This weekend, I'm going to keep on checking Streetsblog and The Gothamist for some hot news that might be coming from Mayor Bloomberg.
Rumors are flying that an Earth Day press conference will include announcement about a trial congestion pricing plan - basically, a toll for automobile access of midtown and downtown Manhattan.
This goes in line with the perspective, adopted by liveable streets advocates, that charging for things like parking spaces and automobile access to streets - letting the free market limit access to those resources - will both be the disincentive necessary to start a reduction of automobile use, as well as generate revenue needed to expand public transportation service to some of the outer neighborhoods in the boroughs from which lots of new york city drivers drive.
Several months ago, I watched a movie called "Contested Streets," which discussed the rise of congestion in New York City as well as the anti-congestion measures taken in London, Paris, and a couple other cities.
Traffic congestion can't really be dismissed as a niusance; I think of the possibilities that behavior is tangibly affected by the spaces provided for person to person interaction. Streets are bad, and pedestrian plazas are good. There's a reason why Road Rage is not only a common phenomenon, but a common term - we're all familiar with this effect! Furthermore, in the next decade or so, New York City's population is going to grow by an estimated one million people. Where they will go and how they will get around must be carefully considered and planned for - it must be built, now. And it must be built in a way that is going to be safe, healthy, sensible, and sustainable. Cities have an incredible potential for radical sustainability and low resource use - as long as decision-makers are willing to make dramatic changes.
Congestion procing is a good start.
I'll be clicking "Reload" a bunch this weekend.
As a parting image, this is what Park Avenue used to look like. A park. Actually a park - rolling greens and winding brick paths all the way down. How beautiful!
Rumors are flying that an Earth Day press conference will include announcement about a trial congestion pricing plan - basically, a toll for automobile access of midtown and downtown Manhattan.
This goes in line with the perspective, adopted by liveable streets advocates, that charging for things like parking spaces and automobile access to streets - letting the free market limit access to those resources - will both be the disincentive necessary to start a reduction of automobile use, as well as generate revenue needed to expand public transportation service to some of the outer neighborhoods in the boroughs from which lots of new york city drivers drive.
Several months ago, I watched a movie called "Contested Streets," which discussed the rise of congestion in New York City as well as the anti-congestion measures taken in London, Paris, and a couple other cities.
Traffic congestion can't really be dismissed as a niusance; I think of the possibilities that behavior is tangibly affected by the spaces provided for person to person interaction. Streets are bad, and pedestrian plazas are good. There's a reason why Road Rage is not only a common phenomenon, but a common term - we're all familiar with this effect! Furthermore, in the next decade or so, New York City's population is going to grow by an estimated one million people. Where they will go and how they will get around must be carefully considered and planned for - it must be built, now. And it must be built in a way that is going to be safe, healthy, sensible, and sustainable. Cities have an incredible potential for radical sustainability and low resource use - as long as decision-makers are willing to make dramatic changes.
Congestion procing is a good start.
I'll be clicking "Reload" a bunch this weekend.
As a parting image, this is what Park Avenue used to look like. A park. Actually a park - rolling greens and winding brick paths all the way down. How beautiful!
Labels: congestion charging, justice, new york city, safe streets
posted by mattio at
11:26 AM
2 Comments:
.
We all have to wonder what Bloomberg is really thinking of with this congestion pricing tax scheme. Maybe he mostly just wants a new tax. Just wrap it up in ‘concern for the environment’, and then people can just demonize those who oppose it.
If he cares so much about traffic jams, congestion and air pollution, why does he let Park Avenue be blocked off? Why doesn’t he do anything about that?
It's true, Pershing Square Restaurant blocks Park Avenue going South at 42nd St. for about 12 hours a day/5 months of the year! This Causes Massive Congestion and Air Pollution!
But apparently it does not bother NYC’s Nanny-in-Chief Mike “Congestion Pricing Tax” Bloomberg?
The extra gridlock and exhaust fumes certainly help support the fact that the city is hugely congested.
Check out the map!
http://whataplanet.blogspot.com
http://preview.tinyurl.com/38obfd
Check it out!
Thanks,
Little Blue PD
:)
Little Blue PD, I think you're way off base. I think that "new tax" is a Daily News-style buzzword used to rile people up. But this "new tax," congestion pricing, is not just a tax for the sake of political evil - this is to make particular, significant concrete improvements (to the transit) that citizens have clamored for, for years - which will begin to prepare the city for an influx of another million people over the next two decades.
Furthermore, this "new tax" is pretty self-imposed, and affects a vast minority of New York City residents who choose to drive into Manhattan. Yes, some people rely heavily on that ability due to lack of MTA service to certain parts of the outer boroughs; improving transit options so that people don't need to drive from those places is part of the goal of using the funds generated by transit improvements.
Your commentary on the Pershing Square Restaurant is also misguided, I think. Blocking off the road does not cause congestion and air pollution - those cars are already on the road. What causes congestion and air pollution is events and incentives (free parking, building new parking structures - proposals for the West Side Rail Yards? New Yankee Stadium?) that bring more drivers into the city.
Standard urban planning/land use research shows quite conclusively that removing streets from auto use reduces, not increases, traffic. While a block for a restaurant is hardly comparable to, say, taking a highway off the map, it shows part of underlying theory.
In addition, I think it's very important to note that congestion pricing is part of, hopefully, a broader push to give New Yorkers more public space that is currently offered exclusively to people in automobiles. There has been a rennaissance of sorts, of public space, just beginning - and we hope it can continue. We hope to see more sidewalk space, less road space, more squares, public cafes, more Green Streets, more pedestrian plazas like the proposed (but currently unlikely/unacted-upon) vision42.
Check out the documentary "Contested Streets" to see some of the practical, real, existing effects of these ideas in other cities.
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