New York Times: $8 traffic fee for Manhattan gets nowhere
The plan's collapse was a severe blow to Mr. Bloomberg's environmental agenda and political legacy. The mayor introduced his plan a year ago as the signature proposal of a 127-item program for sustainable city growth that helped raise his national profile. Without approval from Albany, the city now stands to lose about $354 million worth of federal money that would have financed the system for collecting the fee and helped to pay for new bus routes and other traffic mitigation measures.
After Mr. Silver announced the plan's demise, a statement was released by Mary E. Peters, the federal transportation secretary, indicating that her department would now seek to distribute those funds to traffic-fighting proposals in other cities.
New York also hoped to use revenues from congestion pricing to finance billions of dollars in subway expansion and other improvements by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, money that must now come from somewhere else.
Assemblyman Mark S. Weprin, a Queens Democrat, said that in discussing the issue with his colleagues, "the word 'elitist' came up a number of times." His constituents, Mr. Weprin said, almost uniformly opposed the measure, viewing it as a tax on their ability to move around their own city.
New York Times: Bloomberg Tactics Were Highhanded on Traffic Plan, Lawmakers Say
Last week, with a landmark proposal at a delicate juncture, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's transportation commissioner raced to Albany as part of an all-out effort to persuade state lawmakers to approve a measure to charge drivers entering the busiest sections of Manhattan.
In Albany, the commissioner, Janette Sadik-Khan, expressed the mayor's sentiments, saying: "You are either for this historic change in New York or you're against it. And if you're against it, you're going to have a lot of explaining to do."
Ms. Sadik-Khan's remarks were widely noted by Albany lawmakers, with some viewing her tone as condescending. So when it was revealed that the state police had pulled her over for speeding and improperly using her lights and sirens on her way to the Capitol, it only underscored what the legislators saw as the Bloomberg administration's imperious attitude.
"When Commissioner Sadik-Khan was coming up here telling me I can't drive, she was busy being driven in a city-owned car by a chauffeur, speeding, getting a ticket with her lights and sirens on," said Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, a Bronx Democrat and an ardent foe of the program. The proposal was "rotten to the core," said Mr. Dinowitz, who was handing out copies of a Daily News article about Ms. Sadik-Khan's citations to fellow legislators.
Despite the intimate meals at Gracie Mansion, exhaustive lobbying, and presentations of sophisticated, district-by-district traffic analyses, Mr. Bloomberg was unable to persuade lawmakers like Mr. Dinowitz to support his plan, which would have formed a major pillar in his legacy. Indeed, Ms. Sadik-Khan's stumble was but one of many missteps that state lawmakers said had led to the program's demise, and something of a replay of events last July, when Mr. Bloomberg previously failed to persuade lawmakers to approve the proposal to charge drivers $8 to enter a designated zone in Manhattan.
New York Daily News: Sheldon Silver's getting good at just saying, "NO!"
However you stand on congestion pricing, whatever you felt about the stadium, you should be outraged. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has once again ignored the principles we are all supposed to believe in.
He did not just say "no" to a plan to reduce traffic and improve the subways by charging people to drive into Manhattan.
He said "no" to democracy.
Here is how democracy was practiced in Albany Monday on an issue that affects millions of people and how they travel through the greatest city on Earth:
Silver let it be known he didn't want it.
And, what Shelly doesn't want, nobody gets.
Why even have the rest of the Assembly?
Why not just let only the Assembly speaker speak?
The majority of the Assembly is a disgrace, anyway.
They have a responsibility to represent the voters who sent them there.
Instead, a craven majority turns it over to Silver in exchange for pork-barrel grants and perks.
The result is Silver has the power to just say "no."
Do not imagine that just because Silver represents lower Manhattan that he necessarily acts in the best interest of the city, or even his district.
Silver looks out for Silver. |
