Congestion pricing is great. I routinely end up in Manhattan on Friday and Canal Street at 5pm is running smoothly (not packed end to end with idling cars as before), the city looks like a regular city instead of the packed cars honking and spewing tire dust and exhaust. Long gone are the people that would drive into LES on Friday night with their expensive cars and blare loud music and rev their engines. It’s a different environment and everyone is loving it that I’ve talked to.
> Long gone are the people that would drive into LES on Friday night with their expensive cars and blare loud music and rev their engines. I
I don't live in New York, but have been following along loosely on the congestion pricing policy as someone who has some official business but also just generally curious to see how it would work out, and this is a benefit that I had not considered. Thank you for mentioning this.
> ”Long gone are the people that would drive into LES on Friday night with their expensive cars and blare loud music and rev their engines.”
Interestingly, in London’s case we do not get this particular benefit from the congestion charge zone, because congestion charging ends at 6pm! So all the boys eager to show off their hot, loud cars still show up on a Friday or Saturday night.
Congestion pricing is only a half of the solution. The second half should be the MTA reform. MTA has been a dysfunctional mess and a bottomless money pit for as long as I remember. MTA of today will squander any amount of money you throw on it wasting all the potential gains from congestion pricing.
Great to hear the positives about congestion pricing. It would be great to see how it can ease the congestion in Toronto. Unfortunately, I suggested congestion pricing as a possible solution as part of an academic project and was laughed off.
It remains amazing to me, time and time again, how relatively small fees can encourage large changes in behavior. At the aggregate level, people overvalue their time and undervalue their money.
Are there any measures that show any downside to this? I confess a bit of bewilderment at how many people will assert there must be something bad every time this comes up. I don't think a single measured outcome has gone poorly from this.
It reminds me of what happens nearly every time car parking on a busy retail street is removed for bike lanes/bus lanes/better walking.
Business owners universally oppose the change and predict catastrophe, the change goes through, and business/foot traffic goes way up instead.
It seems that business owners' ability to "know their customers" is rather limited; that, or they're just biased by their own need for car/delivery parking.
It's basically that America has a caste system, and public transit is a lower-caste thing that any respectable member of society should ideally avoid. It's a pity because public transit done well is amazing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNTg9EX7MLw [NotJustBikes]
The project was studied for 10 years so the nay-sayers really don’t have a platform because they’re up against a decade of research. Most of the anti-cp has a romanticized view of driving into the city as some sort of right or NYer benefit.
Trivially, the measure of how much it costs in dollars to drive into Manhattan along the affected routes has gone up. So there are likely some people who are worse off. It's rare to have a completely free lunch, but this one looks pretty cheap.
>how many people will assert there must be something bad
Some of my friends seem to be convinced that Pigouvian taxes don't work, that hoi polloi just suck up the extra cost and complain more. Also they'll say that it's regressive (i.e. the thing being taxed already represented a higher proportion of income for the lower classes).
What I'm getting at is, I agree with you, but I don't think the objections are all that nebulous, nor based in "too good to be true" intuition.
A downside could be that 2 years from now the effect has rippled away (the shock and awe of paying for it is gone), and everyone sits in the same traffic but pays more money for it.
Archaeology tells us that for ~ 4000 years, people have tolerated an average of a 30 minute commute.
The usefulness of a city goes up (superlinearly!) with the number of people that can work / shop / live there.
So, the universal metric for any city, and therefore transit system is: “How many people can regularly make use of the city?”
A simple proxy for that is: “How many people live within a 30 minute commute of the city center?”
So, at peak times, how many people can simultaneously get to their destination in NYC in under 30 minutes?
Second: How many of those people can do so during non peak hours?
If congestion pricing is a success on all metrics, then both those numbers will have increased. Those metrics have worked well for 4000 years of cities so they are as close to a natural law as exists for cities.
It wouldn’t surprise me if the numbers went up (or down) but the lack of reporting on “is NYC’s effective population increasing or decreasing as a result of congestion pricing?” makes me skeptical.
Other than Trump's seemingly knee-jerk opposition because it was implemented by, in his own oft-repeated words, radical left lunatics, I haven't really heard anything negative at all as a Manhattanite.
In London from 2020 till about 2023 congestion charging ran till 10pm and then that was moved back to 6pm. The reason was it was hurting nightlife especially west end theatre.
I wonder whether pedestrian collisions will be slightly more deadly, since one effect is that traffic flows faster than before. Great for drivers but probably more dangerous for the jaywalking new yorker.
The biggest downside is that the reason this was done had little or nothing to do with congestion. That's a side effect. It was to fill budget holes in the MTA, which is a notorious money pit that delivers far less value than the billions if gobbles up.
There's a real chance that future cash flows from this congestion pricing are going to be securitized for today's cash payments, similar to Chicago parking.
Cycling is so much more effective than cars.. actually approx 5x more in terms of street usage. So when people move to bikes, the streets look way less busy.
You'd need a 5x more bike traffic than car traffic for the two lanes to be equivalent.
Just worth bearing mind when people talk about streets being emptier - just emptier of cars
It's interesting that everyone is saying it is a drastic change, when it says "Traffic is down by about 10%" (which doesn't sound like a drastic change to me).
I guess it is near a critical point where a relatively small change in traffic results in a large change in travel times, traffic jams, etc.?
Manhattan traffic was pretty much at capacity. Bumper to bumper most of the time, certainly during peak times.
Reducing traffic to 90% of capacity makes a huge difference. A little bit of room here and there allows for much smoother flow and a lot better experience for those who didn't get priced out. And almost certainly better flow for busses, which is helpful for a lot of people.
Yeah it's like fluid flow where once you reach choked flow or hit the sound speed, there's a discontinuous jump in resistance that fucks up everything.
Congestion will creep back up, just like it has in London.
Unless they really price it to deter people, they'll just drive. In London it's cheaper to pay the £15 charge than to get two adults return tickets on the tube from the outer suburbs. Once you factor in comfort, convenience, reliability and practicality of your private car Vs London's public transport it's obvious why more and more people just pay the fee to drive.
If they really wanted to stop congestion they'd increase the fee from £15 to something like £150-250 a day. But they won't do that because then hardly anyone would pay it and they'd lose the revenue.
> If they really wanted to stop congestion they'd increase the fee from £15 to something like £150-250 a day. But they won't do that because then hardly anyone would pay it and they'd lose the revenue
This is nobody-goes-there-it’s-too-crowded logic.
If there is congestion despite a charge, you can make more money by raising the price until there is less congestion.
> Congestion will creep back up, just like it has in London.
This is actually a good point, because of the nature of what causes congestion.
It's that governments don't do the things that prevent it (e.g. allowing higher density housing construction to shorten commutes or adding capacity to both mass transit and road systems), until the congestion gets really bad.
So when you first introduce congestion pricing, congestion goes down, because of course it does -- increase the cost of something and you get less of it. But then, why do any of the other things that address congestion until it gets really bad again? So population grows over time or existing infrastructure decays and doesn't get replaced because it isn't "needed" yet. Until congestion is as bad as it ever was, but now people are living with a new mass surveillance apparatus and paying a regressive tax.
Thinking the same thing. Sydney has a lot of tolls but not for congestion. More as an additional tax really. Doesn't stop people using cars. What probably does is pedestrian streets and less parking making it a PITA to drive vs get a bus.
There are so many more initiatives from climate adaptation and environmental advocates and urban planning folks that will have similar, “well duh,” effects. It’s surprising how many easy, simple ideas there are that society and politicians dismiss.
Maybe we don’t need to burn the planet to “achieve AGI,” in order to “solve climate change,” and, “make cities livable.” It’s not like that tech, even is possible, is going to stop hurricanes or take cars off the streets.
Hope more cities in North America will follow suit. It’s sad how many have been doing the exact opposite of good ideas for so long.
Why is this called congestion pricing as if the price would change dynamically based on traffic congestion? In fact it seems to be a static toll of $9. Or am I missing something?
"Only after Donald Trump won re-election did it start."
That makes it seem like Trump was pro-congestion pricing... he was not. I remember reading there was a threat and attempt by him to reverse it. Lest it seem like I am a Trump hater, I am very much not impressed by Hochul's delaying which was certainly because of her special interests.
The problem I see is most cities just don't have the public transportation infrastructure to pull something off like this.
I lived in Atlanta for a while and public transport there was just not built up enough where someone could use it productively. Now I live in Denver and the situation here is even worse.
I would LOVE to be able to not use my car for every day transportation (and I say that as a diehard gearhead), but in most places it's just such an inconvenience that it's not worth it.
The reason this plan works in NYC is they already have all that infrastructure.
I think congestion pricing is popular on HN, but only because the user base skews to towards wealthy. IMO congestion pricing forces the burden of reducing usage onto poor people while letting the wealthy keep on doing whatever they want even though wealthy people already consume more per capita than poor people..
The price will determine how poor you have to be to get forced to do without so the wealthy can benefit from an increase in quality of life. In this article, a 1h trip dropping to 15m means a certain portion of people got priced out of the market. Is is the bottom 10%, 20%, 50%?
It's great if you're in the top percentage of income earners, but what happens when wealthy people want to cut another 5 minutes from their commute? Do they dial up the congestion pricing to push out a few more people?
I work every day at an honest job and pay taxes, but don't make a ton of money. Why should my taxes get used to build infrastructure that's going to be subjected to congestion pricing that prices me out of using that infrastructure?
IMO, the reality is the rich haven't been forced to pay their fair share for a half century, infrastructure has been massively underfunded, and now the solution is to force poor people to suffer the consequences for a system that's benefited the rich and increased wealth inequality to the point where it's going to break the system.
I'm not young, but I understand why millennials and younger don't want to work. They're not getting their fair share of infrastructure and productivity gains relative to what they're contributing. Who would want to participate in a system that's set up to cheat you for your entire life?
Another predictable success would be converting entirety of NYC into a driverless car zone, but we are probably not ready for the repercussions as a society
[+] [-] righthand|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] ericmay|8 months ago|reply
I don't live in New York, but have been following along loosely on the congestion pricing policy as someone who has some official business but also just generally curious to see how it would work out, and this is a benefit that I had not considered. Thank you for mentioning this.
[+] [-] Reason077|8 months ago|reply
Interestingly, in London’s case we do not get this particular benefit from the congestion charge zone, because congestion charging ends at 6pm! So all the boys eager to show off their hot, loud cars still show up on a Friday or Saturday night.
[+] [-] lr1970|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] tixocloud|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] jgalt212|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] taeric|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|8 months ago|reply
Business owners universally oppose the change and predict catastrophe, the change goes through, and business/foot traffic goes way up instead.
It seems that business owners' ability to "know their customers" is rather limited; that, or they're just biased by their own need for car/delivery parking.
[+] [-] Herring|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|8 months ago|reply
The opposition to Manhattan’s congestion pricing has a curious tendency to be inversely correlated with how frequently that person is in Manhattan.
At this point I think it’s just another proxy for rural voters’ rage at liberal cities.
[+] [-] righthand|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] erehweb|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] zahlman|8 months ago|reply
Some of my friends seem to be convinced that Pigouvian taxes don't work, that hoi polloi just suck up the extra cost and complain more. Also they'll say that it's regressive (i.e. the thing being taxed already represented a higher proportion of income for the lower classes).
What I'm getting at is, I agree with you, but I don't think the objections are all that nebulous, nor based in "too good to be true" intuition.
[+] [-] navane|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] hedora|8 months ago|reply
Archaeology tells us that for ~ 4000 years, people have tolerated an average of a 30 minute commute.
The usefulness of a city goes up (superlinearly!) with the number of people that can work / shop / live there.
So, the universal metric for any city, and therefore transit system is: “How many people can regularly make use of the city?”
A simple proxy for that is: “How many people live within a 30 minute commute of the city center?”
So, at peak times, how many people can simultaneously get to their destination in NYC in under 30 minutes?
Second: How many of those people can do so during non peak hours?
If congestion pricing is a success on all metrics, then both those numbers will have increased. Those metrics have worked well for 4000 years of cities so they are as close to a natural law as exists for cities.
It wouldn’t surprise me if the numbers went up (or down) but the lack of reporting on “is NYC’s effective population increasing or decreasing as a result of congestion pricing?” makes me skeptical.
[+] [-] standardUser|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] tim333|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] xvedejas|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] prasadjoglekar|8 months ago|reply
There's a real chance that future cash flows from this congestion pricing are going to be securitized for today's cash payments, similar to Chicago parking.
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/nyc-transit-governor-s...
[+] [-] Tangurena2|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] time4tea|8 months ago|reply
Just worth bearing mind when people talk about streets being emptier - just emptier of cars
[+] [-] michaelcampbell|8 months ago|reply
... for 1 person in decent weather having to transport very little.
As it turns out, this is the majority of traffic, but let's set constraints.
[+] [-] mizzao|8 months ago|reply
/s
You can do the same things in a car and all you'll get is a traffic ticket.
[+] [-] ks2048|8 months ago|reply
I guess it is near a critical point where a relatively small change in traffic results in a large change in travel times, traffic jams, etc.?
[+] [-] toast0|8 months ago|reply
Reducing traffic to 90% of capacity makes a huge difference. A little bit of room here and there allows for much smoother flow and a lot better experience for those who didn't get priced out. And almost certainly better flow for busses, which is helpful for a lot of people.
[+] [-] carabiner|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] djaychela|8 months ago|reply
Yes, same as school traffic (certainly where I live in the UK). It's not all the traffic on the road, but the difference it makes is enormous.
[+] [-] mattlondon|8 months ago|reply
Unless they really price it to deter people, they'll just drive. In London it's cheaper to pay the £15 charge than to get two adults return tickets on the tube from the outer suburbs. Once you factor in comfort, convenience, reliability and practicality of your private car Vs London's public transport it's obvious why more and more people just pay the fee to drive.
If they really wanted to stop congestion they'd increase the fee from £15 to something like £150-250 a day. But they won't do that because then hardly anyone would pay it and they'd lose the revenue.
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|8 months ago|reply
This is nobody-goes-there-it’s-too-crowded logic.
If there is congestion despite a charge, you can make more money by raising the price until there is less congestion.
[+] [-] AnthonyMouse|8 months ago|reply
This is actually a good point, because of the nature of what causes congestion.
It's that governments don't do the things that prevent it (e.g. allowing higher density housing construction to shorten commutes or adding capacity to both mass transit and road systems), until the congestion gets really bad.
So when you first introduce congestion pricing, congestion goes down, because of course it does -- increase the cost of something and you get less of it. But then, why do any of the other things that address congestion until it gets really bad again? So population grows over time or existing infrastructure decays and doesn't get replaced because it isn't "needed" yet. Until congestion is as bad as it ever was, but now people are living with a new mass surveillance apparatus and paying a regressive tax.
[+] [-] bravesoul2|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] djaychela|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] agentultra|8 months ago|reply
Maybe we don’t need to burn the planet to “achieve AGI,” in order to “solve climate change,” and, “make cities livable.” It’s not like that tech, even is possible, is going to stop hurricanes or take cars off the streets.
Hope more cities in North America will follow suit. It’s sad how many have been doing the exact opposite of good ideas for so long.
[+] [-] amai|8 months ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congestion_pricing_in_New_York...
[+] [-] tmaly|8 months ago|reply
But the tolls on the tunnels are super expensive.
[+] [-] unknown|8 months ago|reply
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[+] [-] amazingamazing|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|8 months ago|reply
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[+] [-] EasyMark|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] throw7|8 months ago|reply
That makes it seem like Trump was pro-congestion pricing... he was not. I remember reading there was a threat and attempt by him to reverse it. Lest it seem like I am a Trump hater, I am very much not impressed by Hochul's delaying which was certainly because of her special interests.
[+] [-] 7e|8 months ago|reply
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[+] [-] unknown|8 months ago|reply
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[+] [-] anonymousiam|8 months ago|reply
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[+] [-] turnsout|8 months ago|reply
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[+] [-] _fat_santa|8 months ago|reply
I lived in Atlanta for a while and public transport there was just not built up enough where someone could use it productively. Now I live in Denver and the situation here is even worse.
I would LOVE to be able to not use my car for every day transportation (and I say that as a diehard gearhead), but in most places it's just such an inconvenience that it's not worth it.
The reason this plan works in NYC is they already have all that infrastructure.
[+] [-] donmcronald|8 months ago|reply
The price will determine how poor you have to be to get forced to do without so the wealthy can benefit from an increase in quality of life. In this article, a 1h trip dropping to 15m means a certain portion of people got priced out of the market. Is is the bottom 10%, 20%, 50%?
It's great if you're in the top percentage of income earners, but what happens when wealthy people want to cut another 5 minutes from their commute? Do they dial up the congestion pricing to push out a few more people?
I work every day at an honest job and pay taxes, but don't make a ton of money. Why should my taxes get used to build infrastructure that's going to be subjected to congestion pricing that prices me out of using that infrastructure?
IMO, the reality is the rich haven't been forced to pay their fair share for a half century, infrastructure has been massively underfunded, and now the solution is to force poor people to suffer the consequences for a system that's benefited the rich and increased wealth inequality to the point where it's going to break the system.
I'm not young, but I understand why millennials and younger don't want to work. They're not getting their fair share of infrastructure and productivity gains relative to what they're contributing. Who would want to participate in a system that's set up to cheat you for your entire life?
[+] [-] unknown|8 months ago|reply
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[+] [-] 2OEH8eoCRo0|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] newyankee|8 months ago|reply
[+] [-] wakawaka28|8 months ago|reply