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Congestion Pricing in Manhattan? Let’s Hope…

So Chris over at Turning25 wanted to know what I thought about Mayor Bloomberg’s idea of congestion pricing in Manhattan. For the uninformed, here’s a primer on congestion pricing.

So what’s the plan?

Well, the idea is that in NYC, if you want to go below 86th Street during the busiest times of weekdays, you have to pay extra. The tolls would include a bridge or tunnel toll (in other words, you’d pay the fee at a tollbooth) and taxi drivers are exempt as well as drivers who aren’t stopping in the “zone.” In other words, pure common sense.

If you’ve ever seen the car traffic in Manhattan during the course of a day, you understand that cars roving the streets other than taxis and buses make grief for everyone. People who do the right thing and don’t bring their car into Manhattan are often punished because the buses they connect to can’t move in the sea of cars, and that’s just one example.

Making people pay for inconveniencing millions of people doesn’t seem like a bad idea if you ask me. Frankly, there’s no place in Manhattan that’s unreachable by subway (give or take a few blocks) or Bus. In the end, you shouldn’t be driving in Manhattan anyway, particularly since most of the idiots that do come into the city with one person in a car. When you take into account that millions of people enter and leave Manhattan daily, if 25% of the 8 million people drive into the city by car, you’re looking at between 1 and 2 million cars daily in a city that’s just not big enough to handle that logistically.

By now you understand that I don’t hold a lot of sympathy for people in cars in Manhattan.

Chris notes that he’s enraged because people might have to pay to go home. Indeed they might, although realistically, if they’re going home from work, it probably isn’t going to put them in Manhattan at a time when they would be effected. Even if they were, though, the reality is that most people in Manhattan live North of 86th Street (not affected) and most of the people who live South of 86th Street don’t own cars anyway.

All in all, Bloomberg is right. It’ll be cost-prohibitive for most people and will lower the overall congestion in the city. It has worked well in London and should be employed here as soon as possible. If you want to live in Manhattan, there are premiums associated with it.

Deal.

 

This entry was posted on Monday, April 23rd, 2007 at 10:17 am and is filed under Localized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Viewing 4 Comments

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    In principle it's not a bad idea. Personally, I can't stand driving in the city -- I only take the train when I need to get into Center City Philly. I say why not charge people (namely out-of-towners, etc.) who want to be foolish enough to take their cars into the city.

    My beef, like you pointed out, was charging people who live in the zone.

    While you're more-than-likely very right that the 6A-6P window will probably keep this from causing people who live in the area to have to pay and that people in the zone don't have cars to begin with, it still doesn't seem right to even make the few this might effect pay just because their home is inside the area.

    Thanks for throwing your $0.02 out there. I'm guessing most people in NY are for this? It would make sense they would be since a majority up there use MTA or walk, right?
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    I wholeheartedly agree with Bloomberg's plan. Traffic in the city is a mess. At the rate it's growing, it's only going to get worse. The problem is, we need it to continue growing to thrive.
    The only way to maintain a quality of life and the status of the city, something has to be done. I applaud Bloomberg for his plan. He's thinking ahead. And what i also like about him is that he is taking what may seem to be unpopular steps in the short term but will benefit us all hugely in the long term. Go Mayor Bloomberg!
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    • v
    Hear, hear. Except that the congestion charge should be coupled with a crackdown on people who abuse parking permits as well.
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    WWhen the 18% parking garage surcharge was started years ago, purportedly to reduce traffic congestion, it had absolutely NO effect on traffic congestion in Manhattan - and everyone is still paying exorbitant garage parking fees in Manhattan.

    Congestion Pricing would have the same effect - added driving taxes forever, and absolutely no effect on traffic congestion.

    Additionally, 150,000 government sector vehicles with parking permits have been "exempt" from millions of illegal parking violations for years, an inexcusable practice that has been ignored by Bloomberg. Because of this history of "exempting" government sector commuters, congestion taxing is a terrible idea because the reality is that the City WILL exempt all 150,000 government sector commuters again, and traffic congestion will be made even worse. Elimination of illegal permit abuse is a prerequisite to congestion taxing!
 

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