The Battle Over Congestion Pricing Begins

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority could be forced to pump the brakes on its latest money grab, better known as “Congestion Pricing,” after New Jersey filed suit in federal court to thwart the scheme. Staten Island, too, wants to join the suit, a last-ditch effort to stop the transit agency’s push to impose tolls of up to $23 on driving into Manhattan. As Gotham struggles to recover from Covid, it’s hard to imagine a worse idea.“We have to put our foot down to protect New Jerseyans,” Governor Murphy reckons, pointing to the harm to Garden State residents who need to drive into Manhattan for their work. Yet with New Yorkers likely to bear the brunt of the congestion pricing tolls, Governor Hochul isn’t budging from her support for the new tax. “Congestion pricing is going to happen,” she avers. Mayor Adams, too, has acquiesced to the tolling proposal.That leaves New York’s Republicans to lead a rear-guard action against the plan. Staten Island’s borough president, Vito Fossella, said he wants to sign on to New Jersey’s lawsuit. The minority leader of the City Council, Joseph Borelli, contends that Mr. Fossella “has the backing of an overwhelming number of city residents.” Mr. Borelli calls the MTA a “disaster” and grouses that “the default can’t just be that we always pay more.”That’s a contrast with New York’s Democrats, who are content to bail out the MTA — at taxpayer expense, of course — despite the agency’s inability to manage its finances. The MTA eyes an extra $1 billion a year from congestion pricing via tolls and dedicated borrowing. Yet the agency just admitted it’s been losing $690 million a year due to its okay to turnstile-jumping. Cushy pacts with unions, too, cost the MTA hundreds of millions a year.The financial imperative behind congestion pricing is ignored by backers of the scheme, who are calling Trenton’s lawsuit “outrageous” and, with a straight face, contend New Jerseyans “will undeniably benefit” from the tolls. How? From “better transit” and “less traffic,” says the head of one transit watchdog group, Lisa Daglian. This overlooks the fact, noted by our Dean Karayanis, that New York could use the extra traffic.Mr. Adams, for one, has been pleading with Wall Street and other businesses to get more employees working in the office. “All of our corporate leaders need to get in the room and say, let’s come up with a minimum,” he implores, as Bloomberg reports the city’s vacancy rate for office space stands “at a record high.” Yet Ms. Hochul blithely chirps that with congestion tolls, “we’ll see significantly fewer vehicles in central Manhattan every single day.”So it is that an unusual coalition of New Jersey Democrats and New York Republicans is the city’s best hope to save its economy from the new tolls. The lawsuit, filed in federal court at Newark, centers on whether President Biden’s transportation department was too hasty in giving the green light to the tolling scheme. The suit calls for further review of environmental effects and raises questions over harm to disadvantaged communities from the tolls.“The power to tax involves the power to destroy,” Chief Justice Marshall observed more than two centuries ago. New York City has already gone a long way toward wrecking its own economy by excessive taxation of commerce and residents’ incomes. Yet the gaping maw of the MTA remains unsated. Now, residents of other states are expected to cough up cash for New York’s dysfunction. No wonder New Jersey is turning to the courts for justice.

The Battle Over Congestion Pricing Begins

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