Wednesday’s Headlines: Congestion Pricing Works, Part 541 Edition

Fourteen percent fewer cars! Thirty-six percent faster trips through the Holland Tunnel! Fifteen percent fewer injuries!

These are the topline datapoints released yesterday by the Hochul administration to magnify what all of us who have eyes are already seeing: congestion pricing is working!

In August, nearly 2.7 million fewer vehicles entered the congestion relief zone compared to the previous baseline, a 14-percent reduction. Every day, the MTA said, 87,000 fewer vehicles enter the zone — with an aggregate of 17.6 million fewer vehicles since congestion pricing launched on Jan. 5, 2025.

And traffic injuries are down by 15 percent in the zone, but the safety benefits are being seen all over town. The city Department of Transportation’s data show that road fatalities and injuries are among the lowest of the Vision Zero era.

The tolls fund billions in repairs to the subway and commuter rail systems, but even before those repairs are made, ridership is already improving, which means fare collection is up. Subway ridership is up 9 percent, bus ridership is up 13 percent, and the Metro-North and LIRR systems are up 7 and 10 percent respectively.

And as we all said, drivers are benefitting, too: Drivers crossing into the congestion zone from Queens, Brooklyn or New Jersey are having faster trips, thanks to the reduction in traffic:

• Brooklyn Bridge: 13 percent faster
• Holland Tunnel: 36 percent faster
• Battery Tunnel: 16 percent faster
• Lincoln Tunnel: 10 percent faster
• Manhattan Bridge: 5 percent faster
• Queens-Midtown Tunnel: 4 percent faster
• Queensboro Bridge: 21 percent faster
• Williamsburg Bridge: 23 percent faster

MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber was excited.

“In less than a year, New Yorkers are seeing massive benefits from congestion relief,” he said in a statement. “This initiative has demonstrated that government can do big things that deliver results — less traffic, safer streets, and improved quality of life for transit users, drivers and pedestrians alike.”

In other news:

• “Gridlock” Sam Schwartz is right about driverless cars: “Go slow!” (NYDN)
• The Atlantic covered the revenge of the New York City NIMBYs (though we’re unsure why the vaunted magazine flopped the lead image of DUMBO in the 1970s).
• Hell Gate reheated our nachos on Instacart’s summer of lobbying, but the worker-owned outlet did a good job with its write-thru.
• Come for the bureaucracy surrounding driverless cars, stay for Justin Brannan’s quote about the End Days of the Adams administration. (The City)
• Some help for mentally ill homeless people, many of whom are in the subway, is on the way. (NY Post)
• A great young reporter, Sammy Sussman, revealed in the Times how poorly law enforcement agencies around the state punish drunk drivers among their ranks.
• Millburn Pennybags and the other plutocrats met in Midtown to once again try to resuscitate Andrew Cuomo’s struggling campaign. (NY Times)
• Blame Amtrak for yesterday’s LIRR delays. (Gothamist)
• And, finally, check out the greatest thing I’ve ever seen (and I saw Secretariat win the Belmont). Necessity is the mother of this father’s imagination: