at the least a few hundred more.
And the way i look at it, if you live in the city or drive in the city, expect to hit traffic. ITS THE CITY.
Congestion pricing is not an attack on the poor. It will benefit the poor because it will bring cleaner air and safer streets!
Kowtowing to cars has damaged most cities in the US so severely that they’ve become inaccessible to pedestrians. Neighborhoods without people on the sidewalks aren’t even neighborhoods anymore–they’re just subdivisions. NYC is one of the few American cities that has maintained its pedestrian infrastructure, but that doesn’t mean we can be complacent. Good quality of life in urban areas requires constant vigilance against automobile incursions.
Requiring that drivers pay for the externalities they create is completely fair. Spending that revenue on transit helps to mitigate the air pollution, wasted space (parking lots and highways), and physical danger to pedestrians that cars bring with them.
Public transit must be improved, but it needs to be paid for. Congestion pricing is a brilliant source of revenue for that.
It’s kind of like public schools: even if you don’t personally use them, you still must pay for them because the public good that is created benefits you too, whether you realize it or not.
Are you saying than owning a car is less expensive than living near a subway station? I have a lot of trouble believing that all the costs associated with owning a car – insurance, maintenance, parking, gas – are more affordable than living in an area reachable by subway.
I dont own a car because i cant afford an apartment in a decent neighborhood and a car. Instead i have to haul ass 11 long ass blocks to a train station (or wait up to a half hour for a bus that sometimes shows up to get me there) so im not late for work.
"I think its death shows that most politicians and people are still too ignorant and too selfish to take that responsibility"
Choose your words wisely. I can name 4 people right now that have NO choice but to have to drive to the city. Believe me, they would give anything to not HAVE to, but they do. And they are nowhere near selfish OR ignorant.
As I stated before, unless there are viable alternatives, the congestion tax is overly burdensome.
I would love for all that nasty traffic to go away and we can live in lush tree lined streets and hear the birds twitter, but for the moment this is naive and utopic.
First, expand and FIX the infrastructure. The public school analogy doesn’t work because there are schools in every district, unlike trains — and don’t get me started on the buses. They are a nightmare in the outer boroughs. I sometimes wait a half hour to 45 minutes to get on the bus, and when it comes it’s jam-packed; you can to push your way through and stand the whole ride. Nevermind the violence at the back of the bus in some routes.
Second, even with gas prices as they are now, housing near subways is still outrageously more expensive. Dont compare a few hundred dollars between blocks in Astoria. Compare Astoria to say apartments in Whitestone or parts of Rockaway.
And what about the elderly or infirm. My mother, who doesn’t drive, has to walk seven blocks just to get to a bus stop. Now that she’s in her seventies, she can’t do it that often, especially in the winter with the ice and snow and she’s forced now to spend her social security (which is nothing) on car services to get to her doctors.
Shall I tell her she’s selfish and ignorant?
I can go on, but the bottom line is that is indeed an attack on the lower middle class and poor in its consequences. Make public transportation truly public and available to all, then talk taxes.
Marisa, I don’t think your argument makes sense. You do realize the congestion charge would just be for driving in Manhattan, and only certain busy parts, and only certain busy hours, right?
The people in the far parts of the boroughs would be crazy to drive all the way in to Manhattan as a daily commute anyway, even without the fee. How would they pay for parking? And compared to parking, an $8 fee is pretty small. (Crossing the Tri-Borough bridge costs $5 or $6; it’s practically the same.) If you drive to an express station, or a commuter rail station, and then ride the rest of the way, that makes much more sense. And you won’t have to pay the congestion fee.
If you’re just tooling around in Whitestone or Far Rockaway, you won’t be affected by the charge. So, continue as always, you’re fine.
I do think you’re right about the state of infrastructure. It needs to be greatly improved. However, you neglect to ask why it sucks, and the reason is that people have been too easy on cars since the days of Robert Moses. We have to stop that behavior now, so that we can build sustainable and equitable transportation infrastructure!
Almost all infrastructure investment went to highways and car-only needs since the 1940s. The subways, streetcars (now gone), and everything else suffered. Unfortunately, people will use their cars unless you make great effort to decrease that convenience. Empirical studies show that even good transit won’t attract riders unless you make it harder or more expensive to drive. That has to come first, then there will be money and interest in improving transit infrastructure.
Your mother is a good example of how a car-centric infrastructure fails to meet people’s needs. She cannot drive, but at least in NYC she has some other options–can you imagine what she would do if she lived in Phoenix or Atlanta? The nearest bus stop could be three miles away! And there are no sidewalks!
Tell me how the congestion tax is overly burdensome? I just do not see it. Typical rule-of-thumb estimates are that owning and operating a car costs on average, about $5,000 per year. You could pay the congestion fee hundreds of times over with that! (New cars cost much more: http://www.thecarconnection.com/Auto_News/Daily_Auto_News/Auto_Operating_Costs_Hit_New_Record.S173.A13720.html?DID=RSS )
bhorst, read what I write before you tell me that I dont make sense, please. I was talking about driving from Whitestone to Manhattan. In fact, everything I’m saying is about driving into Manhattan.
And no, not everyone pays for $40 parking lots. There are things called meters where you put a quarter into them.
Yes, I know all about Robert Moses and his plan to make his commute to his LI beach house easier. I’m not talking about Great Neck bourgeois not wanting to take the LIR. I’m talking about the workers who live five in a one-bedroom apartment and share a car to that they can do their repairs, carry their tools and make a living in the city. Yes, they pay costs for keeping a car but it’s because they have to. Sure, let’s add some more costs to them?
Do you really believe the tax will go to better infrastructure? No, it’ll go to high priced hookers. I’ve lived in this city all my life and would love to believe the pretty pictures y’all paint, but the solutions need to be grounded in reality with specific earmarks and secured funding for better transportation. Then I’ll buy it.
Me again. First, I apologize for the "snarkiness" of my comments but it’s obviously an issue I’m passionate about after seeing so many people practically forced out of NYC because they simply cant afford to live there anymore. I’m now only living there half the year myself.
The irony for me is that I’m coming off as anti-green while offline I’m helping a major US company in their environmental compliance for strict EU regulations. I really like trees and fresh air. Really. But I also believe in finding balances so as not to turn off people against the green movement entirely.Taking things one step at a time.
The NY Times Op-Ed today had a balance that I think is fair: "Pick on the big guys." It says:
"So here’s the answer: charge a premium for expensive and inefficient vehicles. Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London, has already taken this step, tripling toll charges for S.U.V.’s. We should take this one step further, requiring that vehicle registrations include designation in tiered classes, taking into account weight, sales price, emission rating and gas-mileage efficiency. Tolls would be levied according to these classes. Smaller, cheaper and more environmentally friendly cars would pay less, while drivers of more expensive, wasteful and higher-polluting cars would pay more."
That seems like a good compromise to me.