Yay or Nay to Tolls on the Brooklyn, Manhattan and Williamsburg Bridges?
If transit group Move NY has its way, moving between boroughs via car will become dramatically more expensive. The group is pushing to revive its failed plan to charge a toll of $5.54 in each direction when crossing the Brooklyn, Manhattan and Williamsburg bridges. (The plan also calls for a toll on the Queensboro Bridge,…
If transit group Move NY has its way, moving between boroughs via car will become dramatically more expensive. The group is pushing to revive its failed plan to charge a toll of $5.54 in each direction when crossing the Brooklyn, Manhattan and Williamsburg bridges. (The plan also calls for a toll on the Queensboro Bridge, as well as crossing 60th Street in Manhattan or taking the West Side Highway or FDR, and to lower tolls slightly where they already exist.) What do you think of the idea?
Transit Group Would Add Tolls to Four New York Bridges [NY Times]
Proposal to Add Tolls on Brooklyn, Manhattan, Williamsburg Bridges [Eagle]
Photo by Anne Holmes
I am all for this plan, as long as taxi cabs aren’t charged the toll.
No way! The State can’t keep asking hardworking taxpayers to bail it out as it spends lavishly on projects it can’t afford. With already high gas taxes, tolls, income taxes, etc., you’d think the City and State would have it together. Learn to live without your means.
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To those who are going to claim that this plan is about fixing “congestion”: get real. Apart from the huge backup that would be caused by vehicles waiting to pay the toll, I doubt that the number of vehicles traveling across these bridges would be reduced by so much as to make a substantial dent in congestion. People often point to congestion pricing in London as a “success story” in this area. But, while congestion pricing has led to fewer cars on the road in London, traffic in London is still terrible, and survey after survey continues to rank London as the most congested city in North America and Europe. The fee has been a huge cash cow for the City of London, though, which is why I suspect that some are eyeing it for NYC.
Manhattan will start to see even less of me for sure now…. IN the UK these tolls helped areas outside of central London grow. Queens, Brooklyn will become more popular.
And what about high state gas taxes and City income tax, which, if I recall reading correctly, was supposed to be “temporary?” This isn’t a problem with not having enough money, but with smart spending. We shouldn’t be asked to keep paying more and more to support bloated government that has shown its fiscally irresponsible.
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If we want to discuss the vehicles that cost a really high amount of wear and tear on NYC roads, we have to look to taxis. Tax them more, if anything.
But it lowers tolls for how long? If history is any indication, the new revenue from these tolls, which would help see the toll on the Verrazano lowered (of course, the tolls would still be very, very high), would only encourage greater spending, which would be used to justify substantial toll increases in the future. This is NY, where tax increases are common and fiscal responsibility is not. The Verrazano is currently making a $250 million profit each year (http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/552303-brooklyn-officials-call-for-verrazano-bridge-toll-discount-for-brooklynites/)! That’s profit! This means that the tolls on the bridge are being used for much more than operating expenses, but are serving to bail out other areas of State/City government. The tolls would start out at $5.54 in each direction, but how long before we’re seeing $10? When is enough going to be enough?