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Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

nytimes.com

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Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#671

Post by munificent »

tizzy wrote: post #661
munificent wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support this policy and was a bike commuter for several years, but just to play devil's advocate: Speed is not the only reason people prefer a car over walking and biking. * Some people have mobility issues and can't bike or walk but can drive. * Cars give you environment isolation when it's freezing, sweltering, or pouring rain. * Cars isolate you from other people, which can be important especially for groups tha…

Bringing up these points when talking about improving urban transit is harmful. These points always appear in reaction to urbanist policy and all of a sudden care about the minority transit user. The problem is that the assigned proportion of road space is unfairly weighted to cars and is impossible to shift because people often say things like “cars make it easier to shift things around” and “some people have mobili…

The point of bringing this up is that you won't convince anyone to stop driving by pointing out that biking isn't slower if speed isn't the reason they drive in the first place.

If you want to convince people, you need to understand their actual motivations.

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#672

Post by munificent »

tizzy wrote: post #663
munificent wrote: post #635

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have data, but I'm pretty sure you're even safer in a low speed car-to-car accident than in a low speed bike-to-bike accident.

The maths says unlikely. Kinetic energy=0.5mv^2 The two variables are orders of magnitude smaller in one scenario, and the function grows quadratically.

Yes the energy is much larger in a car collision, but the fraction of that energy absorbed by the cars is also much larger.

My face doesn't have a few feet of crumple zones on it, just a couple of millimeters of skin over bone.

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#673

Post by Mawr »

efavdb wrote: post #244
9283409232 wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Car-centric design is hell for parents and kids alike.

FWIW I like driving my kid to school in my car. YMMV

A meaningless statement unless you've tried a reasonable number of alternatives. As it is, you're just stating that you've grown accustomed to what your environment forces you to do, e.g. "I like breathing air". Good for you, but not relevant.

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#674

Post by munificent »

Mawr wrote: post #662
munificent wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support this policy and was a bike commuter for several years, but just to play devil's advocate: Speed is not the only reason people prefer a car over walking and biking. * Some people have mobility issues and can't bike or walk but can drive. * Cars give you environment isolation when it's freezing, sweltering, or pouring rain. * Cars isolate you from other people, which can be important especially for groups tha…

> * You are much safer being in a car when hit by another car than when not being in a car. This is something a lot of bike commute advocates sweep under the rug. They talk about how biking is overall safe, but then you ask them if they've ever had an accident and so many have been hit by cars and broken bones. Are you serious? That's a lot to type without realizing what you're saying at some point. You could not get…

This kind of hyper-aggressive response is exactly what turns regular people off cycling.

I am a bike commuter. I biked to work for years. I fill up my gas tank about three times a year.

I'm on your side but you are so gung-ho about bikes that if I'm not as zealous as you, you think I don't even understand how "backwards" my argument is.

I never ever said there should be more cars. I said that if you want to get people out of their cars you need to understand why they are in them in the first place and speed is only a fraction of that answer.

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#675

Post by isaacremuant »

Ajedi32 wrote: post #512
isaacremuant wrote: post #444

Everything tends to optimize to benefit the rich. Just like tax incentives on expensive electric vehicles. Of course every other metric section is beaming but the one about affecting lower income is "it's too early to tell". It's not fair economics or policy making if it always skews one way. It's like "carbon tax to force people not to fly or move, while elite private planes are essential".

> It's not fair economics I think you have a distorted sense of what fairness is. Charging the same price to the rich that you charge to the poor for the same service is fair. Charging different prices would be unfair. Charity/philanthropy is a good thing, because human life is inherently valuable, but it's not a matter of fairness. People don't have an inherent right to benefit from the labor or ingenuity of others.

> think you have a distorted sense of what fairness is. Charging the same price to the rich that you charge to the poor for the same service is fair. Charging different prices would be unfair.

Nice strawman. No. Charging for something that changes behavior in the poor but not in the rich because it's an exclusinary device is definitely not fair. I also didn't suggest different prices but simply not doing exclusion via money or taxation, which doesn't affect the rich.

> Charity/philanthropy is a good thing, because human life is inherently valuable, but it's not a matter of fairness. People don't have an inherent right to benefit from the labor or ingenuity of others.

What are you on about? I'm sorry to tell you but the likes of corporate magnates and rich politicians don't create more value just bend the rules to stay on top. It's easy to throw money at things to create more money when you have it. When you can put your capital in a tax haven and the rubble pays it in full.

Next time you come with inspired strawmen takes, prep a bit.

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#676

Post by IG_Semmelweiss »

dns_snek wrote: post #617
IG_Semmelweiss wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>> I'm curious, do other larger cities where commercial is concentrated into one area not have a private mini-bus(es)? It turns out, there are some private buses. Take for example, Santiago, Chile. It succeeded in terms of profits and customer satisfaction. The problem is they do not survive. There comes a time when they don't pay sufficient "political capital" and get taken over (nationalized) by local politicians.…

If one failed public transport project can be used as evidence against the viability of all public transport projects, will you accept my example of one failed privately owned transport project as evidence against the viability of all such projects? In other words, why are you trying to use one cherry picked example of gross mismanagement to argue that all publicly run projects are doomed?

Yes, if you can name 1 example of a failed private transport project that led to

1) the biggest riots in 4 decades. 2) the requested resignation of all cabinet ministers 3) a new (socialist) constitution.

My point was not "you will die every time you play russian roulette" .

Because that's not the point. My point is, Santiago was playing it safe for many decades. Then they switched to russian roulette. Bad idea, and it showed in less than 1 decade (9 years, to be exact)

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#677

Post by Mawr »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #239
ackfoobar wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny how the urban design forcing poor people to pay car insurance and auto loan, just to survive, is fine; yet charging a hundred or so to use the highly valuable space in the city is outrageous. Concern about public order is fair. But instead of fighting for the privilege to avoid it cheaply, why not fight to actually fix it. Triple the prison population, or whatever your solution is.

Japan has a 99% conviction rate, and still has 56% of women reporting having been groped on transit. This cannot be solved. To force women on transit is to flip a coin whether they will be assaulted. You’re not going to beat a car culture with that strategy. I heavily doubt that New York City has the appetite for incarceration that would be necessary, for even a remote chance, to turn public transit into a merely neu…

Now think real carefully why you had to jump all the way over to Japan in order to be able to make your point at all. Cherry picking at its finest. Japan is very culturally different from the West and such issues are tightly tied to that culture.

> What about bikes? I thought they were great too, until someone was careless with their dog and left me bleeding and weighing the probabilities of serious disease.

You know you can trip, fall, hit your head and die on the spot anytime you walk anywhere right? A piano can randomly fall on your head too. Nothing is 100% safe; it's unfortunate you had an accident, but that's just anecdotal evidence, which is worthless.

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#678

Post by Mawr »

RhysU wrote: post #551
sebstefan wrote: post #460

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're just quoting a danish government report Googling it, I found a second one in London with the same methods (surveying CCTV footage of multiple intersections) and they get the same findings In both: - Motorists break way more traffic laws - Motorists mainly break the law for speed or convenience - The infractions by motorists are generally more serious and pose a threat to others (the main one is speeding) - Th…

> the main one is speeding Speeding mildly is usually a consequence of stupidly low speed limits. Unless the speeding is bucketed, this alone is enough to skew the results to say motorists are worse than bicyclists. Remember, speeding tickets are a revenue source and the incentive is to set limits that produce revenue. > The main one cyclists break is riding on the sidewalk - which is because of cars, and it doesn't…

> Speeding mildly is usually a consequence of stupidly low speed limits.

And you think the average driver is qualified to make that assessment on a moment-by-moment basis?

Hell, I don't know you, but given the chances I'm gonna go ahead and say you don't know the intricacies of road design either. Most drivers do not even fully grasp the concept of line-of-sight, much less anything more complex than that. Hence, the easy to understand speed limits decided by experts.

But hey, go ahead, tell me specifically where the speed limits are commonly too low in your opinion and why.

> these are grown adults willfully ignoring the law because they find it inconvenient.

No, "inconvenient" is e.g. what drivers find yielding to pedestrians. Riding a bike amongst cars is dangerous and unsafe.

> A motorcycle likewise can ride on the sidewalk to avoid car congestion but it doesn't because it's illegal

Speeding is illegal too, so clearly "illegal" is not the reason. It'd be unreasonably dangerous to pedestrians to operate a motor powered vehicle on a sidewalk in a way that a bicycle isn't.

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#679

Post by kazinator »

toss1 wrote: post #652
kazinator wrote: post #639

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you have a car, ... Sounds vaguely like, why are you begging, and why should I give you anything, if you can afford cigarettes? A lot of low-income Americans drive cars, and would be way more fucked without them, because of the way things are. > that is much harder to tune and could present a far more serious impediment. What impediment, and how is it harder to tune? In principle, you can tune the system to such…

>>why are you begging, and why should I give you anything, if you can afford cigarettes? The expense profile of a motor vehicle in the USA in 2025 is quite different than cigarettes. And yes, if you are buying two packs per day of cigarettes, at $11.96 NY State average [0] you can skip one to drive into the congestion zone in congestion time. >> A lot of low-income Americans drive cars Yup. It is near-absolutely crit…

You're not trying to argue that random selection for a benefit is unfair, compared to selecting for people who are willing to pay?

About appointments, there could be a very simple website where you punch in your license plate, hit Enter, and see a calendar with all your days highlighted, for the next 6 to 12 months.

There could be some flexibility in the system. Everyone gets a small number of tokens (which expire: must be used in a year or something) that provide a free pass on any day whatsoever. You use those for those situations like getting a sudden appointment that couldn't be planned around the regular system (e.g. someone canceled and you were next on the waitlist, and the time is the time).

The token system could be automatic in fact. You just drive to the city on an off day when you aren't supposed to, and your "ding count" increments by one. On the same website where you punch in your plate number to get a schedule, you can see the number of dings against your license plate. (The system wouldn't have to track all license; just ones that triggered a ding.) (Not sure about the privacy implications. Someone who enters your plate number and sees a ding count knows that your car has been to the city sometime in the past few months on an unassigned day. If that's something you need to hide from someone, then maybe just don't go by car on those days.)

Re: Changes since congestion pricing started in New York

#680

Post by dahart »

Chris2048 wrote: post #644
dahart wrote: post #640

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People get robbed at gas stations, convenience stores, parking lots, and streets at fairly high numbers. I’m not sure what we’re comparing or debating here, but does your example actually count as a “robbery” if they died first? Would it not have happened if they hadn’t died? The anecdote you brought doesn’t seem to reflect on safety at all, it’s unclear what relevance it has. Speed is absolutely a huge factor in dri…

> People get robbed at gas stations, convenience stores, parking lots, and streets at fairly high numbers Not where I live. the comparison/debate is: > In contrast, the transit systems I've seen in Europe and Asia appear well maintained, clean, and relatively safe. I think the point is, although (public) necrophilia is rare, so presumably is access to dead bodies, so the fact this happened is telling. > does your exa…

Sure people have the option to control their own speed, and authorities can police speeders. The accident rate we have already accounts for that. Speeders are still dying, and they’re taking out more non-speeders with them than the total number of public transit deaths, by multiples.

Still not sure what the argument even here is. You’re being pretty forceful about one single, weird incident. Fine, but the fact of the matter is that driving in cars is causing a lot more injury and death than public transit, by several orders of magnitude.

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