
Driving a Car in Manhattan Could Cost $11 Under Congestion Plan - vanderfluge
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/18/nyregion/driving-manhattan-congestion-traffic.html
======
nwah1
Congestion pricing is one of the most economically literate ways to improve
traffic, and those funds can be used to improve infrastructure. It isn't so
different from surge pricing in ridesharing apps.

There is a narrowmindedness on the part of opponents of both congestion
pricing and surge pricing, because they are ignoring the obvious point that if
they weren't paying the fees they'd be paying in terms of time.

Not to mention that congestion has other negatives, like pollution.
Infrastructure needs to get paid for somehow. It is fair when it is paid for
by the people benefiting from it.

~~~
lazerpants
I'm always surprised by the only-in-this-circumstance libertarian philosophy
of people who support congestion pricing. I think if you took the exact same
logic and applied it to say, schools, supporters would feel completely
differently about it.

Example: It's really hard to get your child into certain public schools in
NYC. Why not start charging $3k a year per child (much less than private
schools) at high demand schools in order to lessen the overcrowding of those
schools? There are viable alternatives to paying (less in-demand schools),
most lower income people are already not able to send their kids to in-demand
schools for reasons of geography, and after all, parents choose to have
children, they should pay for the services and infrastructure to support them.

That example seems to essentially be the same as what is proposed for
congestion pricing, with many parallel arguments. Why is congestion pricing
okay when applying the same philosophy to other matters of public good isn't?

(by the way, I'm a reluctant supporter of congestion pricing, and not of what
I proposed for schools, but I struggle with why I believe one is okay and the
other is not)

~~~
gamblor956
In the U.S., a public education is considered a right. Driving is a privilege,
not a right, and so the same considerations don't apply.

For example, we already charge drivers for the privilege of driving: annual
license fees, mandated insurance, gasoline taxes, etc. Congestion fees/taxes
are simply an extension of the costs associated with the driving privilege.

With respect to schools, we already have a de facto congestion charge, in the
form of housing prices near desirable schools. In many states, property taxes
near desirable schools are also higher to reflect the greater desirability of
the neighborhood.

~~~
rsync
"In the U.S., a public education is considered a right. Driving is a
privilege, not a right, and so the same considerations don't apply."

I find this conversation very interesting - first, the thought provoking
notion from your parent that supporters of congestion pricing invoke a
"libertarian but only for this" exception that they wouldn't apply to other
goods like schools.

Then your (obvious) reply that driving is not a right, but a privilege.

I would counter that while driving is certainly a privilege, the _roads
themselves_ are a right, or a public good, comparable to schools. So
regardless of what hoops you have to jump through to purchase and license your
car, once jumped, the roads are analogous to the schools.

FWIW, I am personally enthusiastic about congestion pricing and have heard
nothing but good things about its deployment in London. I would like very much
to have it considered here in San Francisco.

~~~
apendleton
> the roads themselves are a right, or a public good

Transportation is the public good. Roads are one means of providing it, but
there are others, like public transit. It's up to the government to determine
how best to provide that public good given existing constraints in funds,
time, land area for roads and other transportation infrastructure,
environmental considerations, etc. They've apparently determined that the
distribution of modes is suboptimal, and are creating economic incentives to
shift it and better pay for it, but ultimately people will still be able to
get places one way or another.

~~~
willyt
Roads have only been a public good since 1888 in the UK. Before this it was
common to pay a toll to be able to use a road.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toll_roads_in_Great_Britain](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toll_roads_in_Great_Britain)

------
rthomas6
This is one of the only places in the US where public transportation is kind
of good. Many people in NYC don't own a car and don't even know how to drive.
It boggles my mind the amount of people complaining about how expensive it is
to drive to Manhattan. ...Why did you drive in the first place? Unless you
need to carry something large/heavy, there's no real reason to drive there.
Just park, take a cab/train there, and once you're there, it's _faster_ than
driving to use the subway to get places.

~~~
Nav_Panel
People are stuck in old modes of thinking about the city. When my parents
lived in the city during the 80s, it wasn't safe to take the subway. Everybody
owned a car, even in Manhattan. Now, none of my (20-something) friends own
cars, but I imagine a lot of older people don't want to give it up.

It does seem pretty nice to drive to work rather than cramming into a subway
car for a half hour, even if you're stuck in traffic...

~~~
rsynnott
It's amazing how habit-forming driving seems to be. A friend was recently
talking about a colleague of his who lives right next to a tram stop and works
right next to another stop on the same tram line. 20 minute tram journey, tram
every five minutes at peak time. And instead they drive an hour to work at
rush hour, because they're from a rural area and are used to driving. Makes no
sense to me at all...

~~~
hartator
I think you have to live in big city and have taken public transportation on a
daily basis, to understand the frustations, the dalays, the insecurity, the
smell, the crowdness, and the freedom reducing of it.

~~~
woolvalley
You have to live in a dysfunctional city for that to be a reality. In cities
that are functional, you only have to deal with occasional crowding.

~~~
hartator
NYC, Paris, London, etc.

------
ebikelaw
This framing of the issue is typical for the mainstream press, however readers
should note that this scheme changes nothing about the cost of driving. It
only changes who pays, and how. Today everybody pays the costs associated with
driving in Manhattan, even though driving in Manhattan is only practiced by a
tiny minority of people. Congestion pricing will shift part of that burden to
the people who cause it, which is perfectly fair.

~~~
rbcgerard
Also not noted is the portion of people driving in new york city that do not
live in new york city...

~~~
SamReidHughes
They're driving in so that the people living there don't have to drive out.

~~~
rbcgerard
??? They NEED to drive in from NJ CT etc instead of taking public transit?

~~~
BoorishBears
From my parent's house in CT you can get to Grand Terminal in NYC by:

\- Taking public transport only: 30 minutes of walking to the nearest bus stop
(bus only on the hour btw). 20 minutes on the bus. 2 hrs 30 minutes on a train
to Grand Central. All assuming bus and train time line up (they won't since
the bus is hourly).

\- Driving and taking a train: Drive for 30 minutes and take a 2 and a half
hour train ride to Grand Central.

\- Drive: 2 h 20 min at 5 o'clock on a Friday. Google maps shows 1.5 - 2hrs is
average.

~~~
krschultz
It's foolish to count driving to the train station in CT. Any time the traffic
is minimal into NYC, the parking at train stations is also empty. Really
everything you cited is fairly naive for getting into and out of the city.
Parking is ~$40 a trip unless you can get a street spot (which can be really
hard to count on in most neighborhoods).

The optimal path is to drive to a train station close to NYC that has frequent
service, park and take the train for the last bit. I used to use the Greenwich
train station and it worked well. The same is true from New Jersey, you can
park at Metropark or get dropped off in Seacaucus.

Source: I lived in CT for 3 years, lived in Manhattan for the last 5 years,
bought a car and keep it in Manhattan for the last 6 months.

~~~
BoorishBears
It's foolish to speak so brashly since you don't even know which part of CT
I'm referring to.

They aren't near enough to any train stations to make the trip faster by
switching stations. Your "brilliant" drive to a closer train station idea is
still a 2 and a half hour total trip time for reaching the same place.

And if your commute daily you're not going to be guessing where you park,
you'll probably have a monthly garage.

This all goes back to the parent comment which was just being obtuse. In
theory no one "needs" to do anything, we can just sit around all day until we
waste away.

People who "need" to commute in their cars really _want_ to commute in their
cars. No one is saying it's cheap, but it's a right that people have, and it's
not hard to imagine that for some people commuting from NYC to CT daily, doing
it by car is preferable to public transit.

------
weatherlight
Manhattan is 2 miles by 14 miles. Unless you are moving something heavy, there
really is no reason not to use the Subway, it's faster, cheaper, and runs all
night and all day.

Not only that, the majority of New Yorkers do not own cars. I don't even know
how to drive. I do, however, take buses and ride my bike. (In NYC you'll get
ticketed if you ride your bike on the sidewalk )

In NYC, real estate is extremely limited. Why should such real estate, which
is paid for with city taxes benefit so few?

~~~
electricslpnsld
> there really is no reason not to use the Subway

East-West across the park can be a bit of a pain on the train. If you're
trying to get from the Upper West Side to the Upper East Side, a bus is going
to be a faster choice than taking a train to midtown, transferring, and taking
a train back up.

------
lclarkmichalek
London has something similar, the congestion charge. Has helped somewhat, and
def makes regular driving in central London a 'you did what?' thing. It's
lifted on the weekend, which is nice if you want to pop to IKEA or whatever.

I think they're planning on pushing something similar all the way out to the
north circular, and maybe the M25 for heavily polluting traffic.

~~~
iraklism
Worth noting that the CC in London operates for 15 years now. I’m sure there
is a wealth of data that can be analysed, and I’m even more sure that there
are a number of studies and papers that have explored its usefulness and
positive/negative impact on traffic/economy/environment/public transportation.

------
javindo
Since surprisingly nobody has mentioned it in the comments here yet, we have a
similar scheme in place in London, and have done for quite some time. It's
only for the most central/congested zone and has had a hugely beneficial
impact on congestion.

That being said, it almost never makes sense to drive a car inside central
London anyway as the public transport is very reliable and has almost full
coverage, and it's dealing with a very different problem in the first place
(old horse and cart windy roads adjusting for the modern age).

------
liveoneggs
a friend was once visiting me in manhattan and decided to drive. He came over
on the george washington bridge ($15 toll), missed his turn to my block and
ended up getting turned around and going over to brooklyn (tunnel, of course:
$8.50 toll), realized he was in the wrong place and turned around ($8.50 back
through the tunnel).

This, of course, was after driving up from Virginia via I-95, which has its
own $20+ worth of tolls along the route.

\--

Where I live now, in Atlanta, we recently closed a $0.50 toll (GA400) because
apparently we didn't need the money.

~~~
jimmaswell
I just recently learned about this. It's unbelievable. How can anyone defend a
$15 toll? I'm glad I don't have any business in NYC.

~~~
beisner
Because cars in Manhattan are a blight on livability and safety. There are
only a handful of reasons to legitimately have a car in Manhattan; off the top
of my head: moving large items, transporting those with mobility issues,
getting from specific subway dead zones to other parts, and leaving manhattan
altogether. There is an enormous (albeit overloaded and dilapidated) public
transit infrastructure allowing people to both move throughout the city and
come into the city from basically anywhere in the tri state area. And even if
direct transit options into the city aren’t spectacular, you can drive to any
of the thousands of park-and-ride locations on the cheap and take public
transit from there.

There are legitimate life circumstances that necessitate driving around
manhattan, and I would be more than happy to exempt those from congestion
pricing. And I have no problem with Taxis and buses and delivery vans
operating, as they have high utilization. But private cars cause so many
problems in manhattan, including danger to pedestrians (which make up the bulk
of people in the city at any given time), noise pollution, air pollution, and
inefficiency for legitimate ground transport/logistics, that I have no problem
disincentivizing the use of them in Manhattan with large tolls. There’s a
certain hubris required to be the only occupant in a vehicle in manhattan when
the public transit infrastructure is so expansive and affordable.

And don’t even get me started on all the wasted space dedicated to parking
that could be used for public space, business, bicycle lanes, etc...

~~~
nogridbag
Everyone keeps talking about Manhattan, but the GWB bridge serves more than
Manhattan. I don't have any numbers to back this up, but I would guess the
vast amount of traffic over the bridge serves commuters between Jersey and the
other boroughs.

~~~
beisner
I'd actually wager that the vast majority of people commuting in from Jersey
work in Manhattan, rather than the other boroughs. I grew up in central
Jersey, and everyone I knew who commuted in on NJ Transit (along the Northeast
Corridor line) were commuting into Manhattan. If you worked in Queens or
Brooklyn, you'd live somewhere on Long Island. If you worked in the Bronx,
you'd live in Westchester (or north). Some fraction of people have longer
commutes, but my guess is that it would be a tiny one. You are correct, the
GWB serves a diverse set of areas (I only take the GWB to get from Jersey to
Westchester), but it's not the only means by which cars get into NYC.

Regarding why everyone talks about Manhattan, it's because it's where a huge
fraction of people in NYC live and work. While there are only 1.6 million
permanent residents of Manhattan, the population during the day swells to
around 4 million due to commuters and visitors. The outer boroughs, while busy
in their own right, operate on a completely different scale (population
actually _decreases_ during the day), because they're so spread out.

~~~
nogridbag
Don't forget the other direction. I commute from Queens to Jersey daily so my
perspective might be biased. While I don't have to pay the GWB going towards
Jersey, I still have to pay the toll going home (along with RFK or
Whitestone). Looks like I pay between $400-$600 per month just in tolls.

~~~
beisner
My apologies on the commute, can't be pleasant to go through all that traffic.
I don't think the the GWB tolls are congestion-based though, they're more for
maintenance of the infrastructure that hundreds of thousands of people drive
over daily. From my understanding of business in NJ, there are relatively few
people doing your sort of commute, so perhaps with congestion prices in
Manhattan, the amount of wear on the GWB and related infrastructure (along
with maintenance costs) might decrease, which could result in reduced GWB
tolls.

------
setgree
Weighing in as a Manhatto who works in midtown -- I welcome this! But another
fruitful option is curbing the very worst behavior attendant to driving.
Blocking the box -- apparently being policed heavily in Queens! [0] -- is
typically addressed (near times square) by having traffic cops in the streets
guiding traffic. How about tickets that scale up by orders of magnitude for
each repeat offense, i.e. $1 for the first offense and $10K for the fifth and
after that you lose your license?

The next thing I'd want to tackle is rampant honking. Not sure how to police
this but it should probably cost $10 per second that your horn is making
noise. that seems to me like a fair pricing of the externalities produced. And
if you're honking to save someone's life i.e. if they're walking into traffic
while looking at their cell phone -- ok that's a tough one.

[0] [http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2017/09/21/ridgewood-ticket-
trap...](http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2017/09/21/ridgewood-ticket-trap/)

~~~
alkonaut
Traffic violations fees should be proportional to income to really be painful
to rich people. See e.g Finland.

~~~
ghaff
Probably the worst horn honkers in Manhattan are the taxi car drivers. Not the
wealthy guy driving his Mercedes.

------
rbcgerard
A couple of things to note:

1) is who is actually causing the congestion in NYC - its my understanding
that the bulk of the congestion is caused by non-NYC residents

2) a large unaddressed component is parking - the large amount of free parking
available, especially to non-residents, creates a distorting subsidy in favor
of commuting in many areas.

If you want to read a great book on the broader subject, check out Traffic by
Tom Vanderbilt
[http://tomvanderbilt.com/books/traffic/](http://tomvanderbilt.com/books/traffic/)

------
qnk

       "drivers would not have to pay if they entered Manhattan
       by all but two of the city-owned East River bridges,
       which are now free to cross, as long as they bypassed
       the congestion zone."
    

I don't think I understand this part. Why would you have to pay if you "bypass
the congestion zone"? no matter where you're coming from. Now, if what this
means is that you don't have to pay the $11.52 fee after having already paid
the $15 (if you pay cash) for the toll fee coming from New Jersey, makes
sense.

~~~
ghaff
It's confusing the way it is written and there's no actual map but:

"In turn, that means drivers can enter Midtown and Lower Manhattan by two
bridges without paying as long as they go directly to the F.D.R. Drive along
the East River and then continue on it until they are out of the congestion
zone."

I believe what they're saying is that you still enter the congestion zone via
those two bridges but you can stay on FDR drive and exit the zone without
getting on interior streets [ADDED: and not get charged. FDR Drive is the road
that runs along the East River.]

------
thebiglebrewski
As someone living in Brooklyn who drives to NJ regularly, I wonder if this
will increase congestion on the Staten Island bound route to NJ. People will
dodge the Holland Tunnel to avoid this surcharge.

~~~
herbturbo
To be fair that's probably a good thing. The BQE and Turnpike are more
appropriate places for large amounts of through traffic than SoHo.

------
ramblenode
I won't take a position on this plan until I see the details. There are plenty
of neighborhoods south of 60th that aren't congested. And congestion varies
greatly by time of day. It would be pretty unfortunate if entities which
aren't actually contributing to congestion get swept into this scheme.
Delivery trucks need to service businesses in busy areas, but they usually
operate in the early morning when traffic is light. Likewise, taxis and
rideshares that operate during off-off hours are filling in for the reduced
service of the MTA without actually contributing to congestion.

A congestion pricing scheme that increases the efficiency of the total
transportation system would be excellent, but I am skeptical. Congestion,
whether on the subway or the road (or even the sidewalk), is already a
negative feedback loop that encourages seeking alternate routes/times. If
people are taking congested roadways, they are doing so _in spite_ of all the
other options available to them in a city with extensive public transit. I am
curious what kind of data informs this plan and whether it is primarily a
solution to transit times or just another source of revenue for the MTA.

------
rdtsc
Driving 10 miles from Northern Virginia to DC on I-66 could cost you $40:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/dr-
gridlock/wp/2017/12/0...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/dr-
gridlock/wp/2017/12/05/i-66-toll-in-virginia-reaches-new-high-of-36-50-on-
day-2/?utm_term=.ae68bc50c0f0)

Is it wrong? I don't know, usually it is not as bad. But when it got that high
and people were still jumping into the lane one has to wonder what's going on.

Granted the nearby counties are the wealthiest in the country, so maybe it
shouldn't be that shocking.

------
cseelus
I find concepts of road space rationing like in Beijing to be more fair.[1]

This plan for Manhattan will obviously only stop people with low financial
power from driving, although they might already have paid for these roads via
taxes and duties.

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_space_rationing_in_Beij...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_space_rationing_in_Beijing)

~~~
ufo
São Paulo has a similar system in place since 1996, where each vehicle has one
day a week where they are banned from using the roads during peak times.

My understanding is that it doesn't really help that much because even with
the rationing the tendency is still to saturate the roads with cars. São Paulo
is one of the cities with the worst traffic congestion in the world.
Additionally, rich people can bypass the rationing by purchasing additional
vehicles.

------
pimmen
We've been implementing these schemes across Europe for a long time. In my
home country, both Stockholm and Gothenburg has them and they're unpopular but
actually do a lot of good. My parents have finally started taking the train
and the tram again which was something they never did before and the data
shows that people are driving less in both cities now.

------
lewis500
I wrote a history of downtown congestion pricing a few months back:
[https://medium.com/@lewislehe/a-history-of-downtown-road-
pri...](https://medium.com/@lewislehe/a-history-of-downtown-road-
pricing-c7fca0ce0c03) Since then I've written it as an academic paper with a
lot more material.

~~~
ebikelaw
Thanks, that is a great contribution to the discussion. I hope in the coming
years these charging schemes will be so common that cataloging them becomes
impossible!

~~~
lewis500
Currently Vancouver is also seriously considering a scheme. I do believe they
are going to implement one.

Singapore is also switching over to a satellite-based per-km charge.

------
kevin_thibedeau
> In a key change from past efforts, drivers would not have to pay if they
> entered Manhattan by all but two of the city-owned East River bridges, which
> are now free to cross, as long as they bypassed the congestion zone.

The West side should get the same benefits.

They should also increase the motorcycle toll discount back to 20% like it was
years ago.

------
stmfreak
The article claims there are fewer cars entering the city than a year ago and
yet traffic has gotten worse! Seems we can predict the outcome of additional
incentives against driving: even worse traffic!

------
ForHackernews
The London congestion charge is £11.50, and it works pretty well.

~~~
nikon
How does it work well? The roads have never been busier.

~~~
ForHackernews
The percentage of private vehicles on London roads is lower relative to other
big cities. London streets are packed with buses, delivery vans, black cabs
and minicabs.

[https://www.centreforpublicimpact.org/case-study/demand-
mana...](https://www.centreforpublicimpact.org/case-study/demand-management-
for-roads-in-london/)

> There was a 37 percent increase in the number of passengers entering the
> congestion charging zone by bus during charging hours in the first year.

> “Greenhouse gas emission was reduced by 16 per cent from 2002 to 2003. NOX
> and PM10 within the congestion charging zone decreased by 18 per cent and 22
> per cent, respectively, by 2004."

> The scheme generated £122 million net in 2005/2006.

> By 2006, the congestion charging zone had reduced congestion in central
> London by 26 per cent from its 2002 levels.

> There have been between 40 and 70 percent fewer accidents that resulted in
> personal injury within the zone.

------
MBlume
Wow, that's not nearly enough

------
intrasight
Why do we still use pennies in commerce?

~~~
btbuildem
Because they add up to millions over time?

------
hartator
> East river bridges

Making poor people pay as always.

------
saas_co_de
It seems like it would be fairer to privatize the roads entirely and force the
people who can actually use them to pay the entire cost.

Otherwise poor people are subsidizing roads reserved for the rich that they
can't even use.

~~~
yellowstuff
Even though this pushes road use into being more of a transaction I still
don't believe that we should think about road use as a pure transaction.
Infrastructure shapes how people live, work and play. Roads that cost $12 to
drive will change the city differently than roads that cost $50 to drive on.

Specifically, I'd be worried about driving away tourists and commercial
traffic. I doubt a lot of well-off locals would start driving in Manhattan if
there were a congestion tax and less traffic, they'd keep taking Uber.

~~~
wlesieutre
Even if we did view normal everyday road use as a transaction, the road
infrastructure is critical to other services like police, fire, and ambulance
that still make sense to be funded from taxes. If you want to be able to call
the police, you're relying on roads being available.

~~~
sp332
Funding it with a progressive tax makes more sense to me than charging
everyone the same flat rate.

