The fury over congestion pricing is growing louder, with New Jersey’s elected officials in broad agreement that the plan must somehow be stopped.
But that political noise must not quell these immutable truths: The health of the region requires that we get people out of their cars, repair a century-old New York City subway system that hundreds of thousands of New Jerseyans use every day, and do our part to lift some of the smog that sits on lower Manhattan like a grimy blanket.
The congestion pricing proposal is a monumental step in the fight to save the environment, and while some myopic New Jerseyans will exaggerate the burden, this is no time to be parochial: An overwhelming majority of our commuters won’t even be charged another dime, so we’re taking New York’s side in this fight.
Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-5th Dist.) has been leading the truculent New Jersey delegation’s pushback on the MTA’s plan, but his real quibble should be with our state’s inability to reach the underserved areas of his district with mass transit options.
He has legitimate concerns about some commuters being under threat of a double toll, such as the relatively small number who use the George Washington Bridge to reach the Central Business District below 60th St., where drivers will be subject to the congestion fee. He also assails the scarcity of transit options in parts of his Bergen-Passaic-Sussex district, asserts that the trains and buses to Manhattan will be overwhelmed, and warns that trucks seeking to avoid the CBD will invade Fort Lee.
The double toll is a possibility, but the specifics are still being worked out, with seven scenarios under consideration. Either way, consider the numbers: 90% of our commuters to Manhattan take mass transit. And less than 2% of Gottheimer’s constituents – who have a median income north of $100,000 – commute to the congestion zone, according to the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.
As for the lack of mass transit options, that’s not New York’s fault, it’s Trenton’s fault. Indeed, this should motivate the state to finally complete the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail so that commuters from Englewood and Leonia – that’s Gottheimer’s district — can reach Manhattan without their cars. The HBLR has been operating for 23 years, and it still hasn’t reached Bergen County.
As for existing trains and buses being unable to handle the extra load, the MTA’s projections show that congestion pricing will have low impact on ridership: Depending on the scenario, PATH train volume will increase between 0.7% to 2.0%. NJ Transit ridership will rise somewhere between 0.3% to 2.3% for trains and 0.5% to 1.1% for buses.
And as for trucks piling up at the GWB: The bridge already handles 300,000 vehicles per day, so another 630 to 955 trucks (another MTA estimate) is not going to do much except pad Port Authority revenue.
No doubt, Gottheimer is right to point out that some elements of the plan are blatantly unfair, and with the 30-day public availability period now open, that should be voiced.
In only three of the seven scenarios detailed in the MTA’s report, Jersey drivers entering Manhattan through the Lincoln or the Holland would receive a credit for tolls already paid. In only one scenario, drivers would receive credits at the tunnels and at the George Washington Bridge. That’s not exactly toll parity.
And while countless New Jerseyans will benefit from an upgraded New York subway system, no part of the $2 billion in annual congestion revenue is going to New Jersey to upgrade its own systems.
It’s also wrong that the Bronx gets funding for the environmental impact it will absorb, and that New Jersey gets nothing – even though the projected increase in air pollutants is higher in Bergen County (0.7%) than the Bronx (0.2%). The tradeoff, however, is that Hudson County will experience a 3% reduction.
And it’s still conspicuous that the Traffic Mobility Review Board, which will set the rules, doesn’t include a representative from New Jersey among its six members.
Still, Regional Plan Association VP Kate Slevin is optimistic: “Ultimately, the board has a lot of people who care about the region and want this program to succeed – and success means that you don’t have serious ramifications anywhere in the region,” she says. “This is now a national issue – all the other cities are looking at this – and we have to get it right.”
We can’t get it right unless everyone’s all-in. This is a historic effort to upgrade a decrepit system that moves 1.7 billion riders a year, many from New Jersey, as part of an even greater effort to save the environment. Like it or not, this is our fight.
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