Are There Better and Fairer Alternatives to Congestion Pricing?

Paul Steely White

Are There Better and Fairer Alternatives to Congestion Pricing?

To raise $400 million per year to fund a new generation of necessary transit improvements and to reduce the skyrocketing health[pdf], quality of life, environmental and business costs of traffic congestion, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is pursuing a plan for London style congestion pricing.

Opponents of the plan have said recently that they have two better ways to solve New York City's transportation problems: improving traffic enforcement and reducing truck traffic. While these proposals have merit (and are in fact already a part of the Mayor's larger transportation plan, they would not raise any money for necessary subway and bus system expansions and would have only a small impact on traffic congestion. Trucks represent less than 10% of traffic, and no amount of enforcement is going to change the fact that there are simply too many drivers clogging our streets, polluting our air and making life miserable for everyone.

Opponents of the Mayor's plan have gotten a bit more traction with their argument that the plan is "unfair" to the working class. But again, the facts tell a different story. Only 5% of workers drive into Manhattan (the rest take transit or drive elsewhere) and these drivers, compared to subway and bus riders, earn substantially more income. [Source: 2000 Census]
census graf congestion pricing.JPG
Congestion pricing is not everything to everyone, but it is more than fair to the majority of low and middle income New Yorkers who are literally sick from traffic and tired of poor quality transit. This is why a growing coalition of over 80 labor, business health and community groups has come out in support of the Mayor's plan.

Comments

The ultimate solution to traffic is to have an infrastructure that works by allowing all vehicles to enter and exit an intersection without stopping.
The problem with the traffic is that we all want get to where we want to go, but we want every traffic light and intersection we approach to give us a clear run so we don't have to stop at a single intersection.

Not possible you say?

Well you would be wrong!

The simple solution to traffic jams and congestion is to design a road system that lets you do this.

Well we have that solution.

This allows all vehicles that approach any intersection on or to an arterial road to enter the intersection and exit it without stopping. All day, every day, in the worst peak hour traffic and save up to 40per cent on fuel costs and pollution emissions.

At www.ubtsc.com.au are models that allow everyone approaching an intersection to do exactly that!

People mentioned in this article are invited to visit and prove for themselves that we can design a city traffic infrastructure that eradicates congestion, jams, and gridlock.

In the response and reply to my initial communication addressed to USA, Secretary of Transportation, Dr Mary E. Peters the DOT states that Liquid Flow Traffic Management addresses "a number of successful practices for addressing traffic congestion related to the infrastructure".

Perhaps you would be kind enough to forward this e-mail to the Departments and the people mentioned in the article and ask for an opinion?

Jozef Goj CEO UBTSC Pty Ltd

To my mind, the facts stated weigh in favor of some mechanism to lighten the burden on lower income (less than 50k/year) drivers. A number of burden shifting mechanisms are possible (tax credits, vouchers, free or greatly reduced metro-cards) to reduce the adverse financial impact of congestion pricing on lower income people and the (or at least my) perception that the net effect of Mr. Bloomberg's proposal is to only change the behavior of the poor. (Since the rich can pay whatever they want.) Do you, by the way, think taxis should be taxed as well?

@Jozef (since DMI is yet another site that for some inexplicable reason does not have threaded comments - DMI please get with the modern world)

Jozef - so your solution seems to be massive exit and entrance ramps from all intersections?! You sir are a genius!