Gov. Kathy Hochul’s congestion pricing revival got the MTA’s green light Monday – clearing the way for Manhattan drivers to be hit with $15 tolls by 2031.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority board OK’d the governor’s phased-in congestion pricing plan in a 12 to 1 vote.
Congestion pricing’s return is “huge for the MTA,” said Janno Lieber, the agency’s chair. He argued motorists, transit riders and businesses would benefit from the program reducing traffic in Manhattan.
“It’s a hopeful moment for drivers as well as for transit riders and for everybody because life can and should get a lot better if you have to drive to New York, if you elect to drive to New York, if you’re not spending as much time in congestion,” he said. “If you can save 10, 20 or even 30 minutes your time is money.”
The procedural vote went off without much fanfare compared with the public fury both in favor of and against the long-awaited plan to toll cars entering Manhattan below 60th Street, which is now set to take effect Jan. 5.
Hochul last week announced she’d lift the “pause” on the program – enacted over the summer just days before tolling was first slated to kick off – and carry it out with a $9 toll, instead of the original $15.
But largely hidden in Hochul’s sales pitch was the fact that the lower toll would gradually increase to the $15 that had been approved last year by the MTA.
The phase-in offered by Hochul – and ratified by board members Monday – calls to hike tolls to $12 in 2028 and the full $15 in 2031.
Many opponents have cast congestion pricing as a tax on hard-working commuters and New Yorkers who drive.
Lieber said 143,000 people drive into the congestion toll zone every day, compared to 6.5 million who take transit.
He argued the tolls will help make the subways and commuter trains better, and likely draw in drivers who’ll take a second look at taking the rails.
“Don’t believe the hype when people want to represent that this is some sort of dystopian hellscape,” he said. “The New York mass transit system is so much safer than many, many other places in the states where people rail about congestion pricing and rail about New York. Take a look at the crime rates in their major cities.”