> On the risk of regressive taxation, I agree. But it's a risk, not a certain outcome. Properly varying the charge throughout the day will incentivize deliveries when the roads are less crowded. Better utilizing our freight rail infrastructure may also dampen the effect.
The congestion already does that. The issue is that it's a hard problem. You can't make deliveries to shops at 3AM because there is no one there to receive them. To the extent you can make deliveries at 6AM, they already do. But a delivery driver loads up the truck and then makes deliveries for eight hours. Telling them to work a de facto 14 hour shift because you're going to put two separate three hour blocks of "don't drive during peak hours" into the middle of their day is going to drive up costs.
And freight rail serves an entirely different market. That's used to transport bulk products in industrial quantities, not to deliver bread to the corner deli. Trucks sometimes are used in contexts where freight rail could be used but those aren't the ones driving through Manhattan during rush hour.
> The congestion charge makes little sense as a way to fund the MTA. It does make sense as a counterbalance to the negative externalities traffic congestion creates.
The problem is that the externalities are really just failures in the markets for alternatives that have dumped their natural demand onto the roads, because all of the externalities come from congestion, which could be absorbed by better alternatives if they existed.
If you make the subways better then fewer people drive. If you make them less expensive then fewer people drive. That means paying for them from taxes rather than fares -- just getting rid of the fares and using taxes instead would get a huge number of cars off the road and eliminate the overhead cost of all the fare collection infrastructure.
When you have things like minimum parking requirements or anti-density zoning rules, that makes it more expensive to build high density housing and subsidizes car ownership for people in urban areas. Then the people who live there drive more, because they have somewhere to park a car and therefore own one, meanwhile there is less housing there which means people need to live further away and then many of them will drive back in to their jobs.
Congestion pricing doesn't actually fix any of that, it just squeezes even harder on the people who the lack of alternatives had already squeezed into congested roads. It makes driving worse when what we need is for alternatives to driving to be better.
> Congestion pricing doesn't actually fix any of that, it just squeezes even harder on the people who the lack of alternatives
Every other city's experience with congestion pricing shows decreased car use in favor of alternatives. Effects on local grocery prices were minimal. And in the end, revenues paled in comparison to the health, infrastructure, policing, quality of life and economic costs of traffic congestion.
> Every other city's experience with congestion pricing shows decreased car use in favor of alternatives.
Suppose the forest is on fire and instead of spending money to put the fire out, we just ignore it. Then a bunch of wolves come into the city to flee from the fire.
Someone suggests that we introduce bears to the city in order to drive out the wolves. Many people point out what a terrible idea that is, but some cities do it anyway. Then the proponents point out that some of the wolves have fled back to the forest.
But now your city is full of bears. And the surrounding forest is still on fire.
> Effects on local grocery prices were minimal.
This is cost disease in a nutshell. "We did this one thing that was a bad idea, but the net effect was small, so that makes it alright." What's the cumulative effect of using that logic as a general principle?
> And in the end, revenues paled in comparison to the health, infrastructure, policing, quality of life and economic costs of traffic congestion.
Compared to the untenable status quo, or compared to the better alternatives?
When the status quo is a dumpster fire, "this is better than a dumpster fire" is not a very high bar.
Build more housing in cities so that more people can live there instead of having to commute in. Eliminate minimum parking requirements so that pedestrian-oriented neighborhoods can exist. Fund mass transit with taxes and eliminate fares to create a cost advantage over driving which is progressive rather than regressive.
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Fix the subway (by which I mean make it more like Japan's rail):
* Make loitering illegal, enforce it
* A 'short loop' everything recorded space
This is anti-vandalism / for crimes within a day
* Since this is the US, safety barrier the train
* In-city Automated circuits, automated schedule.
There'd also need to be baked in maintenance, but I'm not an expert in subway repair so I'm not sure what's actually required vs nice to have. If the subway is down, surface buses should run to replace it.
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An interface between the subway and the rest of the world:
Large parking silos close enough to the city to be on the subway grid (with good service), BUT, far enough out to have good use of the land. These too should have somewhat short loop subservience for security (maybe a 7-day rotation here). Parking can be charged for, but it should be less than the cost of having an automated driver take you in to the city, drop you off, and pick you up later.
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Every-day Freight backhaul:
As a transportation utility, during the more downtime hours the subway could be used by semi-automated transport cars to route pallets (or a replacement transfer unit) of things classified in several storage classes: Frozen, Refrigerated, 'room temp', not conditioned, 'special'. (Special being an un-conditioned, but ventilated with normal air, room that provides power for local regulation.) The transfer pods would be ferried along normal subway lines between cars during the downtimes. The stops would probably mostly be off of the normal ones, but exceptions might be made. Nearby storage rooms would receive the contents and buffer them. Those rooms are a city owned public utility (somewhat like paid parking spaces are now). Again, subservience on short loop, with added restricted access via RFID fobs and needing to show faces. Automated logging of who's checking in and which pallets they're taking out. At this point they may be close enough to hand/forklift transport, or maybe form an airport luggage style electric powered tram delivery.
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Reducing friction of desired transport methods:
Probably the free# (for people; #paid for with taxes) transport, and keeping the costs of the last-mile backhaul minimal for commercial ideas would be the biggest reduction. The increased patrols, and automated subservience backup (to trace fault after humans identify issues) are also supposed to reduce friction. In the narrative I've setup the civil enforcers are only supposed to be providing help, not hassling random people asking for papers.
make it more like Japan means privatizing the public transportation and giving the companies running the lines the ability to buy and own real estate in and around the stations as well as not giving all lines to one company
Your confusing analogy about bears and wolves was the counterargument. I didn't find it a persuasive response to the original argument: "Every other city's experience with congestion pricing shows decreased car use in favor of alternatives. Effects on local grocery prices were minimal. And in the end, revenues paled in comparison to the health, infrastructure, policing, quality of life and economic costs of traffic congestion."
The congestion already does that. The issue is that it's a hard problem. You can't make deliveries to shops at 3AM because there is no one there to receive them. To the extent you can make deliveries at 6AM, they already do. But a delivery driver loads up the truck and then makes deliveries for eight hours. Telling them to work a de facto 14 hour shift because you're going to put two separate three hour blocks of "don't drive during peak hours" into the middle of their day is going to drive up costs.
And freight rail serves an entirely different market. That's used to transport bulk products in industrial quantities, not to deliver bread to the corner deli. Trucks sometimes are used in contexts where freight rail could be used but those aren't the ones driving through Manhattan during rush hour.
> The congestion charge makes little sense as a way to fund the MTA. It does make sense as a counterbalance to the negative externalities traffic congestion creates.
The problem is that the externalities are really just failures in the markets for alternatives that have dumped their natural demand onto the roads, because all of the externalities come from congestion, which could be absorbed by better alternatives if they existed.
If you make the subways better then fewer people drive. If you make them less expensive then fewer people drive. That means paying for them from taxes rather than fares -- just getting rid of the fares and using taxes instead would get a huge number of cars off the road and eliminate the overhead cost of all the fare collection infrastructure.
When you have things like minimum parking requirements or anti-density zoning rules, that makes it more expensive to build high density housing and subsidizes car ownership for people in urban areas. Then the people who live there drive more, because they have somewhere to park a car and therefore own one, meanwhile there is less housing there which means people need to live further away and then many of them will drive back in to their jobs.
Congestion pricing doesn't actually fix any of that, it just squeezes even harder on the people who the lack of alternatives had already squeezed into congested roads. It makes driving worse when what we need is for alternatives to driving to be better.