Something is getting lost in the debate over Gov. Hochul’s decision to put an “indefinite pause” on the plan to impose tolls on people driving south of 60th St. Congestion pricing was intended to raise $1 billion annually for the public transit system, while discouraging driving into Manhattan, thereby reducing traffic in the city’s most crowded districts and making the city a more livable place.

Now, the governor is proposing to look elsewhere to fund public transit. But that’s letting the tail wag the dog: regardless of how public transit is funded, traffic is approaching a crisis condition in Manhattan, and there is no other plan for reducing congestion.

While raising badly needed funds for mass transit was a great benefit of the congestion pricing plan, it was hardly its central purpose. In Manhattan, with gridlock at an all-time high, no one needs to be convinced that traffic is terrible and that something needs to be done about it.

The costs in wasted time, delays for first-responders, not to mention the adverse effects of congestion on the environment and quality of life, are all too apparent. New York is threatening to become a victim of its own success.

Proponents of the plan argue that we need congestion pricing to finance public transit, the lifeblood of the city. Critics claim that the MTA wastes money and that additional funds can be raised with better fare collection or even raising fares.

The governor has suggested that the city’s economy is too fragile to add additional fees on commuters. She claims that there are other ways to fund mass transit, and she has criticized what she calls the “lack of imagination” exhibited by those fixated on congestion pricing as the only source of funds. She instead wants to increase taxes on city businesses.

While it’s unclear how increasing taxes on city businesses is supposed to help the city’s economy, opponents of congestion pricing are right about one thing: it makes no difference to public transit how the funding is raised — funding is fungible.

But reducing congestion is not fungible. The promise of less traffic and a more pedestrian-oriented public realm cannot be attained by any other means. We need to lead with a robust vision for a more livable and sustainable city. In fact, the congestion pricing concept originated from the need to reduce congestion, and the plan’s ability to fund transit was a happy side-benefit. 

Currently, the MTA’s crossings (like the Battery and Queens-Midtown tunnels and the Triborough Bridge), which are directly connected to highways in the outer boroughs, are tolled. But the crossings by the city, the Brooklyn, Manhattan, Williamsburg and Queensboro bridges, offer free passage.

Drivers are thus incentivized to exit highways as they approach Manhattan to avoid the tolled crossings, and maneuver through residential neighborhoods to access the free bridges, contributing nothing to the communities they drive through other than fumes, congestion, and honking horns. Regardless of how much money is raised by tolling, we should fix this nonsensical and unfair condition.

First, we can immediately use the gantries already installed for congestion pricing to toll the city bridges. To start, and to gather performance data, the tolls should match those currently on the MTA’s crossings.

Since the mission is to reduce congestion, one option is dynamic pricing, set by demand. In that way, when there is low demand (e.g. late at night), the fee could be zero. Streets in Manhattan are scarce shared public assets; to avoid a tragedy of the commons we need a strategy to protect them.

The MTA’s core mandate is to provide safe, efficient, and reliable public transportation services. It stands to reason that their congestion pricing scheme focused on generating income to advance this mission.

However, the initial purpose of disincentivizing driving in Midtown and Downtown was actually to reduce congestion, allowing for more valuable and successful uses of the public realm, from landscaped areas, playgrounds and dog-runs, to “third place” facilities. Perhaps if the effort were led by the city, there would be more of an emphasis on the quality of life in the city.

Much of the discussion about congestion pricing conflates two related, but separate issues: a dedicated source of income to fund public transit, and reducing congestion. These are both legitimate and beneficial goals, but distinct. By muddling them we are losing the opportunity to significantly improve our city.

Cohn is a transportation architect, living and working in New York City.