<story><title>Things that are more inequitable than road pricing</title><url>http://cityobservatory.org/ten-things-more-inequitable-that-road-pricing/</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>bradleyjg</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t know about other cities, but to understand the strong political push back against congestion pricing in NYC requires a bunch of local context.&lt;p&gt;Neither the rich+, nor the poor, nor the vast majority of the middle class regularly commute into Manhattan by car. The poor and the lower&amp;#x2F;middle middle class because parking is prohibitively expensive. The upper middle class and the rich because they either live in Manhattan or they&amp;#x27;d rather take commuter rail than sit in traffic. To the extent the latter take ubers or similar such services already pay congestion charges and there isn&amp;#x27;t too much fuss (except from the drives who don&amp;#x27;t have much political muscle).&lt;p&gt;The bulk of car commuters into Manhattan are instead those with de jure or de facto free parking. That&amp;#x27;s largely government workers (e.g. teachers, cops, firefighters) and members of the trades (i.e. construction workers).&lt;p&gt;For those with de jure free parking congestion pricing isn&amp;#x27;t a big deal, whatever authority is setting aside parking will either pay the congestion charge or get it waived. It&amp;#x27;s the beneficiaries of police and traffic control refusal to enforce the law with respect to certain favored populations that are up in arms about congestion charges. Because a congestion charge is likely to be enforced by an automated mechanism which, unlike parking control, will not engage in public corruption on their behalf. And these groups, unlike the uber drivers, do have a great deal of political muscle.&lt;p&gt;+At least the ordinary rich, hecto-millionaires and billionaires might be a different story</text></comment>
<story><title>Things that are more inequitable than road pricing</title><url>http://cityobservatory.org/ten-things-more-inequitable-that-road-pricing/</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>jonstewart</author><text>In Northern Virginia outside DC, I-66 had been subject to directional rush hour restrictions on single occupancy vehicles. It was illegal to drive a car with just yourself for a few hours every weekday and you risked a ticket if you were caught. People put blow up dolls in their passenger seats.&lt;p&gt;Last year they rolled out automatic congestion pricing for SOVs. All the news stories were about how the toll could hit a ridiculous-seeming price of $40+, but that was usually only for a few minutes in the morning rush. Buried in the articles several paragraphs in would be a note that, oh yeah, it had been illegal to drive alone. Now a year later, peoples’ habits have changed and the toll has done its job. Commuters have effectively time-shifted, alleviating and smoothing congestion. It has been so effective that the length of I-66 subject to this treatment will be extended.&lt;p&gt;I’m a smalltime neighborhood elected official in DC and I really hope I can convince DDOT to roll out bus lanes faster.</text></comment>