Traffic plan hits jam
Trump inaction means congestion pricing off by a year
The MTA’s plan to implement congestion pricing, taxing cars in the busiest parts of Manhattan, will be delayed by “roughly a year” thanks to holdups by the Trump Administration, the agency’s chief development officer Janno Lieber said Monday.
“We’ve literally hired the consultants. We’ve designed the systems and the cameras and so on that are going to be implemented, but we just can’t move forward without the Trump Administration’s action,” Lieber said during a video interview with the Manhattan Institute.
“It’s not complicated, but it does need to be set in motion. The software needs to be created and put into effect, and that’s what takes a little time.”
The state Legislature in March 2019 signed off on the congestion pricing program, which will charge motorists who drive in Manhattan south of 60th St. The MTA board in October approved a $507 million contract with a company called TransCore to build out the infrastructure and technology.
The new tolls were slated to go into effect at the start of 2021 — but the feds have since slow-walked an approval process and declined to tell Metropolitan Transportation Authority leaders what kind of environmental review process is needed to give the program the green light.
“There’s a federal approval that’s needed because the federal government has funded a lot of our roadways,” said Lieber. “It is so frustrating.”
Lieber and other transit honchos have for months said that congestion pricing will not go live in January — but Monday marked the first time that an MTA leader said it would be delayed by a full year.
The holdup further imperils the MTA’s $51.5 billion 2020-2024 capital plan, which promised to rapidly modernize mass transit in New York but has been put on ice since March due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The money from congestion pricing was intended to pay for roughly $15 billion of the massive construction plan.