Walking Is Transportation

With Alternative Congestion Pricing Plan Approved, Next Moves Are Up to City and State Elected Reps

As reported in the January 31 STREETSBLOG, the New York City Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission has approved one of five plans it had considered in order to qualify for major federal funding for traffic reduction in Manhattan's central business district.

The approved plan streamlines the original version championed by Mayor Bloomberg, reducing its cost and complexity, with guarantees that all funds generated will support mass transit improvements. The next step in the process is to secure approval from the New York State Legislature and the City Council. The feds' deadline date for legal approval of the plan from the city and state is March 31, so there's not much time left to get this done.

I plan to write to my City Council, Assembly and Senate legislators, urging their support for the plan. I hope readers of Walking is Transportation.com will consider writing their elected reps as well.

Congestion Pricing, Take 3

Attic window transoms with stained-glass insets, St. George, Staten Island

LATER TODAY, Thursday, January 24, 2008, the New York City Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission will hold hearings in each of the 'outer' boroughs on five plans designed to reduce vehicular congestion in Manhattan's Central Business District while generating revenue for major mass transit improvements citywide.

I have submitted to the Commission written testimony about the plans, which appears later in this entry.

GO AHEAD, CALL ME A FLIP-FLOPPER

I know; I know.

First I supported Mayor Bloomberg's original Congestion Pricing plan and testified in favor of it at a hearing of the New York City Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission (TCMC) late last fall.

But even as one of the plan's ardent supporters, I had to admit it sounded awfully complicated and seemed pretty expensive just to implement.

Then I thought I liked the sound of tolling the East River bridges--a simpler means of discouraging private car commuting into Manhattan's Central Business District. Not only was the bridge tolling plan projected to yield greater income than the mayor's plan; it was also projected to yield greater reductions in traffic congestion as well.

But like the original, this plan had some serious flaws.

The bridge-tolling plan charges for all trips into and out of Manhattan all the time. So it cannot distinguish between trips when traffic is light from trips that occur when congestion is heaviest. And it fails to charge for trips that start and end within Manhattan, where congestion is greatest. Further, how ever unintentionally, the bridge-tolling plan tends to penalize particular classes of drivers and particular locations, some of them small commercial vehicle operators and many of them low- and moderate-income motorists, disproportionately from Upper Manhattan and the Bronx.

I SUPPORT THE ALTERNATIVE CONGESTION PRICING PLAN

Of the three remaining plans being considered by the Commission, one fails to reduce traffic congestion adequately; the other fails to generate income for mass transit improvements. So neither of these can be considered viable. The remaining proposal, called The Alternative Congestion Pricing Plan, is a streamlining of the mayor's original PlaNYC proposal with significantly lower capital and operating costs. It also satisfies the revenue and traffic reduction mandates upon which funding by the Federal Department of Transportation depends.

Here's a profile of the Alternative Congestion Pricing Plan, taken from an interim report of the TCMC:

"The alternative congestion pricing plan is a modified approach to congestion pricing that eliminates the intra-zonal charge [$4] . . . charges inbound trips only, and moves the northern boundary of the charging zone to 60th Street [NOTE: The original plan's northern boundary was 86th Street.] Cars would be charged an $8 fee to drive into the zone on weekdays between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. Trucks would pay $21, except for low-emission trucks, which would pay $7. Under this fee-based plan, drivers would pay once upon entering the charging zone and would be able to make additional trips in and out of the zone at no additional cost. For E-Z Pass users, the value of all tolls paid on MTA or Port Authority bridges and tunnels would be deducted from the fee up to $8." [The alternative plan includes three additional measures affecting taxi/livery service vehicles, parking rates, and parking tax exemptions.]

MY WRITTEN TESTIMONY TO THE COMMISSION

Greetings to the Commissioners.

I appreciate the opportunity to share my views on this important topic. My name is Dan Icolari. I'm a 30-year resident of Staten Island; the founder of Walking is Transportation.com and a co-founder of the St. George Civic Association and the Preservation League of Staten Island. I've served on Community Board 1 and am a member of numerous Staten Island civic and cultural organizations.

As I did at an earlier hearing, I would like to declare support for the concept of congestion pricing as an approach with many benefits to offer residents of every New York City borough. Chief among these are (1)
Reduction of negative health and conduct-of-business impacts of traffic congestion; (2) Development of a new funding source for mass transit improvements; and (3) Positive impact on climate change--a global
problem with potentially life-threatening consequences for our city.

Of the several plans proposed by the New York City Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission, I support The Alternative Congestion Pricing Plan. I base my support on the alternative plan's reduced complexity
lower cost and greater ease of implementation. I believe these attributes offset the alternative plan's various weaknesses, as enumerated by the Commissioners in their interim report.

Thank you for your consideration.

Congestion Pricing, Take 2

Our house at the corner of St. Marks Place and Westervelt Avenue, St. George, Staten Island, N.Y., Thanksgiving Day, 2007

Resurrecting an old idea (and maybe a better one)

[I'm convinced that no matter which form the Feds decide to fund and the city finally adopts, Congestion Pricing will be a major benefit to pedestrians and walkers--and all New Yorkers. Not only because it'll generate the revenues needed to pay for expansion of and improvements to New York City's public transit system, but because it will make our streets safer and more pleasant for all those who use them.]

In a November 12, 2007 editorial in the Daily News, veteran transportation consultant Brian Ketcham proposes to base Mayor Bloomberg's Congestion Pricing (CP) proposal on an idea that planners, politicians and transportation activists have been yakking about for decades.

"Charging cars and trucks to get into the central business district makes perfect sense," Ketcham says, "but the rest of [Mayor Bloomberg's] scheme would be a logistical nightmare," requiring "costly administration and enforcement" and "adding little revenue."

Calling the mayor's existing CP proposal "needlessly complex," Ketcham advises the mayor to "ditch the elaborate detection grid"--"a full-scale network with 340 charging stations on Manhattan streets south of 86th St."--and replace it with a system that would "close the loophole of the four untolled East River bridges in Brooklyn and Queens."

Take 2: An alternate Congestion Pricing plan

Ketcham proposes the city install overhead charging monitors on the six inbound bridge spans and set the congestion fee so that there's no unfair difference between any CP charge and regular MTA tolls.

He would also install 19 toll collection stations that would, he says, eliminate the free ride now enjoyed by those who enter the central business district from starting points north of 60th Street.

And that's not all.

Paying for the right to occupy prime real estate

Ketcham also recommends the city "eliminate all free and long-term street parking and charge hefty garage rates at on-street meters." Such a pricing recommendation brings the cost of street parking into line with what Manhattan parking lots and garages charge and substantially boosts potential revenue.

But market-based pricing offers benefits that may be even more important. This alternate CP proposal sends the message that bringing a private car into one of the most congested sectors in the country isn't a basic human right; that streets are public spaces that must be shared; that automobiles can't continue to dictate who uses the street and how.

All in all, I think Ketcham's proposal makes a lot of sense. It's easier and less costly to implement and maintain; it makes the cost of entering the central business district by car more equitable (drivers pay the same, no matter how they get there). Ketcham's research shows that closing the various loopholes also eliminates more cars and yields more revenue than the mayor's existing CP plan.

I hope Ketcham's proposal gets the serious consideration--by the New York City Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission, among others--that it deserves.

Facing Fact

Uh-oh. It's that walking shoe image again, and you know what that means. (If you don't know what that means, see my post of November 4, 2007.)

EVEN SWEAT-WICKING GARMENTS AREN'T ENOUGH

I'm a fair weather walker. That's the fact I have to face.

I thought this year might be different. That maybe resolve and sweat-wicking polyester garments would make me more willing, even enthusiastic about stepping out of doors.

Well, winter hasn't even officially happened. The weather's been nippy, but hardly bone-chilling. Yet last night, walking the half mile or so between the ETG Book Cafe in Tompkinsville, Staten Island and my house in St. George, I realized how tense my body was. Not even below freezing, and already I'm steeling myself against the wind and the cold.

Call it a seasonal adjustment

The fundamentals haven't changed. I still walk everywhere, except when the time's too short, the distance is too great, or the weather's too bad. I'm what has changed.

In late spring, summer and early fall, I do two types of walks; those of necessity and those of discovery. On longer walks of necessity--the exciting, surprising ones--the distinction melts away and an errand becomes an adventure.

But when the weather gets below 40 degrees, as it's been on and off for the last few days, the prospect of a walk loses nearly all its appeal. Yes, the cold can be invigorating; and yes, trees in a winter landscape have a singular beauty--for somebody else.

No hibernating here

That doesn't mean Walking is Transportation.com is going into hibernation. Instead it'll cover transportation issues more generally--issues like Congestion Pricing, Bus Rapid Transit, Light vs. Heavy Rail.

It may be too early in the process to expect noticeable changes in the culture--as drivers s-l-o-w-l-y begin to realize they have to rethink their choices and their behavior--but I'll be looking for that, too.

I hope you'll stick around.

What Congestion Pricing could mean for Staten Island(ers)

Decorative gate at the top of one-block-long Pearl Street, Stapleton

NOT JUST FOR COMMUTERS TO MANHATTAN

I'll be attending tomorrow night's (November 5) Staten Island hearing of the New York City Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission at the Williamson Theatre of the College of Staten Island at 6 p.m. The commission will be taking public testimony on the congestion pricing proposal, one of many in Mayor Michael Bloomberg's ambitious and visionary PlaNYC.

The proposal would charge private cars $8 to enter the Central Business District (minus any other tolls they may have paid to get there). The proceeds would be devoted to expanding and upgrading mass transit services throughout the city to accommodate the projected increase in ridership that higher tolls and gas prices--and near-gridlock congestion-- would generate.

Those who've followed the arguments for and against Congestion Pricing probably are already familiar with the major points in contention--most but not all of which, in my view, have been manufactured by opponents to obstruct or derail a program model which has proven its viability elsewhere. One of the most vocal in its opposition, unsurprisingly, is a parking lot owners' group and its seeming mouthpiece, Assemblyman Richard L. Brodsky, a Westchester Democrat.

Following is the testimony I will present:

More vehicles = more congestion = more pollution = more pulmonary and other diseases

Staten Island is New York City's fastest-growing borough, with a mass transit infrastructure and a dispatching frequency utterly inadequate to the needs of our exploding population--one that does nothing to remedy the island's increasingly limited capacity to operate and store the numbers of vehicles we add to the existing number each year.

Expanded mass transit operations are the only solution, and the only source of funding for those operations is the Federal government--provided the city can come up with a plan that can significantly reduce the number of private vehicles entering the Central Business District each weekday. Only Congestion Pricing, or a plan very much like it, holds the promise of delivering on that requirement.

The transit solutions proposed under Congestion Pricing--like the entire transportation system on Staten Island--focus on the needs of weekday commuters to Manhattan. That's a start, but an expanded, enhanced Staten Island transit system must also respond to the needs of the many Staten Islanders who commute to jobs within the borough, do not drive, and depend exclusively on bus operations whose traditional focus has been coordination with the schedule of the Staten Island Ferry.

How to avoid two, three or more cars in every driveway

Staten Island's notoriously poor bus service practically guarantees that, as soon as they can, islanders abandon the bus, one of the most efficient transport modes, for the private automobile, the least efficient and most polluting. We need service that's so good, and such a good value, that people will want to leave their cars at home and walk to the bus stop or the railway station--whether they're commuting to Manhattan, shopping in New Springville, or visiting family in Grasmere. Congestion Pricing can start to move us toward that goal.

Poor bus transit, more than any other factor, actually promotes two- and three-car households, and the health problems, congestion, pollution, lost time and lost productivity that adding more population and more cars inevitably brings about. Over time, Congestion Pricing can help to bring Staten Island's use of mass transit more in line with that of the other boroughs.

Congestion pricing NOW

This New York City borough is, or soon will be, built out. Building new major roadways is simply not an option. Widening existing roads to accommodate increased traffic, where feasible, is really just a Band-Aid. Only a major investment in our mass transportation infrastructure can help us reduce congestion, improve air quality, better accommodate our current transportation needs and better prepare for the increased demand we all know is coming. That major investment will come only from the Feds and only if the plan submitted can meet their requirements. That plan is Congestion Pricing.

Thank you.