Congestion Relief Zone signage on Park Avenue in Recent York on Friday, before the tolls took effect Sunday.
Bloomberg News
The Recent York Metropolitan Transportation Authority activated congestion pricing on Sunday for vehicles entering lower Manhattan.
The launch of toll collections is a milestone for a program that was years within the making, beset by lawsuits and abruptly halted in June by Recent York Gov. Kathy Hochul three weeks before it was set to start.
Recent York is now the primary city within the U.S. to charge tolls for congestion. The revenue is planned to back $15 billion of bonds to pay for the MTA’s capital projects.
“The Congestion Relief Zone has been in operation since midnight – 1,400 cameras, over 110 detection points, over 800 signs and 400 lanes of traffic and it’s all gone easily,” said MTA CEO Janno Lieber on Sunday. “I hope drivers will take one other have a look at the speed and convenience of mass transit.”
This system is meant to limit pollution and congestion and generate as much as $1 billion annually for the MTA. The MTA projects that 80,000 fewer vehicles will enter the “Congestion Relief Zone” per day now that the toll is in effect.
Congestion pricing in Recent York was first proposed by then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg in 2007, nevertheless it took ten more years — until 2017’s “Summer of Hell” — for the thought to achieve traction on the state level. The state assembly enacted congestion pricing into law in 2019, as a income for the MTA’s 2020-2024 capital plan.
The policy’s implementation was stymied first by the Trump administration, then by lawsuits.
Hochul halted the tolls in June, but resurrected them in November with lower tolls than originally planned. Hochul and the MTA raced to start this system before President-elect Trump’s inauguration.
The bottom rate of the tolls that took effect on Sunday is $9, as an alternative of the $15 that the MTA originally planned. The MTA can raise the toll to $12 in 2028, and again to $15 in 2031.
On the MTA’s November board meeting, CFO Kevin Wilens said the lower toll will likely delay the bonds from congestion pricing revenue. The agency initially planned to issue bonds a couple of yr after activating the tolls.
“The strategy in the course of the phase-in period is to time our bonding,” Willens said, “not just for the initial one yr, but additionally because the revenue is ramping up, to issue the bonds as we want the money for the projects and what the revenue stream can support.”
There are nearly a dozen lawsuits against congestion pricing still working their way through the courts. A lawsuit from Recent Jersey searching for to halt the tolls was struck down on Friday, although the state is searching for an appeal.
“Despite the very best efforts of the state of Recent Jersey,” Hochul said in an announcement last week, “our position has prevailed in court on nearly every issue. This can be a massive win for commuters in each Recent York and Recent Jersey.”