By Gus Saltonstall
In the days and weeks following Gov. Kathy Hochul’s announcement that she was indefinitely suspending congestion pricing, there was general uncertainty over which Metropolitan Transportation Authority projects would be cut due to the loss of expected funding from the program.
The MTA subsequently announced that it would be cutting $16.5 billion worth of upgrades and renovation plans because of the shelving of the tolling initiative.
At the beginning of June, West Side Rag reported that despite the loss of funding, upgrades to build new elevators at the 81st and 96th Street stations would still move forward.
But what about the rest of the Upper West Side?
Earlier this month, The New York Times came out with an interactive map as part of an article, titled — “See How Your Subway Service May Suffer Without Congestion Pricing.”
The map shows that the loss of congestion pricing means there are 27 projects on hold at train stations in Manhattan, but, luckily, none of them are on the Upper West Side.
There are multiple lines that serve the Upper West Side, including the A, B, C, D, and 1 trains that have projects at stations on hold, however, they are all at stations not in the neighborhood.
Examples of projects on hold include: elevator installations related to work for the 1 train at 168th Street and the B and D at 7th Avenue.
You can check out the map and full list of the improvements that have been put on pause at almost 100 NYC subway stations on the New York Times’ website — HERE.
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Upper West Side subway riders will see a big impact from the congestion delay. The 1 train cars are some of the oldest in the system (put into service in the 1980s) and were scheduled to be replaced with new cars funded by congestion pricing. These cars often have broken air conditioning units that can send temperatures to 95°+.
“The train cars on the line are called R62s and were manufactured in the early 1980s, making them some of the oldest running cars in the entire subway system. MTA officials said they planned to replace them in the coming years, but that’s been put on hold due to Gov. Kathy Hochul’s indefinite pause of congestion pricing.”
https://gothamist.com/news/faulty-ac-units-on-nycs-1-train-put-riders-on-fast-track-to-hell
This was money the MTA never should have counted on. The UWS would be inundated with cars, parking, congestion, and pollution from the all the cars trying to park on the UWS north of 60th Street to avoid the tolls. People from NJ and CT should not be paying for NYC problems and budget shortfall. Start by cutting all the bloated salaries and overtime. NJ isn’t taxing NYC residents to pay for their budget shortfalls.
The MTA planned to spend the congestion pricing money because congestion pricing is the law. Gov. Hochul has delayed it, but has never said she is cancelling it, and legally she can’t do so. If opponents want to pass a new law, they are welcome to try, but congestion pricing remains the law and will go into effect.
CT and NJ are functionally suburbs of NYC and benefit dramatically from our job market so they absolutely should be contributing, especially if they insist on driving instead of taking the train.
The train does not go everywhere in NYC, people who drive have valid reasons to do so. CT also has big job markets of its own such as Stamford which once boasted the largest stock trading floor and was once known as America’s filing cabinet. NJ is building the housing UWS residents do not want so that they can have abundant historic districts. NJ and CT has the housing that NYC residents who need more space are able to raise families in, thus keeping these families in the metro area. It is very much a two way street, it is not a one way street.
But there are plenty of people who drive in that do have access to public transportation. Look at all the construction workers’ cars with safety vests on their dashboard that park anywhere they want and don’t get ticketed. I don’t believe that none of them can’t access public transportation. They choose to drive because parking is free for them. But what really riles me up though is to see the multitude of MTA workers who do the same. That’s irony.
“Free” parking is not the incentive people have to drive. Maybe people do not like to deal with multiple transfers and a transit time that is LONGER than driving. But when you never venture out of Manhattan or gentrified Brooklyn or Queens neighborhoods except to go to the airport or the Hamptons, you do not see things the same way. Do you know any MTA workers? I am friends with many of them and many of them are not enthusiastic about transit like urbanists are. Many of them do not want to be on transit a nanosecond more than they have to. The commuter railroads are even worse, LIRR employees have an almost police department like us vs them mentality towards riders.
They may have their own individual reasons to do so, but giving those drivers an incentive to use mass transit benefits everyone.
Yes it’s great NJ builds more housing than NYC, doesn’t mean we should keep making it easy/convenient for NJ traffic to flood our streets.
Urbanists calling commuter rail “a luxury service” is not an incentive. Going from a one seat ride in your own car to a 3 to 4 seat ride with one or more transfer penalties which result in a transit trip being slower than one’s own car and dealing with parking problems at train station parking lots that can be worse than the UWS is not an incentive. Interstate commerce, including drivers from outside Manhattan, is essential to the functioning of Manhattan. You want to make it harder for drivers outside Manhattan to access Manhattan so your Uber or Lyft or Revel rideshare ride is faster and you yourself can be the arbiter of who is more justified to use a car within Manhattan, that does not benefit anyone but well to do Manhattanites.
AGAIN…..congestion pricing will just push the traffic, danger, and polution up to these more residential streets. Furthermore, why offer no neighborhood parking permits? They exist in Brooklyn. Enforcement needs to happen too of course, and as it is we’re seeing e-bikes run us down on our sidewalks. Isn’t this unaddressed problem enough to make you see that safety has NOTHING to do with the City’s concerns. This is merely a money grab . (PS: proof that they know that it’s a shift is the fact that the UWS is already filled with parkers from NJ, CT, MT, and PA….. Let’s back up and create some intelligent solutions first…and consider that lack of subway in many areas is part of the problem. PS: congestion pricing had a short term effect in London and has not been a long term solution. AND the fare zone prices went up and up and up.
There are also many UWS residents who register their cars outside Manhattan either at their second home or a relatives home. The difference also between London is that they went from an already good transit system that was liked and made it even better. The MTA as it stands now probably has a worse favorability rating than Hamas.
Registering a car at a relative’s house is very frequently done for nefarious reasons- insurance fraud to get lower rates. I have no sympathy for people who do that- why do they deserve any from anyone?
There are many people on the UWS who have no plans to remain here permanently. That is what happens when you gentrify a neighborhood. Also many people in the Bronx who are poor register their cars elsewhere because insurance is unaffordable to poorer people.
You are right that they shouldn’t have counted on this money….
but you are wrong to say that people from NJ and CT should not pay for NY problems. They are basically paying a parking fee, that’s all. What’s wrong with that? If they want to take advantage of the city’s economy, then they should be willing to chip in. If they don’t like it, let them get jobs elsewhere!
Or, you know, take the train into the city.
The “take the train” crowd cannot tell people to take the train, then tell people who take the train that their trains are a luxury service (that is what the Riders Alliance spokesperson said on twitter). Let us face it, the Manhattanites who tell non Manhattanites to “take the train” would not take the train themselves to go to these outer borough and suburban communities. I saw this when Tom Suozzi was running for Congress and Manhattan Democrats went out to campaign for him. There were politically influential people who support congestion pricing who either chartered a private bus or drove to eastern Queens and Nassau to campaign for Suozzi rather than take the train like they tell me.
NJ residents who work in NY pay state income taxes to NY not NJ. NJ issues a credit equivalent to whatever NY income taxes are. They do chip in. NJ also absorbs housing demand that the UWS will not, look at the gentrification of Jersey City and Hoboken
I thought they renovated the e 168th St station years ago? They didn’t upgrade the elevators?
Let us face one thing about the anti-car transit advocacy groups, they claim to care about advocating for the disabled, but there was one transit advocacy group closely aligned with MTA management that banned a disabled man from attending their events. One of the most lovable people around, NY Times even wrote an article about him. https://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/25/nyregion/he-loves-new-york-and-it-loves-him-right-back.html
Okay, great. So… I’m disabled. How long before there’s a subway station within half a mile of me that I can actually use? And how long until even half the stations I might potentially be traveling to will have a way for me to get back to street level?