She couldn’t just honor the hard work city officials put in to ease the gridlock that has made pedestrian life in Midtown a misery. If it worked according to plan, congestion pricing would have reduced the number of vehicles passing below 60th Street while providing desperately needed funds for the subways.
But no. Hochul had to insert herself into a highly thought-out plan and muck it up. She “temporarily” froze its start planned for June. Most read the move as an effort to curry favor with New Yorkers in the suburb. The argument was that the $15 charge was a tax on drivers already paying stiff tolls on the bridges and tunnels to enter Manhattan. Funny, but despite those “stiff tolls,” Manhattan is perpetually clogged with traffic drawn to near standstills.
The video clip below shows what happens every single day. Note how the crosswalks are totally blocked while the “Walk” signs are lit. (Sometimes pedestrians can’t even see the walks signs due to blockage by by trucks.) Pedestrians having to squeeze between fenders to get across the street are a normal occurrence.
One of the dumber objections to congestion pricing was made by United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew. He held that congestion pricing was cooked up to benefit allegedly rich white Manhattanites at the expense of “people of color” elsewhere in the city. I suggest that Mulgrew compare the racial makeup of people driving cars in Midtown with that of the subway riders. By the way, only one in a hundred travelers into the congestion zone come via car.
The original congestion pricing plan was intended to provide the Metropolitan Transportation Authority with $15 billion in bonds to improve the city’s decrepit bus and subway system. The upgrades would have also created thousands of jobs.
And what about the psychic and physical costs gridlock forces on those crossing streets in Midtown? Could subjecting residents, shoppers and workers to this experience be good for business? Leading city-based business groups don’t think so. They have been backing congestion pricing, according to Politico.
Now Hochul has returned to the mess she created and given a green light for congestion pricing. She’s lowered the fee for cars to $9 a day from $15.
Had the original $15 fee gone into effect as previously planned, everyone would be used to it by now. If it did seem to hurt midtown businesses, the fee could have then been lowered.
And so congestion pricing should start early next month, just in time for the start of Donald Trump’s second presidential term. Trump has vowed to kill the program. Good work, Kathy!