: Seeking Other Options: Alternative Congestion Pricing Plans Tackle Issues of Traffic, Use, Funds

Honk, gas, brake. Honk, gas, brake.
Increasingly, traffic in New York City is about as certain as death and taxes. Commutes are getting longer and more crowded whether by car, bus or train, this is agreed across the city.
Honk, gas, brake. Honk, gas, brake.
In Queens, the Long Island, Van Wyck, Grand Central and Brooklyn-Queens expressways are among the most notorious in the nation as less-than-reliable thoroughfares. Radio stations might as well not even bother updating during rush hour as it only disappoints.
At Community Board 4, Tuesday night, Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s ostensible plan to charge every car a daily fee of $8 to enter Manhattan between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. in the central business district, below 86th Street, was criticized.
“It’s making Manhattan too expensive for middle and low-class families,” board member Judith D’Andrea said.
“What about the seniors on fixed income who have to go into Manhattan for doctor’s appointments,” board member James Lisa asked.
“I already can’t find a place to park,” Roberto Brun, board member, said.

Alternative Plans
There are many stones to throw at the mayor’s plan and besides, the public, Council members, Assembly members, senators, lobbyists and interest groups have all cocked back their arms and lofted their opinions and alternative plans in hopes of changing the underlying idea of congestion pricing.
Probably the heftiest plan in the stack was filed by Councilman Lew Fidler (D-Brooklyn).
Six weeks before the mayor unveiled his plan this spring, Fidler tried to pass a resolution in City Hall not to consider congestion pricing.
“I shouldn’t have done that,” he said. “The mayor’s plan has done a good job in raising a couple important issues like ‘how are we going to clean our air’ and bringing them to debate.”
The mayor’s plan anticipates a 6.5 percent reduction in the number of vehicles entering Manhattan south of 86th Street, which will clean the City’s air. New York has the second dirtiest air in the country after Los Angeles.
Never one to back down, Fidler spent six months crafting his “Nine Carat Stone Plan,” that derides at the mayor’s plan for being “Manhattan-central.”
“The mayor’s plan only cleans up the air in the central business district,” he said. “We should think bigger to clean everyone’s air.”

Dig This Idea
Fidler’s plan calls for the construction of three new tunnels. His first tunnel would be the Cross Harbor Freight Tunnel connecting New Jersey to the outer boroughs, which according to his calculations will take about 1 million trucks off the streets every year. His second tunnel would connect Staten Island to New York City’s subway system. And his third would sink the Gowanus Expressway in Brooklyn.
However, Dan Hendrick, spokesman for the New York League of Conservation Voters and proponent for the mayor’s plan, said politicians have been talking about these tunnels for years and it has never taken off.
“It really neglects the politics,” he said.
All in all, Fidler is asking for about $30 billion worth of projects over several years, which he suggests could be paid for by a .0033 percent payroll tax on businesses.
“A payroll tax would not cost as much to collect as congestion pricing would,” he said, “and would not burden only the people who have to commute into Manhattan.”

Financial Fiction?
Keep NYC Congestion Tax Free, an ad-hoc group against the mayor’s plan, supports the idea that congestion pricing would cost too much to operate.
According to their numbers, the plan loses 39 percent of all revenues raised to its cost of operation by installing video cameras and new toll stations and maintaining the operation.
However, by the mayor’s numbers, the plan stands to make roughly $400 million in the first year and up to $900 million by 2030, all of which is earmarked to go toward public transportation upgrades. Fidler calls these numbers “dartboard economics.”
The mayor’s plan is banking on $354 million from the federal government to kick start the plan. The money was awarded through its Urban Partnership Agreement to New York to implement a price congestion program no later than March 31, 2009.
Noah Budnick, deputy director of Transportation Alternatives, a New York City advocacy group, said his organization will act as watchdogs over the money and make sure every penny is spent on bettering public transportation.
“We’re fighting tooth and nail for the mayor’s plan,” he said. “It’s the only one that cleans the air and improves the quality of life.”

Outer Borough Burden?
Budnick said the mayor’s plan would add 105 additional busses in Queens and reduce traffic in Long Island City by 27 percent, cleaning the air in the highly-asthmatic Western Queens.
Still people like State Sen. John Sabini (D-Jackson Heights) do not see the mayor’s plan as improving the congestion already apparent in many neighborhoods in Queens.
“People are going to drive to places with good access to highways, like Astoria and Long Island City, park and take the train in,” he said. “It’s going to put a tremendous burden on Western Queens.”
The New York City Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission, a group formed to take public input on the mayor’s plan and make suggestions due Jan. 31, where it will then be passed to City Council for a vote, has been taking testimony from concerned citizens and officials alike.
Borough President Helen Marshal told the commission Queens residents drive into the Manhattan area zoned for congestion pricing more often than residents of other boroughs because there are only four major subway lines, a handful of buses and all too infrequent Long Island Rail Road service.
“Reopen strategic LIRR stations in Queens,” she said in her testimony. “The mayor has agreed to my first priority, the Elmhurst station, which will provide much needed relief to the E and 7 lines. Increase LIRR stop frequency – especially at Main Street in Flushing and at Woodside. Add articulated buses on main thoroughfares such as Queens and Northern Boulevards and wherever heavily traveled routes will physically allow them.”
The Mayor’s plan does answer a majority of Marshal’s cries, but then again, it’ only on paper. It also promises a faster ferry service from the Rockaways.
Assemblywoman Cathy Nolan (D-Woodside) pointed out there is no additional parking for Queens in the Mayor’s plan
“Everyone goes to Long Island City now anyway,” she said. “What’s going to happen when the mayor starts charging $8 to go over the [now free] Queensboro Bridge.”
The city has begun a series of public parking workshops, two of which are in Queens. The first is 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 15 at The Learning Center, 43-82 Vernon Blvd. and the second is 7 p.m. Nov. 29 at Forest Hills Jewish Center, 106-06 Queens Blvd.

Who Is Affected?
Also fighting for Queens is Councilman David Weprin (D-Hollis), who also proposed a plan of his own.
“The current plan, as proposed earlier this year by the mayor, is a regressive tax that punishes the middle class and working families,” he said in a written statement.
Budnick also argues the mayor’s plan does not hit the pockets of the working-class as many think.
According to a study by his organization, 95.5 percent of the borough’s workforce either does not work in downtown Manhattan or already uses public transportation, walks or bikes.
In testimony released to New York City’s Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission, Karla Quantero of Transportation Alternative said, “Of Queens’ workers bound for the proposed congestion pricing zone, 87 percent take transit, walk, bike or carpool there, and 85 percent of these transit riders live within a five to 10 minute walk of a subway or Long Island Rail Road station. Only 4.5 percent of the borough’s workers drive alone to the proposed congestion pricing zone, and most of them have a time-competitive transit option that they choose not to take.”
Corey Bearak, a lobbyist for Keep NYC Congestion Tax Free and president of Queens Civic Congress, said the primary flaw in the mayor’s plan is it taxes all vehicles whether or not they are a direct cause of congestion.
“What about the seniors who have to get to the hospital in Manhattan every day,” he said.
Bearak’s group put forward its own plan that calls for an increase in various fines and fees throughout the City, which they deem currently undervalued.
In the end, for Councilman John Liu (D-Flushing), who chairs the Transportation Committee, the mayor’s plan seems the most viable.
“It’s not perfect, but I do support it,” he said. “For the primary purpose that he fulfills his promises to Queens and the City.”