New York Local News

NEW YORK (AP) ― What kind of person drives into Manhattan on a day when there's a gridlock alert and snow in the forecast?

Someone like Linda Mulligan of Upper Monclair, N.J., who commutes by car to her job as a fashion designer and who doesn't much like Mayor Michael Bloomberg's plan to follow London's example and charge drivers $8 to enter the busiest part of Manhattan.

"I think it's horrible," Mulligan said she left her car in a parking lot Thursday. "I've traveled to London. I've talked to taxi drivers there. They say it has not improved anything at all."

Bloomberg unveiled his so-called congestion pricing plan as part of his agenda for a greener New York last April and got a boost from the federal government, which promised the city $354 million if the plan is enacted.

But Bloomberg hit a roadblock of opposition from drivers and their elected representatives. With the plan in peril, he and the state Legislature set up a commission to examine congestion pricing and other potential routes toward the goal of reducing traffic.

The commission has until the end of January to recommend a plan, which will then go to the Legislature and the City Council.

At its meeting last week, the panel looked at alternatives like having cabs pick up passengers only at designated taxi stands and license plate rationing, under which a car with a license plate ending in 6 would be banned from Manhattan on the 6th, 16th and 26th of each month.

"Everything that is being looked at is being looked at seriously," said Marc Shaw, chairman of the Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission, at the meeting.

The commission meets again Monday and will consider adjustments to the mayor's original plan, which called for charging $8 to drive into Manhattan south of 86th street on weekdays between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. Trucks would pay $21.

"What the mayor proposed is in big, big trouble," said state Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, a commission member and a congestion pricing foe.

Brodsky, a Democrat whose Westchester County constituents include many Manhattan commuters, says the plan unfairly targets working stiffs.

"It will keep out the Chevrolets but not the BMWs and Jaguars," he said.

But proponents of the mayor's plan say commuters who drive into Manhattan are wealthier than those who take public transportation.

They point to a study by the city's Independent Budget Office that found that median annual earnings of drivers exceeded median annual earnings of other commuters by 30 percent, $51,021 for motorists vs. $39,247 for others.

"The people who are driving can afford to insure their car, they can afford to operate a car in New York or in the suburbs," said Neil Giacobbi, a spokesman for the group Environmental Defense. "The people who are taking the bus can't."

Cities including Singapore and Stockholm have used congestion pricing, and Mayor Ken Livingstone introduced it in London in 2003.

Appearing at a conference on climate change here in May, Livingstone said London traffic congestion dropped by 20 percent and carbon emissions inside the central zone decreased after the plan went into effect. The fee, equal to about $16, has gone up since its implementation in 2003.

New York would be the first U.S. city to use London-style congestion pricing, but versions are being considered in other cities including San Francisco and Boston.

"If it can succeed on this side of the Atlantic, I think it can really get some legs across the rest of the country," said Randy Rentschler, spokesman for the San Francisco Bay area's Metropolitan Transportation Commission. "If New York makes it work, it starts to make a game plan and a path so that other cities can make it work."

But it's far from certain that congestion pricing can make it here.

Alternatives and potential modifications to Bloomberg's plan that are on the table include license plate rationing, enforced carpooling, significantly increasing the cost of street parking in Manhattan's central business district and raising cab fares and fees charged to cabs.

The northern border of the pay-to-enter zone could be changed from 86th Street to 60th Street.

Also under consideration is instituting a toll on the East River crossings including the Brooklyn Bridge and the Manhattan Bridge.
Shaw said

Taxis are a bone of contention: Under the mayor's plan they are exempt from the $8 fee.

Brodsky said taxis should not get a free ride because "they are largely used by upper income people."

But Kathryn Wylde, another commission member and president of the Partnership for New York City, a business group, said taxis are "an extension of the mass transit system" and should not be penalized.

The proposal for a no-hail zone in the central business district seems alien in a city where children learn in their strollers that if they stick their hand up a bright yellow taxi will magically appear, but it would reduce the congestion caused by cabs cruising for fares.

If the panel does not approve Bloomberg's congestion pricing plan, it must recommend another solution that projects at least a 6 percent decrease in traffic, as Bloomberg forecasts his plan will achieve.

(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)