FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM MARCH 28, 2019 • THE QUEENS COURIER 17
File photo/AP
The facts about congestion pricing in NYC
BY MARK HALLUM
mhallum@schnepsmedia.com
@QNS
While the chips are yet to fall on congestion
pricing, April 1 is the deadline for
the state legislature to include the proposal
which has been heralded as the best
option for providing the Metropolitan
Transportation Authority with the estimated
$40 billion it needs to dramatically
modernize the subway.
Not only does the antiquated transit
system need extensive, systemwide overhauls
but the agency is facing a steep
decline in ridership as a $1 billion defi -
cit looms in 2022. It’s getting down to
the wire for elected offi cials to vote to
include congestion pricing in Governor
Andrew Cuomo’s 2020 executive budget,
here’s what you need to know about congestion
pricing so far:
Th e cost to drivers has not been
decided upon by lawmakers or the
MTA. An early proposal by Governor
Andrew Cuomo’s FixNYC panel release
in January 2018 suggested charging passenger
cars entering Manhattan up to
$11 during business hours. Trucks would
have to pay about $25 to conduct business
between boroughs.
Th e governor’s offi ce has outlined a
central business district in Manhattan
below 60th Street as the boundary for
where drivers to expect to pay to access.
Traditionally free East River Bridges
would not be directly tolled, according
to early projections, unless drivers follow
routes continuing into the central
business district as opposed to heading
Uptown where they would be in the
clear. But a clear defi nition of where gantries
for cashless tolling would be placed
has not been established.
Congestion pricing has been projected
to provide about $15 billion for the
MTA’s next capital plan, which runs
from 2020 to 2024. Th ose funds could go
a long way for making the subways more
Americans with Disabilities Act compliant
within the coming years, for one.
New York City Transit President Andy
Byford’s Fast Forward plan will bring
sweeping changes to the subways and
buses over the next 15 years if it receives
the proper funding which could total $40
billion.
State Assembly Majority Leader Carl
Heastie announced on Monday that congestion
pricing had enough votes to
pass and get inclusion in the 2020 executive
budget, but some lawmakers are
still holding onto their opposition to
the toll which they believe will only isolate
the outer boroughs from services
and attraction in Manhattan while placing
an undue fi nancial burden on eastern
Queens constituents. Legislators such as
Assemblyman David Weprin and state
Senator John Liu have said they want a
more clearly outlined pricing plan before
they take a vote.
Only about 2 to 5 percent of residents
in eastern Queens would be paying
the toll, according to a study conducted
by the Tri-State Transportation
Campaign in 2018, which broke down
commuter patterns by assembly districts.
Th ough the district of Councilman Barry
Grodenchik falls into this range by overlapping
state districts, he has argued that
the impacts will be much more deeply
felt with his district bereft of any sort of a
rail transportation options.
Congestion pricing is part of a $175
billion budget proposed by Cuomo in
January and received support from
Mayor Bill de Blasio in February aft er
over a year of opposition from his administration
who favored a millionaire’s tax
instead, but was shot down by Cuomo
and former MTA Chair Joe Lhota on the
grounds that the plan lacked immediacy.
Th e tax on the 1 percent of New Yorkers
had the potential to raise $700 million in
2018 and had the support of over half of
City Council members.
Establishing a dedicated revenue
source for the MTA, which moves over 8
million people per day across all the services
it provides, is not the only reform
Cuomo has ordered to be made to the
agency. Th e MTA will also undergo a
restructuring to improve accountability
in fi nancing, cut down on bureaucracy
and have an board made up of members
appointed by an elected offi cial whose
tenure would expire with that of the politicians
themselves. Th e restructuring will
include a variable pricing structure for
the tolls into Manhattan and establish a
lockbox for those funds to go into.
Budget amendments would, through
talks with the legislature, determine
the pricing structure “which would take
into account the type of vehicle, the time
and day of the week, credit for any tolls
paid at other bridges and tunnels, as well
as other key factors that will be determined
through conversations with the
Legislature.
Th e lockbox would ensure that 100
percent of the revenue collected through
congestion pricing would only be used
for MTA capital projects.
Congestion pricing was fi rst proposed
by former Mayor Michael Bloomberg,
but it proved unpopular at the state level
and was killed before it could even make
it to a vote in the Assembly chamber in
2008.
Th e environmental impacts of congestion
pricing can improve the overall
health of communities in central zones
where it is implemented dramatically,
according to a Johns Hopkins study performed
in Sweden, which showed asthma
attacks in children decrease by up to
50 percent. Transform, a Los Angelesbased
organization, warns that congestion
pricing, however, can pass on the
burden of traffi c pollution onto other
communities and that legislators should
take caution.
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