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NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

congestion-pricing-tracker.com

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Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#271

Post by paulgb »

tomp wrote: post #266
paulgb wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a New Yorker, a few things made me a proponent of congestion pricing: - watching people have to squeeze between stopped (mostly single-occupant) cars blocking sidewalks on Broome or Canal on their own pedestrian light at rush hour, and realizing that it would be impossible for someone with a stroller or mobility aid. - seeing packed busses miss light cycles because the intersection is blocked - seeing ambulances o…

All these issues have better solutions than congestion pricing. Cars blocking intersections and/or sidewalks can easily be solved with automated traffic fines - that's how Zurich and London does it (the former without any congestion pricing!) Many cities also have special lanes only useable by some classes of vehicles - e.g. busses (or sometimes taxis as well) - I guess ambulances could also use those. In fact, conge…

> Cars blocking intersections and/or sidewalks can easily be solved with automated traffic fines

Rush hour traffic is so gridlocked that cars often can’t know if they will clear a light cycle, so fining would effectively just reduce to a stochastic congestion tax.

NYC does have some dedicated bus lanes, but adding more means reallocating more space from cars which is a political no-go without reducing the number of cars first. That’s what congestion pricing aims to do.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#272

Post by [deleted] »

boroboro4 wrote: post #192
RhysU wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have some agency. I can drive faster or slower, more or less aggressively, choose a vehicle based on safety, not drive in bad weather or when the bars let out, drive more or less frequently. I can't control if some batshit crazy tries to set me on fire, aside from riding the subway less. I do ride the subway, BTW. But I definitely do not habitually walk as close to the platform edge as I used to given how public sa…

You have way more control over batshit crazies than riding the subway less. You can change the subway car, fight, ask for help, engage the police. And let’s face it - you never gonna be this person who got burnt.

[deleted]

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#273

Post by blitzar »

cyberax wrote: post #107
maxwellg wrote: post #11

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.

> During rush hour, cars block the box and slow down busses, with cascading effects. Then stop digging deeper and improve the car infrastructure instead of sabotaging it.

Gotta double all the road widths then. Doesn't leave room for any buildings in Manhattan, but will ease the congestion.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#275

Post by AnthonyMouse »

leetcrew wrote: post #100
tlogan wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The goal is straightforward: make driving more pleasant for wealthy people. Rich Democrats will claim it’s beneficial for the environment, while rich Republicans will call it capitalism at work. In the end, improving public transit isn’t really on their radar. And they rule the world.

buses and cars compete for the same right of way. improving one mode necessarily comes at the cost of the other, but many more people can be moved with a bus. trains would be even better, but people don't like to see the price tag. almost not worth discussing honestly. this has become yet another factionalized holy war over the last decade.

> buses and cars compete for the same right of way. improving one mode necessarily comes at the cost of the other

This is not true at all. Some ways of increasing throughput for both: Build higher density housing which allows more people to take the bus/train and reduces congestion even for the people who still have to drive, add more lanes that either can use (e.g. by building parking garages and then converting street parking to travel lanes), make streets one-way on alternating blocks (reduces congestion at intersections), build pedestrian catwalks above busy intersections to reduce pedestrian-induced congestion and keep pedestrians safer, etc.

> but many more people can be moved with a bus.

The "can" is really the problem. If you do the numbers for a full bus the bus seems very attractive, but then to run buses to everywhere that everyone travels in cars without an impractical amount of latency, many of the buses would end up having only one or two passengers -- and sometimes none -- while still requiring three times the space and fuel of a car and on top of that requiring a separate driver at significant expense.

So instead there is no bus that goes to those places at those times. And since you can't get those people on a bus, they're reasonably going to demand a solution that doesn't make their life miserable when they have to drive a car.

> trains would be even better, but people don't like to see the price tag.

Trains (especially subways) work great in the areas with the population density to justify them. But now you're back to needing higher density housing.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#276

Post by blitzar »

RhysU wrote: post #83
paxys wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Close to 5 million people ride MTA trains and buses every day. And that number gets much higher if you include commuter rail, NJ Transit, PATH, ferries etc. operating in the city. Over 70% of daily commuters in NYC already use some form of public transit, and 90% of those commuting into Manhattan use public transit. All the "the subways are too crime ridden to use" shouts are pure propaganda. If millions of New Yorke…

Calling it "pure propaganda" is itself pure propaganda. Counterpoint, this poor soul who was literally burned to death: https://nypost.com/2024/12/31/us-news/mystery-woman-torched-... The subway is worse than it was pre-Covid. Congestion pricing will not address that. "Suck it up cowards" is hardly good public policy.

100% off all home invasions occur in peoples residences and can be a terrifying and often deadly experience. It is recommended that if you want to avoid these crimes you stay away from homes.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#277

Post by pjc50 »

supernova87a wrote: post #68
throwaway48476 wrote: post #58

There's a lot of interest in forcing people to use public transit but relatively little interest in making transit something people want to use. If people think they're going to be stabbed or assaulted they're not going to want to use it. Other countries don't have this problem and until the transit types realize this normal people are going to reject transit alltogether.

The USA needs to work on: -- making the cost of employing a good staffing level of police more affordable (so that we can have more, everyday police doing a job as a neighborhood force and seen as a reliable presence against crime) -- more certain prosecution and penalties for quality of life crimes that we all pay for in seeing petty but significantly confidence-decreasing incidents that reduce our willingness to ta…

New York has an extraordinary level of police already. They're just bad at dealing with the actual problems. Including murdering a bystander in a totally unnecessary subway shooting.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#278

Post by wkat4242 »

taatof wrote: post #53
maxwellg wrote: post #11

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.

How do we get around? To get downtown I have to take two busses and then bart (or two busses but it takes longer because there are a lot more stops). The kicker: I'm not even in a suburb, I live in SF! All we do in SF is make car driving worse, we almost never make public transit better. At least NYC has a plenty good enough train system. I end up WFH anyway, largely because it's annoying to get to an office downtown…

Yeah that's the key. Not disincentivising cars but to make public transport the obvious answer by making it really good.

They do that really well here in Barcelona. 21€ a month and you can use all the transport you want in the city, all modes. Why would i want a car what's expensive to own, park and maintain and I can only just it when I've not been drinking?

Problem is, making transport good costs money and a lot of effort. Taxing cars is easy and brings money in.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#280

Post by tomp »

paulgb wrote: post #271
tomp wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All these issues have better solutions than congestion pricing. Cars blocking intersections and/or sidewalks can easily be solved with automated traffic fines - that's how Zurich and London does it (the former without any congestion pricing!) Many cities also have special lanes only useable by some classes of vehicles - e.g. busses (or sometimes taxis as well) - I guess ambulances could also use those. In fact, conge…

> Cars blocking intersections and/or sidewalks can easily be solved with automated traffic fines Rush hour traffic is so gridlocked that cars often can’t know if they will clear a light cycle, so fining would effectively just reduce to a stochastic congestion tax. NYC does have some dedicated bus lanes, but adding more means reallocating more space from cars which is a political no-go without reducing the number of c…

You're wrong on both counts.

Fining for blocking intersection isn't stochastic. You simply don't enter the intersection if you're not sure you'll be able to exit it. You wait at green light. Simple. That's how people in London and Zurich drive.

Congestion automatically reduces the number of cars (because they literally can't get into the city!), without congestion pricing. If you reduce 3 lanes to 2, then... 2 lanes will be blocked, instead of 3, so there will be complete gridlock & congestion - for cars. But not for busses! So public transport will work, even thought private is gridlocked. Combine this with (1) - empty intersections - and busses can drive very well!

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