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New York City will charge drivers going downtown

cnn.com

151–160 of 700 posts

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NYC, and Manhattan specifically, is one of the rare places in the country where having a car is almost virtually unnecessary. In downtown, cars are already playthings of the rich: Just parking the car during peak hours can run you hundreds dollars of per month. The core of NYC has walkable infrastructure and an amazing public transportation infrastructure (at least compared to much of the rest of the country). For th…

It is now over a thousand per month for a dedicated space in Manhattan, and that seems to be about the right price.

There are plenty of garages in Manhattan with monthly rates around 500. It really depends on neighborhood

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#152
post #110

So rich people (who really do not care about few dollars) will be able to drive to downtown just for fun. while poor people who truly need to come to downtown by car will struggle. This is an unfortunate reality of life: wealth equates to more available time.

This “poor people will be affected more” is a tired refrain. That is always obviously true, given the consequences of being poor. Not every solution can or has to solve the wealth/income gap. Solve congestion with one solution, solve wealth redistribution with another.

Also, at least with congestion pricing, those wealthy drivers will be funding the public transit system for the rest of society.

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#154
post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, more reason to adjust to car book value.

Do expensive cars create worse traffic?

No but their drivers can pay more thus increasing revenue for public transit, like income all taxes should be progressive :)

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#155
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That nice bag also accounts for >300x more CO2 than the plastic bag it replaced.

Well, that's not the only metric. But, yes, cotton bags in particular are generally considered to have the most impact. (Somewhat ironically my nicest ones come from an environmental organization I belong to.) It probably, in general, falls into the category of performative environmentalism even if it led me to change behavior in a way I personally prefer most of the time. (It doesn't apply immediately around where I…

Yeah, I'm not sure cities should be legislating you to behave in a way that you personally prefer. They should be legislating things that are beneficial for the city and aren't preferable to people.

Also, cotton bags emit about 7000-10000x as much CO2 as plastic bags, while the re-usable bags made from recycled plastic are in the hundreds - you can actually break even on CO2 with those bags if you are careful with them and make sure they don't break before the ~300th use.

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#156
post #133
post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

London and unitary authorities don't have a county above them.

I assumed that was in the context of the US. Country governments in the US vary a lot in how powerful they are from being mostly a judicial unit or organization to being pretty powerful (e.g. parishes in Louisiana).

New York City, which is implementing this, is a bit of a weird case in that it actually sits above the counties, not below them. New York's five boroughs are technically five counties.

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#158
post #25
post #12

See also: London congestion charge: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_congestion_charge Singapore Electronic Road Pricing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Road_Pricing Stockholm congestion tax: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_congestion_tax

When I saw London doing that, I expected cities in the US to start that. I am surprised it took so long. I expected this because of the push of toll roads to make people use EZPASS. Depending upon the City, I think this makes sense. But, in the US, I wonder if this will cause another mass migration of people out to the suburbs ? In the US, people are more addicted to their SUVs than heron addicts are to their drug.

Mass migration to Statin Island, Brooklyn, and Flushing.

I've been interested in cities with rail trails and the like. For example, San Antonio with the many mile extension of the Riverwalk along the San Antonio river and Atlanta with the Belt Line have created non motorized vehicle corridors through the respective cities which have spurred incredible amounts of mixed use development for miles on each side of the walking, peddle biking pathways. The most expensive real estate butting the pathway with bars, restaurants, yoga studies in the lower levels of the new buildings and with less and less expensive real estate pushing away from the sides of the path ways out words. Rather than having concentration of wealth at a circular center, the concentration is linear which has a side effect of having lower income house available in closer proximity to the wealthy areas.

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, given sufficient externalities, this is true. As an example, watch this fictional response to the fact that better cars cost more: Let's get the poors out of safe cars. The peasant class belongs in beaters, while the rich ride safe. Consider the choices necessary to make that statement untrue.

You mean how the richer you are, the bigger (and safer) the vehicle you can afford? I drive by many parents taking their kids wherever in old corollas or kias or other small car, and I see many parents at my kids’ daycare dropping their kids off in large suburbans/F150/Sequoia/etc.

If you want safer vehicles across the board, get rid of cafe and other efficiency regulations.

At this point in the current regulatory framework, safety and efficiency are in direct competition.

Re: New York City will charge drivers going downtown

#160
post #110

So rich people (who really do not care about few dollars) will be able to drive to downtown just for fun. while poor people who truly need to come to downtown by car will struggle. This is an unfortunate reality of life: wealth equates to more available time.

This “poor people will be affected more” is a tired refrain. That is always obviously true, given the consequences of being poor. Not every solution can or has to solve the wealth/income gap. Solve congestion with one solution, solve wealth redistribution with another.

> is a tired refrain.

Only non-poor people can say something as reactionary as that. Or people who are not friends or relatives with poor people. A populist backlash that will bring some of the middle-class egoism down is long over-due, and not only in the States.

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