NYC NOW - October 3, 2023: Midday News

Episode Date: October 3, 2023

New York's Comptroller says the MTA hasn’t fully put in an action plan for hardening the subways system against climate change. Meanwhile, a new NASA-led study shows New York City is sinking at a rate of a half-foot per century, but the cause isn't big buildings. Plus, the group at the MTA tasked with coming up with the fee structure for congestion pricing met for what’s likely the last public meeting yesterday. WNYC’s transportation reporter Stephen Nessen attended the meeting and has the latest.

Welcome to NYC now. Your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Tuesday, October 3rd. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. New York's controller says the MTA has not fully put into action a plan for hardening the subway system against climate crisis. WNIC's Charles Lane reports. Comptroller Tom to Napoli's audit faults New York City transit for greenlighting capital projects without ensuring their ability to withstand flooding, as well as inconsistently activating

extreme weather plans without a clear logic. DeNapoli pointed to last week's rainstorm, which poured multiple inches of rain an hour. But transit advocates and researchers say the problem is more nuanced. For example, publicly knocking the MTA for not sufficiently checking all equipment makes it harder and more costly to run mass transit, which might make it a less desirable alternative to more carbon-heavy alternatives like driving. A new NASA-led study shows New York City is sinking at a rate of a half foot per century. But the overall cause is not the city's nearly two trillion pounds of buildings. The NASA scientists say more than 20,000 years ago, a mile-high glacier pushed down on the

land. On the edges of the ice, the land bulged and rose, much like what happens when a person sits on a mattress. The glaciers are long gone. of course, but much of the city's land is still under process of dropping. Only a handful of sinking hotspots due to construction on former landfills such as Arthur Ash Tennis Stadium and LaGuardia Airport. 74 with sunshine now, 81 and sunny today, and then Wednesday, sunny and even warmer, up to the mid-80s than Thursday we start to cool off into the 70s. The group at the MTA, you're tasked with coming up with the

fee structure for congestion pricing met for what's likely the last public meeting yesterday. Congestion pricing is the MTA's plan to charge drivers a fee to enter Manhattan below 60th Street. WNIC Stephen Nesson was at that last meeting and he joins us now. Stephen, what was the scene like there? Well, I got there a little bit early and out front it was almost like a motorcycle rally. There were, you know, near, and it only took a few, but there was probably, you know, a dozen motorcycles revving their engines. doing laps around MTA headquarters in lower Manhattan, and they have signs. They want a 50% toll discount is what they were calling for. There's also a group of taxi drivers, both yellow cab and

the ones representing the four higher vehicles. They were calling for exemption, so the sort of dueling rallies in front of MTA headquarters. Inside, they brought that energy too. So there was a lot of yelling during the meeting, several taxi drivers were actually escorted out of the building for being too disruptive. There was even like a back and forth at one point. The board didn't know when the tolling in London ended. They didn't know what time it was. So people are Googling in the crowd and yelling at 6 p.m. at 6 p.m. So it's somewhat of a ruckus atmosphere. Stephen, here's a question. Everybody across the region wants to know. How much is it going to cost to drive into Manhattan below 60th Street.

Michael, I have to say, we don't know, but listeners, keep listening. I have more good information. Don't turn off the radio yet. Here's what we do know. Here's what we do know. They laid out four new scenarios. So we had seven options originally from the MTA. They've sort of mixed and matched it, winnowed it down to four different options now.

And the board said they're sort of overarching goals as they sort of finish this this process up. They want a low toll. They want to minimize the traffic diversions. That is the toll shopping, choosing the cheapest bridge or tunnel. They want equity and they want to keep the tolls simple. Nothing too complicated. That said, like I said, we still don't know how much they want to charge, but we do know that some plans are coming into place. For example, they want to start charging trucks, quote, for the congestion they cause. Bigger trucks cause more congestion. So for example, those box trucks that deliver fruit and vegetables, they would be charged twice the toll rate, whatever that is. Those large articulated trucks would pay three times as much to enter Manhattan.

One of the biggest, you know, most contentious issues is what happens if you cross a bridge or tunnel to get into Manhattan? Are you going to be charged again? You, you know, we famously hear New Jersey complaining about this. And the board laid out sort of a range of crossing credits, they call them. And it's not even clear exactly which. bridge or tunnel, presumably all of them. But that's not even clear. But we do know they want to give a discount of $4 to $7. Remember, the highest end they were considering is $23. So imagine knocking $4 to $7 off of that high end charge. They did make some recommendations for taxis and four

higher vehicles. Like I said, those were some of the loudest groups lobbying and some of the ones that paid the most for lobbyists. So basically, I won't get into all the details. but there's a range again for taxis. They might pay the yellows and greens and blacks as much as a dollar to $1.50. The app-based would pay $1.50 to $2. And remember, that group, both of them, already pay a congestion pricing fee before you can get in the car. So congestion pricing is so political, as we know it, and it's fraud.

There's a group of Democrats and Republican members of Congress who have banded together in opposition to this. New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy is even suing the MTA, Were there any concerns about this opposition voiced at the meeting? Not really. Not really. They seem very focused on these different exemptions that I spoke about. They are very interested in avoiding toll shopping.

But remember, the East River bridges are still free. So whatever they charge, they're going to have to do a lot to disincentivize people from taking a free bridge. And I don't know if we necessarily heard that. And we certainly don't know if $4 to $7 is going to discourage people. from toll shopping, that credit I was mentioning. We still don't know the price, but hopefully we will find it out ideally by this month because the MTA wants to get this up and running by May. And they need to raise a billion dollars.

So whatever it is, you know, it could be on the high end of the tolls that we've heard about. And we're still on target for this to start in the spring. That's what the MTA said at the last board meeting. They are installing the infrastructure now. So you may see those tolling gantries in Midtown and Lower Manhattan already. They're being put in place. All right, WNYC, Stephen Nesson, giving us the latest on congestion pricing plans there. Stephen, thank you.

Thank you. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WNYC. Be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives. And subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. We'll be back this evening.