Comments on: Today’s Headlines

By: Larry Littlefield

Larry Littlefield — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 17:30:16 +0000

I just had a flashback to Lew Fidlers 9 Stone Plan, which promised all kinds of transportation improvements if workers would just accept a payroll tax that retirees didn’t have to pay.

Can someone ask Lew when all those improvements are coming? Or is all the money going to debts run up by older generations, and their unfunded pensions and retiree health care?

Promises, promises — while money is taken off the top up front.

http://www.thejoekorner.com/lines/progforaction.htm

By: Arnold Tollinator

Arnold Tollinator — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:01:09 +0000

Sam Schwartz needs to be careful about the way he pitches his toll reform plan. His current argument greases the skids for bankrupting the MTA. The first step in fixing the dysfunctional toll system is not to remove tolls from the MTA’s outer crossings, it’s tolling the inner crossing. Nor is it a good idea to propose a toll freeze for the outer crossings in the absence of tolled inner crossings. Take a look at Albany. The turds who killed the Ravitch MTA bailout plan are running the state senate. They don’t care about transit riders. It’s easy to see a populist anti-toll campaign catching fire which results in frozen bridge tolls and skyrocketing transit fares.

By: vnm

vnm — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 15:10:46 +0000

Staten Island Advance Criticizes Janette Sadik-Khan's Out-of-Town Travel

To the extent that private organizations have paid for her travel instead of the taxpayers, that's a good thing, though some might question the propriety of accepting such gifts, especially from groups with an agenda on transportation issues. The fact that this commissioner has been particularly zealous about creating new bike lanes across the city is hard to forget.

By: Josh

Josh — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 14:36:56 +0000

I don’t see a Post article on tolls, only a News article; did they change the links in the last hour? In any case, I thought the News article did a good job of highlighting the toll-shopping issue:

“And – it gets even crazier – at the same time we continue to allow more than a half-million drivers to cross the East River bridges with no charge during the height of the rush hours. In fact, under the new toll rates, big five-axle tractor-trailers heading to New Jersey from Brooklyn will be charged $60 to stay on expressways in Brooklyn and Staten Island and cross the Verrazano Bridge but nada, not a cent, to travel the streets of downtown Brooklyn, bounce across the creaky Manhattan Bridge, rumble through Chinatown via Canal St., tour the West Village and Chelsea via Eighth Ave. and head out the Lincoln Tunnel.

We actually offer an incentive for big rigs to use local streets versus highways. Insanity.”

By: TKO

TKO — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 13:37:40 +0000

The Post article on Tolls is what makes little sense. Not the toll system. The article seems to not understand that Queens is part of New York City. Manhattan is not the only part. Written for the suburbanite at heart.