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

71–80 of 653 posts

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#71

Post by throwaway48476 »

vvern wrote: post #70
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.

I don’t think in NYC it’s fair to argue that there’s relatively little interest in making transit something people want to use. We can debate about whether the efforts are effective, and certainly many aren’t. However there are vast sums invested in the MTA and a great many folks at the MTA who try to make it pleasant and safe. Additionally there have been added police and military presence in subway stations around…

The police just walked past the lady set on fire. It's on video.

Why is it that where I live all the tech companies built their own transit system just for their employees? Because they can control the experience and prevent the problems that turn people away from public transit. Either public transit is for the quiet people who are just trying to get somewhere or it can be for the nuisance types. They're incompatible.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#72

Post by paxys »

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.

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 Yorkers can survive, so can you.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#73

Post by woodruffw »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #46
jmyeet wrote: post #25

I happened to be living in London when congestion pricing was brought in and the difference on day 1 in the West End was like night and day. I believe it's never gone back to the pre-congestion pricing levels. I fully expect similar in Manhattan. The social media response has been particularly interesting. Predictably, there are a lot of non-NYCers who simply object to the slightest inconvenience to driving in any fo…

>Another complaint: drivers are paying for the roads. This is untrue anywhere in the US. Drivers only partially subsidize roads everywhere. I agree with pretty much everything else you wrote, but this it needs to be noted that most road damage is done by weather and heavyweight vehicles like semis/trash/buses/delivery vehicles etc., not regular passenger vehicles. Semis et al. definitely do not pay taxes proportionat…

This is true, but it's also changing in interesting ways: the rise of both light-truck SUVs and EVs as a whole means that passenger cars are, on average, heaver than they've ever been before.

This is still a small portion of overall road damage, but it matters in places like NYC. In particular it matters on our bridges and cantilevered highways, where passenger traffic can't be easily filtered away from weight-sensitive areas like commercial traffic can.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#74

Post by potato3732842 »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #46
jmyeet wrote: post #25

I happened to be living in London when congestion pricing was brought in and the difference on day 1 in the West End was like night and day. I believe it's never gone back to the pre-congestion pricing levels. I fully expect similar in Manhattan. The social media response has been particularly interesting. Predictably, there are a lot of non-NYCers who simply object to the slightest inconvenience to driving in any fo…

>Another complaint: drivers are paying for the roads. This is untrue anywhere in the US. Drivers only partially subsidize roads everywhere. I agree with pretty much everything else you wrote, but this it needs to be noted that most road damage is done by weather and heavyweight vehicles like semis/trash/buses/delivery vehicles etc., not regular passenger vehicles. Semis et al. definitely do not pay taxes proportionat…

>Semis et al. definitely do not pay taxes proportionate with the damage they cause to the roads, but then again we all need them even if we don't drive.

I don't think there would be much point. At the end of the day we'd all pay it because we all consume the goods they deliver or transport during intermediary steps in the supply chain.

I guess you could argue that the status quo is somewhat of a tax incentive that favors local manufacturing (i.e they use the roads for every step of the chain vs imported goods which only use it for delivery). I don't take much issue with that.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#75

Post by maxwellg »

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…

> All we do in SF is make car driving worse, we almost never make public transit better.

In the last half decade we've seen the opening of the Salesforce transit center, the Chinatown subway station, the Van Ness BRT, the Caltrain Electrification Project, BART expansion to Berryessa, 800 new BART cars, and hundreds of smaller projects.

You can see a full list of SFMTA projects at https://www.sfmta.com/sfmta-projects

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#76

Post by adgjlsfhk1 »

ghaff wrote: post #28
jazzyjackson wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fewer single-person-vehicles = more desirable ontime Bus/Tram throughput = more people who are close to MUNIBART taking MUNIBART. Then use tolls to improve and expand the mass transit services instead of only ever catering to the single-person-car-commuters. (ofc it takes more than ontime performance to sell people on mass transit, needs to be a safe environment at all hours of the day -- even if I can take BART into…

Safety and schedule. I've never had a safety issue with taking commuter rail into Boston but taking it home from an evening event is basically a non-starter given how seldom it runs and how much longer it will take relative to driving even if I catch my train.

I'm very hopeful that Boston commuter rail gets electrified with the associated speed and frequency improvements soonish. the inner half of the commuter rail network is absolutely dense enough to be worth running service every 15 minutes on peak and every 30 off peak

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#77

Post by paxys »

brettgriffin wrote: post #32
mlinhares wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Driving and parking in NYC is already a luxury, there’s no poor person driving and parking there.

There are like 400 housing developments in NYC for lower income folks. Saying that lower income folks don't drive in NYC is bananas.

NYC != Manhattan congestion zone. Plenty of people in lower income groups (literally over a million) live and drive in NYC. A negligible number of them drive into Manhattan for work every day.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#78

Post by potato3732842 »

adgjlsfhk1 wrote: post #76
ghaff wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Safety and schedule. I've never had a safety issue with taking commuter rail into Boston but taking it home from an evening event is basically a non-starter given how seldom it runs and how much longer it will take relative to driving even if I catch my train.

I'm very hopeful that Boston commuter rail gets electrified with the associated speed and frequency improvements soonish. the inner half of the commuter rail network is absolutely dense enough to be worth running service every 15 minutes on peak and every 30 off peak

Top speed (mostly) comes from the tracks, not the method of motive power.

As it stands they're already maxing out and exceeding (when they're late) the max speed for the class of rail they have.

Some of the inner stops might get a few seconds faster with better acceleration but that's about it.

The grade crossings are also kinda f'd. At full speed you can be in the middle of the train and see the arms still be in the process of lowering at certain crossings. That ain't safe. Faster won't make that better.

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#79

Post by taatof »

maxwellg wrote: post #75
taatof wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> All we do in SF is make car driving worse, we almost never make public transit better. In the last half decade we've seen the opening of the Salesforce transit center, the Chinatown subway station, the Van Ness BRT, the Caltrain Electrification Project, BART expansion to Berryessa, 800 new BART cars, and hundreds of smaller projects. You can see a full list of SFMTA projects at https://www.sfmta.com/sfmta-projects

While I'm obviously exaggerating by saying "never", the list is much smaller than it needs to be, and you have some misleading things on that list.

Chinatown subway station is great. Better connects SF residents and it's exactly what I want to see more of in SF.

- Van Ness BRT? That project started in 2003. It took 20 years to complete. Not exactly the poster child of solid transit improvements in SF, except if you ignore how it got there.

- The Caltrain electrification project is great for the environment, but doesn't help SF much as far as improving transit availability. It's slightly faster, at least.

- BART expansion to Berryessa is a bit separate from SF transit improvements, which is what I'm talking about.

- Salesforce transit center is fine and has good vision, like expanding caltrain downtown. But doesn't add a massive amount of transit availability that wasn't already nearby (yet).

Re: NYC Congestion Pricing Tracker

#80

Post by [deleted] »

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.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN