MTA Board Members (And Janno Lieber, Too) Still Want Congestion Pricing

The MTA is hiding the fiscal impact of Gridlock Governor Kathy Hochul's congestion pricing pause, but members of the transportation authority's board continue to show support for the "indefinitely delayed" traffic toll.

Board reps reacted to the July financial update delivered on Wednesday by MTA Chief Financial Officer Kevin Willens — which broadcast half-billion-dollar annual deficits but hid the loss of almost $1 billion from the toll's cancellation — by noting the one simple way to avoid doomsday financial collapse: implementing congestion pricing like the law demands.

"I'm really concerned during this time of deep uncertainty. You don't have a way to fund the remaining capital plan and we don't have a way to fund the next one. To not know how that will be funded is not a good feeling to have as a board member and as a fiduciary," said Midori Valdivia, one of Mayor Adams's appointees to the board, in response to Willens's wish-casting budget presentation.

"We actually have a revenue method now, congestion pricing, which was in state law, to move forward with so we actually have a potential way forward."

Norman Brown, a non-voting union rep on the board, pointed out that congestion pricing is closely tied up with the MTA's entire reason to exist — namely that it helps encourage people to ride public transit. The authority was projecting a 1.25-percent increase in ridership across the system once congestion pricing began, as well as increased ridership that would follow once buses began moving faster through the formerly congested parts of Manhattan below 60th Street.

"Our job is to bring people in by train and bus or move people around through the other five boroughs by bus," said Brown, who reps Metro-North workers. "This is this is our job and it's much more efficient than individual cars that are really the least efficient, are very poor use of our infrastructure in the city of limited space."

MTA CEO Janno Lieber did endorse and echo Willens's insistence that the MTA has faith in Hochul's ability to find the money to replace congestion pricing's $15 billion, but he also defended the tolling plan — in stark contrast to his boss's insistence that the toll is bad for working New Yorkers.

And Lieber countered Nassau County Board member David Mack, who echoed Hochul's claim that the toll will "kill jobs" by pointedly reminding the controversial board member that it was a "fact" that no study showed congestion pricing would undermine the local economy.

Lieber's response could have just as easily been a response to what the governor has said about how the toll would ruin lower Manhattan's economy.

"We're ... being upfront about the fact that the studies did not show that congestion pricing will crush the economy," said Lieber. "It did not show the congestion pricing will keep people away from Midtown. The London experience shows that you can actually have more people come to the central city, if you have in a congestion pricing environment and that's what London experienced."

It's been almost two months since Gov. Hochul decided to freeze the central business district tolling plan — the fruit of decades of activism and legislative work — just three weeks before it was supposed to start on June 30.

Without congestion pricing, the agency is going to lose out on more than just badly needed capital work that's already on the chopping block. There will be recurring hits to MTA's finances and two different one-time nine-figure costs.

Keeping older buses running is projected to cost up to $150 million per year, maintaining out-of-date commuter rail locomotives will cost $20 million per year and deferred state-of-good-repair work will cost $90 million per year. The agency is also projecting that it will take a $70 million per year hit from missing out on increased ridership in response to congestion pricing, and will lose $10 million per year thanks to reduced bus efficiency in lower Manhattan.

That's on top of billions of dollars of major repair work that is hanging in the lurch.