There was a time when there were no automobiles in New York City, but there was lots of public transportation. (Ok, there were horses and the consequent manure, and the population was way smaller then. But still...)
Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
241–250 of 735 posts
Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#242Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can live in an urban neighborhood and only use your car a few times a week (mostly on weekends and for yearly kid doctor visits). Its not just Manhattan, Seattle supports this as well (well, you still "need" a car, but you can get away with not driving it very often). You need to be strategic about where you live (e.g. buying the house 7 minutes away from your kid's K-8 and 10 minutes away from his future 9-12, w…
> You need to be strategic about where you live (e.g. buying the house ... I wonder what % (presumably low) of the population can live in SFHs and achieve this cities like Seattle. I should try finding if there's available work that's made visualizations of this sort of things ("How many homes could be within X miles or minutes of A B and C" for SFH, Quadplex, 5-over-1s etc.)
You aren’t exactly going to find an SFH in the suburbs that is much cheaper. So you have a point, but you have to choose between an SFH, a similar priced townhome (basically an SFH without a yard), or a condo with an HOA, all basically unaffordable unless you want to commute from Kent or Marysville. Seattle still has density (the townhome I live in in Ballard is one of three that used to be one SFH).
Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, just imagine. I did. For hours yesterday evening I imagined. Had a car killed my wife or unborn child, there would have been a legal trail and insurance. Had the e-bike killed my wife or unborn child, there was neither. I doubt I could ever find the killer of the unborn child if the baby died later due to injuries-- there's neither license nor registration on an e-bike. Pushing powered transportation into the u…
You would likely be unhappy if you saw the outcomes of almost all vehicle manslaughter cases. It’s the easiest way to kill someone and get away with it consequence free
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Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#244Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#245Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can live in an urban neighborhood and only use your car a few times a week (mostly on weekends and for yearly kid doctor visits). Its not just Manhattan, Seattle supports this as well (well, you still "need" a car, but you can get away with not driving it very often). You need to be strategic about where you live (e.g. buying the house 7 minutes away from your kid's K-8 and 10 minutes away from his future 9-12, w…
Self-driving cars are going to turn America's car-centric "hellscape" into a superpower with untold second order benefits. Everything will be connected and commutable, especially the suburbs. Automated, on-demand delivery will become a part of everyday life. Instead of busses and semis, we'll have small pods for smaller cargo and small parties. Highways will turn into logistics corridors, and we'll route people and g…
China is going to reap more benefits from self driving cars, but they also have (in many cities at least) mass transit in place to truly do multi-modal trips (self driving cars at the end tips of subway rides).
The problem with self driving cars is that they can only optimize road bandwidth a bit more than they are now (and even then, only if you outlaw human drivers), they aren’t a magical shortcut to increasing bandwidth beyond indicated demand (like mass transit can).
Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#246Earlier quoted context omitted.
If public transit even remotely resembled anything in China or Japan, Americans would ditch their cars in a heartbeat. But every train ride I've been on to Manhattan is like commuting through an open sewer while being harassed by strangers doing an obnoxious dance with a bluetooth speaker in my face, dodging puddles of urine, and wondering if today's the day I'll be thrown off the platform. Of course people would rat…
I’ve taken the train a lot in and around NYC, including a ton of subway trips. While the experience you’re describing is certainly not so rare as to be nonexistent, it’s also far from the norm. The large, large majority of subway rides I’ve taken (99% at least) were complete non-events. Perhaps you’re unlucky?
A few points.
1. A 1b. Of course, people get in car accidents all the time. However, rightly or wrongly, people feel more in control when they're driving compared to when they're using public transit (or similarly, taking a commercial flight), which makes them feel better about it. And there is some element of sense here: accidents do not occur evenly among the population, because some drivers are better and more alert than others.
2. If you're traveling with small children, the various (however rare it may be) unpleasantries of NYC public transit become an order of magnitude more unpleasant.
3. There certainly is an element of Stockholm syndrome among NYC transit users, in that other very large cities around the world with ridership comparable to NYC have very little antisocial dysfunction, but in NYC it often gets waved away as "part and parcel of living in a big city".
Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#247The increased speeds are excellent for those who can afford the toll. This is a universal benefit of toll roads for those people.
Also excellent for those public transport riders who can't afford car ownership.
For completeness, might as well add not excellent for those who have a car, find driving more convenient, but can’t afford the toll.
Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#248Earlier quoted context omitted.
Those people simply don't drive into Manhattan, parking is already $30-$40 a day, driving from Jersey means you are already paying at least a $15 toll (you can drive from Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx without paying a toll). An extra $9 simply doesn't matter. Already 85% of commuters to lower Manhattan take public transit. Of the remaining 15%. An analysis found that only 2% of working poor New Yorkers would pay th…
While I am sympathetic to the general gist of the "poors aren't the subject of this tax" argument but the change in denominator "85% in this zone" to "2% of the city's working poor" is obvious and it's kind of concerning that with the huge efforts that went into quantifying this they couldn't come up with something more precise. It's not like NYC doesn't have cameras everywhere and couldn't probably figure it pretty…
> I am sympathetic to the general gist of the "poors aren't the subject of this tax" argument but the change in denominator "85% in this zone" to "2% of the city's working poor" is obvious and it's kind of concerning
Why? Do you want to know something other than the second statistic?
Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#249Earlier quoted context omitted.
The trains and subway are right there...
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I can't find any source online that says felony assaults on the subway are up 9% this year. Even the Post, which is typically inclined towards hyping crime rates, reports that felony assault rates are flat this year[1]. The same source claims that major offenses have dropped 18% YoY so far.
As with so many other things about NYC, salacious stories are given a funhouse mirror effect: you wouldn't want to fill your car's gas tank next to someone who has a victim in their trunk, but that person isn't being given national news coverage like the corpse abuser was.
[1]: https://nypost.com/2025/04/03/us-news/nyc-subway-crime-drops...
Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York
#250Earlier quoted context omitted.
Did you have children or did you live alone?
As someone with children, I can not imagine the bliss of living in Manhattan and being able to do things without needing a car. Car-centric urban planning is hell with kids. You have to load them up into the car for any small trip. You can't walk or bike anywhere because cars make it so dangerous. My only regret about living in the US is this car hellscape that is so hard to avoid. It's mandated by law, not chosen by…
Oof. I know people with kids in the city, and it seems like if you're taking public transit, it's a nightmare when they're little.
(When they're teenagers who knows, you have new problems)
People who live outside of Manhattan have more space and sometimes the optional car.
The professionals are paying an absolute fortune for child care, a salary's worth, and more for bigger apartments in nice neighborhoods.
It's no joke. You'd better be obsessed with the city, or a short commute, because otherwise you're moving to Westchester or NJ or LI.