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In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

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Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#251

Post by sebstefan »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #199

I'm curious how congestion pricing became a national issue. The strength of conviction people have about this policy–almost either way, but certainly among those against–seems to scale with distance from the city. Nobody in Idaho gets uppity about New Jersey's tolls. But they have strong, knowledge-free, almost identity-defining opinions about congestion charges. Is it because it's a policy that's worked in Europe an…

Probably very clear-cut, right? "No parking, no business" never made sense, but it makes even less sense in a city where cars are involved in less than a third of all trips

Especially considering that

* Congestion is an opportunity cost in itself already, which is paid in wasted time by all road users, impacting mostly those who spend a long time on the road, which is busses, taxis, professionals and delivery drivers, as they spend the most amount of time actually driving in congested roads

* Congestion pricing forces trips to self-select on cost/benefits in actual dollars, instead of time, so you optimize for wealthier trip takers, short stays or high value trips, where before you would favor long stays (which make looking for parking forever not so bad), and people who don't value their time very much

* Car use remains heavily subsidized, as motorists do not come close to paying the full costs associated with their road usage

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#252

Post by oatmeal1 »

offsign wrote: post #229

One thing that irks me about these schemes is that they often ignore cities role as regional hubs -- i.e. many cities became cities because they serve as geographical gateways interlocking the surrounding region. They are happy to take the benefits of being at the hub, but (increasingly) adopt a nativistic dialogue with the rest of the spokes. I get that no one likes highways running through their communities, but wh…

It doesn't seem reasonable to complain that multitudes more of people should substantially worsen their everyday trips and suffer much higher risk of being killed by cars to make occasional trips that would pass through the city more convenient.

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#253

Post by raldi »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #199

I'm curious how congestion pricing became a national issue. The strength of conviction people have about this policy–almost either way, but certainly among those against–seems to scale with distance from the city. Nobody in Idaho gets uppity about New Jersey's tolls. But they have strong, knowledge-free, almost identity-defining opinions about congestion charges. Is it because it's a policy that's worked in Europe an…

It’s a national issue because as soon as one city tries it out and it turns out to be pretty good and none of the doom scenarios ensue, congestion-charge opponents all over America lose most of their talking points.

Best they can do now is, “Well, we’re not New York.”

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#254

Post by kspacewalk2 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #199

I'm curious how congestion pricing became a national issue. The strength of conviction people have about this policy–almost either way, but certainly among those against–seems to scale with distance from the city. Nobody in Idaho gets uppity about New Jersey's tolls. But they have strong, knowledge-free, almost identity-defining opinions about congestion charges. Is it because it's a policy that's worked in Europe an…

Attention economy, the algorithm, rage-bait, maximizing engagement, doomscrolling - pick your buzzword. Individual people care about all sorts of weird things, but on average, this and no other reason is why a person in Idaho suddenly finds themselves caring about Manhattan congestion pricing. It's easy to point a finger and laugh/marvel when it's something so obviously absurd to you, but of course you and I both have entirely different blind spots where our attention is marshalled and our opinion is formed by the rage-bait engine. Ours must seem preposterous to those on the outside looking in, too.

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#255

Post by iambateman »

thmsths wrote: post #240
somewhereoutth wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and would it be true to say that regenerative braking on electric cars reduces significantly this dust?

I recall a discussion on HN explaining that while true, this might be offset by the higher average weight of EVs, leading to more dust from the tires and the road. Again, no easy solution unfortunately, just trade offs.

If that were true of tires, you would expect an EV’s tires to get substantially less range before wearing out…which I don’t believe is the case.

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#256

Post by bluGill »

taeric wrote: post #227
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #199

I'm curious how congestion pricing became a national issue. The strength of conviction people have about this policy–almost either way, but certainly among those against–seems to scale with distance from the city. Nobody in Idaho gets uppity about New Jersey's tolls. But they have strong, knowledge-free, almost identity-defining opinions about congestion charges. Is it because it's a policy that's worked in Europe an…

Feels like this is the curse of modern US politics. I'm convinced the majority of people that "want high speed rail in CA" don't live in CA. Further away they live, the stronger they will argue for why we should have it.

Just to defend myself (similar to what I said in a different thread): I live in an area that would be marginal for high speed rail, but I still want it. If the US can get a great high speed rail network it would make sense to bring that to me, but as one of the last lines built! If CA can't build a good HSR where it should obviously work out there is no way it is worth trying here. They have to make the mistakes and then learn from them (this is the harder part!) in order to bring something to me where there can be no mistakes.

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#257

Post by coryrc »

thmsths wrote: post #240
somewhereoutth wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and would it be true to say that regenerative braking on electric cars reduces significantly this dust?

I recall a discussion on HN explaining that while true, this might be offset by the higher average weight of EVs, leading to more dust from the tires and the road. Again, no easy solution unfortunately, just trade offs.

Additional weight (which is minor; of best-selling vehicles, F-150 curb weight is 4000-5600 lbs, Tesla Model Y is 4400-4600 lbs) does not meaningfully increase brake wear because the brakes don't get used.

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#258

Post by aeronaut80 »

Spivak wrote: post #116
Angostura wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because a lot if EV buyers are interested in the environmental impact of their purchase?

I say this as someone who owns an electric scooter and whose next car will be an EV—the sales pitch for EVs right now is basically pay more (especially now that the tax credit is gone) to have a worse time and maybe eventually claw some of it back over the lifetime of the car in fuel savings. The environmental impact is the pro in the pro con list. So if that doesn't pan out, or doesn't pan out enough it's going to b…

One of the biggest bonuses for me is never needing to go to a gas station. So much more pleasant to charge at home overnight, or at charge stations if I’m on a road trip. I can’t imagine buying an ICE car ever again.

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#259

Post by drewbeck »

offsign wrote: post #229

One thing that irks me about these schemes is that they often ignore cities role as regional hubs -- i.e. many cities became cities because they serve as geographical gateways interlocking the surrounding region. They are happy to take the benefits of being at the hub, but (increasingly) adopt a nativistic dialogue with the rest of the spokes. I get that no one likes highways running through their communities, but wh…

> it's somewhat inevitable that the network get snarled.

Is this happening in/around NYC?

> Sure, I'll 'just take public transport' to go downtown, but the options significantly diminish if I want to travel from North Bay to South Bay to see my parents, or Jersey to South Brooklyn to visit my inlaws.

The are the same, you just have to pay the fee.

Also, for like 90% of NJ you'd be going the southern route into Brooklyn anyway, no congestion pricing involved.

Re: In New York City, congestion pricing leads to marked drop in pollution

#260

Post by Jon_Lowtek »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #191
awongh wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But a 6000 pound truck doesn't get replaced with an EV sedan. Or vice versa. As things move to EV I don't know why the proportion of car body types (whatever you call this) wouldn't stay the same.

Yes, but that 24% increase in Europe is partly due to increase in vehicle size. Vehicle size is increasing over time in Europe, and the average EV is newer. Also, cars designed as pure EV's are a lot lighter than EV's built on an ICE chassis. A Telsa 3 is about 2% heavier than a BMW 3 whereas a Ford Lightning is 20% heavier than the comparable F-150.

the 24% increase has nothing to do with car size over time in europa.

Table 2 in the paper lists which cars where compared, and that 24% numbers is an average from comparing models where manufacturers offer EV and ICE variants.

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