Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

congestion-pricing-tracker.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

461–470 of 653 posts

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#461

Post by throw4847285 »

gcbirzan wrote: post #388
throw4847285 wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Driving in New York has been terrible for a century. The only way to make it better is to disincentivize people from doing it by making it more costly and making public transit better. Urban planners have known this is the case since at least the 40s. Congestion pricing isn't some kind of new punishment. It's a bill, long overdue, finally getting paid (and only partially).

Robert Moses knew it, but that didn't stop him.

I'm not sure Robert Moses knew that. He wasn't an urban planner. He was an urban doer. He made it his life's mission to not learn the actual impact of his work on people's lives. I suspect he took that willful ignorance to his grave.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#462

Post by fnfjfk »

jimbob45 wrote: post #443
blehn wrote: post #424

1. The data is obviously flawed, but if there's anything to speculate from it, it's that the actual congestion in lower Manhattan isn't affected that much. 2. So the success of this policy really depends on how much additional revenue it's bringing in for the city and the MTA. The $9 increase needs to significantly offset the loss in toll revenue from the decrease in drivers. 3. There are so many other simple policie…

Metered parking everywhere. Please no. Just tax me at the end of the year if you really need more money. Stop paywalling everything.

Why should everyone pay equally, rather than people that currently store their private property for free on public land in some of the most expensive real estate in the country?

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#463

Post by sethhochberg »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #453
blehn wrote: post #424

1. The data is obviously flawed, but if there's anything to speculate from it, it's that the actual congestion in lower Manhattan isn't affected that much. 2. So the success of this policy really depends on how much additional revenue it's bringing in for the city and the MTA. The $9 increase needs to significantly offset the loss in toll revenue from the decrease in drivers. 3. There are so many other simple policie…

Advocates did worry that reducing it from $15 to $9 would create a sort of "no-mans land" — not quite high enough to deter traffic but high enough to annoy people. I'm not sure how to reconcile the significant drop in the bridge and tunnel commute times with the apparent non-effect on commute times within the congestion relief zone.

Most of the bridges and tunnels have their own tolls, with a few exceptions like the Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges. One possible explanation is that the advocates were right and the combined bridge/tunnel + congestion toll is enough to dissuade driving into the zone entirely for people arriving via bridge/tunnel, but the lower congestion toll on its own isn't as much of a deterrent if you have access to a free crossing into Manhattan from other boros or were already in Manhattan (outsize of the zone) to begin with.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#465

Post by potato3732842 »

CPLX wrote: post #398
Aspos wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seriously think NYC is the greatest city in the history of world civilization? Or is it sarcasm? I am asking this as NYC resident.

Of course I do. Ask any person living in New York, they'll tell you the same thing.

Unless you happen to ask the large fraction of people who knowingly moved there to make big bucks for some number of years before getting out. They will all tell you it sucks, the government sucks, you suck for not realizing that and that they're masterminding their exit to the suburbs of Phoenix or Miami or whatever. These people make up a sizable minority of the NYC population at any given time.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#466

Post by mitthrowaway2 »

Lanolderen wrote: post #444
blehn wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one likes decent and cheap public transport? I find that hard to believe. It's basically the common denominator for the best modern cities. Motorcycles are definitely not the solution. Motorcycle usage in NYC has skyrocketed since 2020 and as a result the streets are far noisier, more chaotic, and more dangerous, especially for pedestrians and cyclists.

I mean it in the sense that I've literally never met a person who prefers travelling by public transport to a personal motorized vehicle outside of long trips. The usage I've seen of it is from people who are too much of a mess financially to afford a car/license or people who are terrified of driving. Incentives just don't fix the issue of having no control and being in a pod with a hundred people you don't know and…

Hi, nice to meet you! I prefer public transit because when I ride it I don't have to drive or find a parking spot! And I believe it to be safer on balance.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#467

Post by potato3732842 »

Lanolderen wrote: post #283

I wish people would focus more on scooters and motorcycles than moving people in busses. Coming from a place with decent and cheap public transport, no one likes it. It'll never be as fast, you'll always be closed in a bacteria greenhouse with strangers, there will always be crazies, it'll never have the exact path you need, you don't have as much control over it.. For the past year I've been commuting on a motorcycl…

>I wish people would focus more on scooters and motorcycles than moving people in busses

Will never happen. Too 3rd worldy for many of the demographics that tend to drive policy on transit matters.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#468

Post by rtkwe »

ortusdux wrote: post #422
rtkwe wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a neat little project but people aren't doing that on the regular so the data should be pretty good.

I do wonder how google handles edge cases, passengers, busses, etc. I've been in rideshares where the driver is using 4 phones - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/17/business/apps-uber-lyft-d...

I think, at least the way I would approach the problem, would be to look at the speed or flow rate of the phones on a particular road as the primary signal. I believe Google has ways of detecting if the device is in a car/vehicle vs being carried for example so they could filter out "walking" phones. Then looking at the flow of devices alleviates the need to calculate the carrying capacity of a particular road. The speed/flow tells you want you're trying to measure more directly than trying to count phones and decide if that means a road is congested or not, to do that you'd need to develop a heuristic to estimate the capacity of roads which seems like you're unnecessarily ignoring the direct signal in favor of trying to calculate it from a noisier source.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#469

Post by tekla »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #458
Spooky23 wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is where the dogma gets in the way of reality. Uber and cabs are the glue that fills the gaps that public transit has left unfilled for decades. The policy goal is to reduce congestion by discouraging personal vehicles in the zone and generate revenue for transportation as a whole, not to turn the city into a pedestrian park. The state took an approach that does that without nuking the city. Based on the fact th…

The congestion relief zone is probably one of the single densest transit zones on the planet. Rideshares and cabs are definitely useful for filling in the gaps in the boroughs, but you basically never need one in downtown Manhattan.

You're forgetting that the transit zones themselves are not only affected, the main BRIDGES are also affected. So even if you're not driving in downtown Manhattan, you will still pay the cost to enter the city through the normal entrances

```

Manhattan's Congestion Relief Zone starts at 60th Street and heads south to include the Lincoln, Holland and Hugh L. Carey tunnels on the Hudson River side, and the Queensboro Bridge, Queens Midtown Tunnel, Williamsburg Bridge, Manhattan Bridge and Brooklyn Bridge on the East Side.

Drivers will be charged when they enter the Congestion Relief Zone using the Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queensboro or Williamsburg Bridges, or the Holland, Hugh L. Carey, Lincoln or Queens-Midtown tunnels.

Drivers coming from the Bronx or Upper Manhattan will be charged once they reach 60th Street.

```

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#470

Post by The-Bus »

gosub100 wrote: post #386
supernova87a wrote: post #51

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,…

I don't see what good it would do to have a car that can only travel in lower Manhattan. Yeah the few people who live there, own a car, and are lazy or use it for going to get groceries 2x a week might slip through, but that's nothing significant in my book. What would worry me is if it leads to more license plate theft. Criminals get to ride for free, while legally registered owners have to fight the fines and clear…

Where are you driving your own car to get groceries easily in lower Manhattan... twice a week?
Post reply on HN