Today’s Headlines

  • Head of FTA Rails Against State Assembly (City Room, AMNY, News, Sun, Metro)
  • Villager: Pricing ‘Too Good an Idea to Stay Dead Forever’
  • There’s Always Secession (The Current)
  • Gas Prices Putting Suburban Dream Out of Reach (Philly Inquirer)
  • MTA May Build Fulton Transit Center as First Envisioned (NY1, Sun)
  • Queens Council Member Tries His Hand as TV Car Pitchman (News)
  • Makeshift Driveways Cutting Up Bay Ridge Sidewalks (Brooklyn Paper)
  • Wider Tappan Zee Would Enable Sprawl (Riverdale Press)
  • A Dash of ‘Customer Service’ on the Subway (2nd Ave Sagas)
  • Elderly Woman Crashes Thru McDonald’s Wall, Allowed to Drive Home (AP)
  • Going Car-Free in Cleveland (Cleveland Mag)
  • bobob

    so is it me, or are the fed telling us that they wouldn’t mind if the congestion pricing bill passed even after the deadline?

  • If CP were to make a comeback, here’s a potential scenario:

    – Other potential MTA fundraising ideas are shot down (i.e. like the millionaire tax) or not enough (MTA announces need for fare increase)

    – It would have to be driven by a top Democrat with good legislative connections (i.e. Paterson)

    – There would have to again be some sweetener from the Feds to build some infrastructure ahead of implementation (maybe this is what the FTA guy is saying)

    – Transit financing becomes a major issue in the fall elections for Assembly and Senate (let’s get to work)

  • Larry Littlefield

    Here’s a priceless link.

    http://gowanuslounge.blogspot.com/2008/04/take-charge-boerum-hill-school-changes.html

    The revenge for daring to even suggest CP has begun.

    My view — none of the CP proponents should make any attempt to solve the financial problems of the MTA, allowing Silver and the boys to sit back, object, and demand concessions.

    They instead should demand that Silver and the boys, along with Anthony Weiner, solve the problem — objecting to any and all sacrifices and pointing out that they are ones responsible for fare increases, service cuts, etc.

  • bobob

    Larry, I like your idea.

  • Spud Spudly

    That will make them look like inflexible and stubborn petulant children who thought that CP would solve everything when it wouldn’t. There was still going to be a large deficit even if CP passed. Would they have stopped working to solve the MTA’s money problems if they had gotten their way? It would just look like a temper tantrum.

  • Larry Littlefield

    Sorry Spud, but that’s not the way it is. Who is responsible for solving the MTA’s funding problems?

    Should out of touch billionaire Bloomberg be proposing fare hikes, service cuts and taxes? Should Christine Quinn? They should keep their mouth shut IMHO.

    The “blue ribbon commission” is likely to bring back something like CP, among other things, and where does that leave us?

    Nope, people here should focus on Plan B, and we have already had our fare increase.

  • Mark

    Should we see the post-congestion-pricing debate as a high school popularity contest? Or should we see it as a debate about reducing congestion and funding transit?

  • Larry Littlefield

    (Should we see the post-congestion-pricing debate as a high school popularity contest? Or should we see it as a debate about reducing congestion and funding transit?)

    We should push “Plan B” — reduce congestion by taking space away from the automobile. That is hand out benefits — less traffic in YOUR neighborhood, nicer environment in YOUR neighborhoods. Make the legislators oppose that.

    And let someone else hand out pain — paying for something, paying more for something, accept less for what yoiu pay.

  • Mark

    Larry, that’s your best summation of the situation yet.

    In other news:

    Oil hits $112 a barrel.

  • Spud Spudly

    With your perfect political tone deafness on this issue LL you should really get a job with Bloomberg’s Albany legislative affairs office.

    Refuse to do anything at all to help the MTA because one proposal was shot down? That would rightly be interpreted as a childish temper tantrum. If even one politician adopts that posture I promise to do Doc’s laundry for a year. By hand in front of a fire hydrant with a bar of soap.

    As for your “Plan B,” I support that. I should, because it’s exactly what I said to you here on Streetsblog Tuesday after CP went down:

    http://www.streetsblog.org/2008/04/07/its-apparently-official-congestion-pricing-is-dead/#comment-47863

  • “I promise to do Doc’s laundry for a year.”

    That would leave me more time to get baited into other people’s arguments!

  • jmc

    LL — Bloomberg is a billionaire but he’s not out of touch. He’s probably the only person in the entire state government who is concerned with future budget deficits!

  • Larry Littlefield

    (Refuse to do anything at all to help the MTA because one proposal was shot down? That would rightly be interpreted as a childish temper tantrum.)

    Hey Spud, don’t you agree that Bloomberg is an out of touch billionaire and Quinn hates the middle class? Would you really expect them to make proposal after proposal, and have Weiner, Brodsky, Silver et. all go running to whoever would have to pay and say they are on their side?

    Let them shut up and work and Plan B.

    Weiner, Brodsky, Fidler, Silver et. al say they have their own Plan B for MTA funding. Let them propose it.

  • Josh

    Agreed, JMC. At least as far as money and numbers go, Bloomberg is as good as anyone else we’ve got.