It is hard to argue with the month of June with school letting out, the summer solstice, and baseball in full swing. Then there are those daily bus trips to New York City that Flyover Pennsylvanians enjoy.
What’s not to like as you wander around Midtown Manhattan with your bus buddies eating the world’s best pizza and prosciutto while seeing the sites? Their idea of adventure is to take a cab to 9/11’s Ground Zero (sharing the fare, of course). I never asked if they visited the other four boroughs that comprise the city of New York because I knew the answer.
Provided the city has its way, those bus trips will get much pricier thanks not only to Bidenomics but the Big Apple’s shameless money grab: congestion pricing.
Congestion for most who live outside of a major metropolis is associated with the cold and flu season. Anyone driving through the city doesn’t want to hear the “c” word when tuned in to WCBS’ traffic and weather together on the eights: congestion.
To solve the congestion issue that has existed ever since Peter Stuyvesant was the Dutch director-general, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), which directs public transit throughout the city wants a draconian driving toll.
Commencing in June, drivers entering Manhattan south of 60th Street will pay a daily driving toll of $15 — provided they have E-ZPass – minus the pass, it will cost you $22.50. Moreover, the MTA can proclaim “Gridlock Alert Days,” which adds 25%, while the state reserves the right to raise the congestion toll by 10% the first year. It wouldn’t surprise me if the initial boundaries were stretched to include all of Manhattan.
The MTA, known among the natives as the Money Taking Authority, is the nation’s most dysfunctional transportation bureaucracy losing more than $700 million – annually. Decades of wastefulness, mismanagement, and political cronyism have taken their toll by creating more and higher – tolls. More money for less while being over budget and behind schedule is the MTA’s credo. The MTA has pensions that would bankrupt countries, let alone New York City.
The addition of bus and bike lanes at key traffic bottlenecks and the ongoing construction of supertalls have only added to Midtown’s woes by urban planning bureaucrats.
The MTA claims the toll will add one billion to their coffers in year one. After subtracting the exemptions, discounts, political favors, and administrative costs, their estimates will be much lower. Given the truckload of exemptions, only Christian, straight, white males will wind up paying.
Make no mistake, a large percentage of the revenue will end up with the MTA’s unions. During their next contract, the MTA will bemoan the lack of funding to do the needed service improvements systemwide and will have no choice but to raise the toll.
Congestion pricing is a tax on services disguised as a toll on drivers. Once an entity has the authority to toll, it loses the ability to think while gaining the power to destroy.
Taxes are like love and can be fleeting, but tolls are like herpes – they are forever.
One trip via bridge or tunnel, gas, and parking could cost $100 before you get that first slice of pizza.
New Yorkers get what they vote for. Look no further as New York Democrat Tom Suozzi won a special election Tuesday flipping a seat in the House from the GOP.
There are two active lawsuits one filed by New Jersey and the other, a federal case filed by Staten Island Borough President Vito Fossella, that is supported by the union representing the city’s nearly 400,000 municipal workers opposing this “crazy toll.”
What’s that saying about an ice cube’s chance in Hell’s Kitchen?
Besides, cracking down on the widespread turnstile hurdlers (a New York track event) and other fare beaters, the MTA must clean house but never will. Moreover, the city needs to privatize the MTA and its sister agency, the Port Authority.
Overall, the rich will deal with it, while the rest will have no choice but to suck it up. Others will see it as the camel’s last straw and seek other pastures voting with their feet, while illegal migrants will fill the void.
What could possibly go wrong?
