Mayor Mike Bloomberg proffered the idea of congestion pricing as a solution to the traffic congestion in Manhattan. It would have meant tolling the East River bridges in New York City, which have been free for pretty much their entire history (the Brooklyn Bridge had a very short lived toll). His stated goal for the tax was to ease congestion in the City and make the city more green, but the only green he was truly concerned with was the tax revenues generated from the tolls - he's never met a tax he didn't like as Mayor.
Bloomberg's idea died in the state legislature after coming agonizingly close to fruition. The whole plan was little more than a regressive tax that would hit residents outside Manhattan hard, and make businesses in Manhattan even less competitive with those outside the borough because they wouldn't have to incur the transportation costs. The plan would have made the most expensive place to live in the nation even more expensive, and that's saying something.
The plan was coming at a time when the economy was still in decent shape. It was widely opposed and businesses opposed it on grounds that it would make people seek to live, work, and spend their money elsewhere - places that they wouldn't have to spend still more money just to get to.
And yet, like a zombie, the idea of tolling the bridges keeps coming back as a way to balance the MTA budget and prevent a steep increase of the fares.
It's not congestion pricing, but the results will be nearly as bad for the city of New York and the State.
The latest tolling plan doesn't even make sense from a fiscal perspective. The MTA is looking at a multi-billion dollar hole, if you believe their current figures (and there's no reason not to believe that they're staring massive deficits given the way that they've mismanaged their assets and capital projects including the Fulton Street project). The idea is to impose a $2 toll on the East River and Harlem River bridges that are currently free. The $6 congestion pricing toll would have raised several hundred million (not counting the hundreds of millions to implement the system in the first place and to maintain the new toll infrastructure along with enforcement). The $2 toll wont even reach a fraction of that amount and it begs the question of just how much money could be raised above and beyond the implementation costs.
The toll would hit commuters and those looking to spend their hard-earned money in Manhattan worst of all - at a time when they can ill afford to see still more of their money taken by the government. The City is in dire fiscal shape because Wall Street has left it without the billions it ordinarily relied upon in years past. Now, they'll try to tax everyone else because the business revenues are no longer there.
The problem is as it has been in the past - when you start raising taxes and fees into the teeth of a recession, you not only don't meet your revenue projections, but you intensify the recession and make it an even more inhospitable business climate. That's precisely the wrong direction to take.
No comments:
Post a Comment