141–150 of 653 posts
This seems to be selling use of the public roads to rich people (who can more easily afford the tolls). Isn't this a step backwards for social justice?
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Most transit agencies have this problem of the "vicious transit cycle" - people don't take the bus because it's too infrequent/unreliable => more cars make the buses more unreliable => less money because so few people take it => back to start. It's amazing when you're sitting in a bus behind 20 cars backed up over 4 blocks, and you look back and there's 50 people on the bus. Really makes you think why the 50-person b…
And if you look to places like Meixco City and Bogota, their bus rapid transit is very fast and efficient. But good luck taking away a single lane of traffic for dedicated bus services anywhere in the US.
This road right here in a west coast US city used to be four lanes of car traffic (two in each direction), but two (one in each direction) were taken out and dedicated for bus service.
It could have been separated into two very normal things: tolls and parking fees. Every city has those. NYC could have played with those knobs until they got mostly the same effect but there would have never been any nonsense about it being illegal or unconstitutional or whatever car advocates are saying.
Even if this works, it will always be hated and fought by a large minority.
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Sounds right. Here in SF, instead of police pulling over people who speed and run stop signs, we're getting rid of parking spots within 20ft of intersections so people speeding and running stop signs can see if they're about to kill a pedestrian. Could raise a fortune for public transit if we enforced traffic laws and used that money.
Because police can't physically be in every intersection at once, and there's research that shows that removing parking around intersections reduces pedestrian fatalities. They could add cameras, but I bet you that people would fight tooth and nail against that as well... not being able to park within 20ft of an intersection doesn't cause any privacy issues, or funnel money into the city councilman's cousin's company…
Can we compromise at some number greater than 0? I've lived here for more than a decade and don't remember seeing anyone getting pulled over by SFPD.
What I am interested to know but cannot find is: Are there are cameras inside the zone tracking cars to bill them if you are already in the zone, or if cameras only track entry to the zone? (i.e. cameras only on the border). If someone happens to evade the cameras, do they catch them eventually just by traveling within the zone? I believe London for example has internal zone cameras. The purpose being, first of all,…
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Well, hell, let's think about everyone who choked to death in New York. Krazy Kat should levy a masticulation tax below 60th street. It'll be easier to get a table! Think of all the environmental benefits of not eating fancy foods!
>The peer who called out agency makes the right point. I choose to drive and I accept the baseline danger of driving. Pedestrians get killed by car crashes all the time, and they never accepted that baseline danger of driving.
This seems to be selling use of the public roads to rich people (who can more easily afford the tolls). Isn't this a step backwards for social justice?
It's not "having a lot of money". It's actually "having a lot of options".
By definition, rich people will have more ways to get around than poor people. The rich can hire a limo, hop in a helicopter, and even take a trip to space.
Is it a social injustice that not everyone can afford a limo, helicopter, or spaceship?
I do not think it's bad to take steps to make driving an activity for richer people, to make it a luxury that it initially was when cars were invented.
On the flip side of things, look at what the dream of mass-market affordable cars, free highways, and free parking have done to society: Swathes of land wasted for parking, low density cities that kill walking/cycling/transit, millions of people dying in car crashes, endless congestion and lane-widening.
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Most transit agencies have this problem of the "vicious transit cycle" - people don't take the bus because it's too infrequent/unreliable => more cars make the buses more unreliable => less money because so few people take it => back to start. It's amazing when you're sitting in a bus behind 20 cars backed up over 4 blocks, and you look back and there's 50 people on the bus. Really makes you think why the 50-person b…
Nah. Most agencies have a problem of people realizing that wasting life in buses is not worth it. Transit can never compete with cars on speed in well-designed cities.
Cars are the least efficient form of mass transit yet devised. They take up inordinate amounts of space to move very few people. This creates unavoidable congestion problems at very realistic levels of urban density, problems which are only solvable by enabling people to use viable alternatives.
This is why the subway and buses in Manhattan move 5x and 2x more people respectively per day than cars. (https://new.mta.info/agency/new-york-city-transit/subway-bus...) (https://www.reuters.com/world/us/manhattan-drivers-face-9-fe...)
Speaking of "wasting life in buses", did you know that the average LA / Chicago / NYC driver spends 85 to 100 hours a year just sitting in traffic? Food for thought (https://inrix.com/scorecard/)
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Well, hell, let's think about everyone who choked to death in New York. Krazy Kat should levy a masticulation tax below 60th street. It'll be easier to get a table! Think of all the environmental benefits of not eating fancy foods!
>The peer who called out agency makes the right point. I choose to drive and I accept the baseline danger of driving. Pedestrians get killed by car crashes all the time, and they never accepted that baseline danger of driving.
I'm incredibly hopeful that NYC congestion pricing pays off in a big way - and that we start to see it in other cities across America. I really, really want congestion pricing in downtown SF. During rush hour, cars block the box and slow down busses, with cascading effects.
I think it's highly unlikely to result in positive effects. I would be hoping that it only harms NYC economic condition "a little", as the best case outcome. This falls solidly in the "it sounds good but causes significant negative unintended consequences" bucket of regulation, like the rest of NYC's many regulations that led up to this point.
Congestion pricing is a way to price an externality, which is usually a good thing compared to externalities being free.