Congestion Pricing works

Photo: Jeenah Moon/Bloomberg

The New York Times:

Everything That Has Changed Since Congestion Pricing Started in New York:

Fewer cars. Faster travel. Less honking. And some questions we still can’t answer.

The reporters sought information from everyone they could think of, including the M.T.A., the Fire Department, restaurant-booking platforms, researchers and one yellow school bus company.

Policy changes often take years to show results. Even then, you may have to squint to see them.

And then there is congestion pricing in New York.

Almost immediately after the tolls went into effect Jan. 5 — charging most vehicles $9 to enter Manhattan from 60th Street south to the Battery — they began to alter traffic patterns, commuter behavior, transit service, even the sound of gridlock and the on-time arrival of school buses.

What’s changed since the toll began?

The idea was that many people, faced with a toll, would stop driving into the heart of Manhattan.

So far that appears to have happened.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority estimates that about 76,000 fewer vehicles per day in April entered Manhattan’s central business district, which encompasses the congestion zone, than probably would have without the toll.

 

That’s the equivalent of 2.3 million fewer cars for the month, or 12 percent fewer than would have been expected given historical traffic trends....