Streetsblog New York City

This just makes Bloomberg’s re-election vital to livable streets and congestion pricing…we all know Thompson is basically going to reverse all of his policies on these matters in favor of businesses.

I think it comes down to this. What is more effective at discouraging people from driving: crushing traffic jams or a small per-trip monetary cost? Elsewhere in his book, Owen marvels that people will radically alter their driving habits over gas price increases that resulted in a charge of 75-cents per week, so clearly monetary cost will have a big impact on one’s mode choice.

We environmentalists are now facing the most massive resistance to any kind of change in our habits, even the kind that is beneficial. The business community is pulling its weight to prevent and roll back policies, statutes and just common sense. The recession may be the proximate cause, as some believe, but I think that they have seized the opportunity to frighten the public and elected officials away from anything that might increase costs for business or consumers sufficiently to curb energy use and consumption. Even the spectre of catastrophic global warming is having almost no effect. I believe we will have to suffer some palpable and extensive direct harm from global warming before they take it seriously. As for making cars more expensive to use in the city, it is not as if NYC were not already a major tourist attraction or as if its year-round attractions (museums, theaters, concerts, restaurants) were devoid of clientele. We were in the city on Columbus Day and the auto traffic was overwhelming; my first thought was: why isn’t the city getting revenues from these idiots who have come into the city this weekend ? If they don’t want to pay to clog the streets, then let them pay the cost of public transportation so our states (NJ, NY, Connecticut) can support public transportation networks. It is all very discouraging and depressing to realize that we have to sit back and wait for disasters so we can say: We told you so. Except for Bloomberg the other politicians are all complete blooming idiots when it comes to transportation. And they continue to fool the public and play to their fears about shelling out an extra few bucks for the privilege of filling our streets up with noisy dirty cars at the expense of public transportation.

I posted this comment about the arcticle on Planetizen:

“He is right that traffic congestion can be good for the environment by shifting people to other forms of transportation – but it nonsense to turn this into an argument against congestion pricing.

“In reality, congestion can discourage automobile use, but congestion pricing can do even more to discourage automobile use

“Imagine the same roads (no change in capacity), first with traffic congestion and second with free flowing traffic because of congestion pricing. There are obviously fewer people driving in the second scenario than in the first: that is why the traffic is free flowing rather than congested. More people were shifted to transit or other alternatives because of congestion pricing than were shifted by congestion.”

Another way of saying it is that there are two effects involved: the pricing effect discourages driving, and the speed effect encourages driving. But for congestion pricing to reduce congestion at all, the pricing effect must outweigh the speed effect.

herenthere: “…we all know Thompson is basically going to reverse all of his policies on these matters in favor of businesses.”

I agree that Bloomberg is a far better deal for the livable streets movement than Thompson. And I’ll vote accordingly. But:

Congestion pricing foes have a strong weapon in their argument that CP needlessly penalizes businesses. After all, car commuters often have other transport options, while a bakery in Brooklyn delivering to restaurants in Manhattan does not. So while CP can raise revenue from trucks, it can’t change behavior. And whether the revenue-raising is fair is debatable.

The solution is to exempt delivery trucks from CP and concentrate on cars, which take up most of the space on our streets anyway.

In case anyone gets the wrong impression, I am fervently in favor of CP. It was the first political issue that ever moved me to write to my electeds.

“Muddled” was a kind word for streetsblog to use about this article in “Today’s Headlines.”

My head was spinning as I read it thanks to Owen’s use of circular logic based on premises he didn’t support.

Just a couple more huge problems with the article:

First, “Traffic jams, if they’re managed well, can actually be good for the environment. They maintain a level of frustration that turns drivers into subway riders or pedestrians.”

He offers no support for either claim.

The idea that frustration might turn commuters away from cars may have some small effect in reality, but mainly, it’s a Yogi Berra-ism that I’ve heard others use to oppose congestion pricing: “Nobody goes there anymore; it’s too crowded.”

“Congestion isn’t an environmental problem; it’s a driving problem.” Um, WHAT? Are the two mutually exclusive? No. Yet he doesn’t explain how it’s NOT an environmental problem.

@Mark Walker:

It’s unclear as to whether congestion pricing will end up actually costing business money or not. Let’s consider your hypothetical bakery. Say that this is a large bakery, which provides many restaurants in Manhattan with bread. It transports so much bread that it needs 5 trucks to do its daily runs in the time window it has.

Now, enter congestion pricing. True, the bakery will get charged for each vehicle entering the congestion zone. However, because of the reduction in traffic, each truck can make more deliveries in the same amount of time. If those time savings allow the owner make all daily deliveries with 4 tucks (eliminating one truck), then it’s likely that this business will have SAVED money, even after having paid the congestion charge.

For many delivery- and service-based businesses, where profit is a factor of how many clients they can visit in one day, congestion pricing has the potential to be revenue neutral or even revenue positive.

I did some digging on this Minnesota business Owen mentions.

As far as I can tell, the Minnesota system doesn’t impose a charge; it just gates people onto certain segments of freeway at set intervals during busy periods.

The agency compared with-metering and without-metering periods of several weeks. During the without-metering period traffic volumes did indeed fall, but as they say:

——–

After the meters were turned off, the evaluation team observed an average nine percent traffic volume reduction on freeways. No significant traffic volume change was observed on the parallel arterials which were studied by the evaluation team. There was some diversion to other time periods and no significant diversion to transit. The reduced freeway traffic volume most likely was diverted to earlier or later time periods and to local
streets not under observation by the evaluation team.

http://www.itsdocs.fhwa.dot.gov/JPODOCS/REPTS_TE/13425.pdf

Quite dishonest on Owen’s part.

While fully supportive of congestion pricing, it is somewhat of a digression, red herring, and major improvements in livable streets and sustainability will come from extensive large scale public and private bike systems with advanced systems to follow.

As Vukan Vuchic would say: You have to have automobile use disincentives combined with transit/bicycling/walking incentives. Right now we are incentivizing everything.

#18 J:Lai, “. . . not feasible to move enough people on bicycles.”

gee, what about the 600 million cyclists at the beginning of china’s industrial revolution?

the estimate was that there was one-half million cyclists took to the streets during the last transit strike which happened overnight.

this is not the requisite millions required by nyc daily multi-million passenger commutes but the refrain was heard by even more: “get me a bike and i will get to work!”

40-percent cycling small cities like amsterdam and copenhagen do not nearly have the capacity that nyc does.

Thinking about the nasty way that the publishing world works, I realized that some editor of the Wall Street Journal must have heard about Owen’s book and offered Owen the opportunity of writing an op-ed only if the op-ed was about why he opposed congestion pricing. That op-ed is an excellent way to publicize a book, so Owen was obviously under a lot of pressure to write what the editor wanted.

This explains why the “bizarre patterns of thinking on the Wall Street Journal’s editorial pages” appeared, “still more bizarrely,” in an op-ed whose “author was New Yorker writer David Owen, promoter of the commonsensical idea that urban density is energy-efficient, hence big cities are green.”

J Lai, yes, I noticed that we were making a similar point, and I assumed it was a crossed post.

I don’t think the WSJ article is illogical.

A street or road moves the most traffic when the cars are moving at 30 – 50 km/h or so. If the traffic slows down or comes to a standstill, that means throughput is falling. That means fewer cars.

If a congestion charge gets traffic moving again, letting traffic go faster, that means throughput is higher. That means more cars.

I know that’s not the result from London and Stockholm, where car traffic fell after putting in the congestion charge. That tells me they are charging more than what’s needed to keep traffic moving. Which is fine with me, because it makes the city more livable.

I recently wrote a paper which analyzes congestion pricing through the views of Pigou and Coase, both famous welfare economists. Bottom line is congestion pricing works in theory and in actuality.

Check it out – http://www.scribd.com/doc/19400824/Welfare-Economics-and-Congestion-Pricing

I think Erik Sandblom makes a tremendous point. We are currently at traffic throughput of X. One possible outcome of congestion pricing could be that traffic throughput increases to X + some number, increasing vehicle miles traveled. Another outcome more commonly seen in real life, and the one that would presumably be the goal of congestion pricing, would be that traffic decreases to X minus some number, while at the same time providing revenue for mass transit that David Owen says is so critical for sustainability. Most likely, uncovering the fact that the first scenario is theoretically possible is a red herring, the mere bringing up of which sets back the effort to enact congestion pricing, which would most likely do a tremendous amount of good by the author’s own standards.

Lest anyone get the wrong impression, I should probably elaborate to say that, in addition to totally supporting congestion pricing, I am all for charging drivers the full cost of the environmental (not to mention health) impacts of their driving. It’s just that an “environmental” pricing policy would be somewhat different than a “congestion” pricing policy because ALL driving has environmental impacts–and those impacts fall disproportionately on certain (usually poor) communities–but only peak-hour driving has congestion impacts (unless you live in LA where there’s always congestion).

It’s pretty important not to confuse the two issues, because doing so can lead to wacky things like calling traffic jams the “solution” to the environmental impacts of driving.

Owen and many others act as if “carbon” is the only environmental harm in the world.

There are a lot more immediate damaging effects, too. Just reason # 100 that his “traffic jams – good for environment” is light years into insane-land.

Thank you Erik Sandblom for pointing out the main point of congestion pricing and the only reason why we can take David Owen’s article seriously. The point of congestion pricing is not just to disincentivize driving and provide a new funding source for transit, it is also to maximize the efficiency of the roads we always have. If someone has no problem paying the congestion fee and parking, it becomes faster to drive from farther away (potentially leading to more mcmansions farther out). Overall car use will decrease, but it may not for those who can afford it.

To Ian Turner, you make the comparison of auto density and auto throughput. Ian correctly asserts that auto density is the cause of pollution.

Being honest, he have to recognize certain things about congestions pricing:
1) Pollution will decrease
2) Transit use will increase
3) Auto use will decrease
4) There will be more cars driving into the city, and their users will be wealthier

#3 and #4 seem to be mutually exclusive but they are not. The more cars there are, the fewer cars can move. If we decrease auto density, we will increase auto throughput. The only way to change #4 would be to lower the capacity for more cars. This can be done by converting lanes on the bridges and tunnels to bus only, or bike only, for example.

An interesting comparison is what Houston did with its highways. They built the most extensive HOV lane system in the world, beginning in the 80s when voters turned down rail transit. Because they were able to use their lanes so much more efficiently, they were able to squeeze many more people onto the highways. The number of cars didn’t really change, but people started carpooling or taking the bus, both of which use the lanes. In a lot of ways, this was great, but I wonder if Houston would implemented a Dallas-like light rail system sooner if they had not made their highways more efficient. Even though they now have light rail, there are no plans to extend it deep into the suburbs like they did in Dallas.

Erik Sandblom, vnm, anyone else who thinks that there is a logical basis for Owen’s argument –
there is not.

The mechanism by which congestion pricing increases vehicle speeds is that it reduces the number of vehicles. A decrease in the number of vehicles will indeed allow greater speed, which may attract some additional drivers. However, each additional driver attracted by the convenience of increased speed will also increase the congestion, thereby decreasing vehicle speed.

If 100 current drivers stop driving because of a congestion charge, at the ABSOLUTE MAXIMUM 99 new drivers will begin driving because of increased speedds. The 100th new driver would return speeds to exactly where they were pre-congestion charge, and therefore will not start driving.

Thus, congestion charges can not produce a situation where there are more drivers than without the charge.

It is possible that the new drivers would be making longer commutes than the drivers they replace. From the standpoint of reducing congestion and making more efficient use of roads, this does not matter. From the environmental standpoint, this may be a net positive or negative depending on many things like the relative efficiency of the vehicles driven, etc. However, it is entirely speculative and not at all germane to the assertion in Owen’s article.

Gecko, I disagree with many of your assumptions about the ability of bicycles to replace other forms of transit at a large scale, but we will leave that for another time.

#36 J:Lai “I disagree with many of your assumptions about the ability of bicycles to replace other forms of transit at a large scale” (continued)

Further, a maxed out 50-foot 35-ton (unpopulated) subway car carries 188 people still partially human powered since most people have to stand. So a 10-car subway train carries 1,880 people maxed in a 500-foot vehicle but likely requires something like one-quarter mile (5,280 feet divided by 4) between trains to maintain a safe stopping distance at any reasonable speed.

All this underground which lots of people have to enter and exit through relatively narrow stairways and again mostly providing their own human power.

Do the math. Let me know what you come up with. Try to explain to me how this makes good design sense, practicality, ease-of-use, convenience, cost, accessibility, etc., for “transit at a large scale” in a city where the public street space is supposedly freely available and greatly exceeds that of its subway’s tunnels.

Moreover, New York City is in it densest areas a highly tiered living, working and human-powered walking-about environment and transit can easily be same way if many extra tons of steel and glass do not have to be moved at the same time; potentially, greatly amplifying mobility densities.

Having spent some years of my life working in road pricing I’d like to think I know what I’m talking about. One of the appalling myths I’ve found is the idea that congestion is “good”. In essence, that having what is a core city network utility functioning erratically is a positive thing.

It isn’t. It wastes time for those stuck, it wastes fuel and increases pollution, and traps a substantial number of road users with every good reason to use the road behind those who could make alternative choices by route, mode or time of day.

The list of cities to have achieved positive benefits from congestion charging is growing. Singapore is the best example, but sadly too many people from North America or Europe patronisingly think that a highly developed Asian city state can teach them nothing. Since then, London and Stockholm are well known having achieved improved flows, reduced car traffic, better flowing bus and taxi traffic, and increases in cycling and walking. Oslo also effectively has a congestion charge as its toll ring has paid off the debt related to the major highway and public transport improvements it helped finance. Sydney recently introduced peak tolls on its Harbour Bridge and Tunnel improving peak flows, and resulting in some diversion to rail and bus.

The big mistake is for people to transplant schemes from other cities onto the city one is talking about. It wont work because cities have all got different urban form, different road and public transport patterns, commute periods and other interdependencies. A congestion charging option needs to be designed, bespoke. It needs to address questions of enforcement, what to do with the revenue, and whether the design can minimise unfairness to any groups of users (and whether the unfairness is real). Road users also need to get something in return, in New York I’d suggest that dealing with a massive backlog in deferred maintenance on the streets would be the obvious answer (which benefits pedestrians and cyclists as well as remaining road users).

For New York it should be a matter of when, and what sort of option to select, not if.