MTA Putting Transit Improvements on Pause Sans Congestion Pricing
By Mark Hallum June 26, 2024 12:40 pm
reprints
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority board voted Wednesday on a resolution to put transportation improvements on pause thanks to Gov. Kathy Hochul’s sudden suspension of the congestion pricing program.
MTA Chairman Janno Lieber said during the June board meeting that without the expected $15 billion in revenue from the toll funds, they simply have to plan for a future without the money. That includes pausing the second phase of the Second Avenue Subway and postponing plans to make the system fully compliant with the Americans With Disabilities Act.
Lieber acknowledged that he was “heartbroken” to drop the improvements, but he was confident that the $500 million worth of congestion pricing hardware that had already been installed would not go to waste.
“No matter how we feel about the pause on congestion pricing, we are going to work with everyone, the executive chamber, the legislature, the feds, to find ways to preserve and revive the projects that are being resequenced right now because we’re short on money,” Lieber said. “The fact is, the MTA cannot start implementing congestion pricing without the New York State [Department of Transportation] signoff. … We can keep the machinery of congestion pricing in operating order so it’s ready when the temporary pause is in fact lifted.”
Congestion pricing would have charged passenger vehicles going into Manhattan below 60th Street about $15 per day, generating an estimated $15 billion for the 2020-2024 capital program.
The program not only had support from the real estate industry, but the tolling structure was also hammered out by a number of executives on the Traffic Mobility Review Board. However, weeks before tolling was scheduled to start, Hochul indefinitely paused the program after a trip to Washington, D.C., during which there has been speculation that members of Congress encouraged her to pause the program ahead of the midterm elections to help Democrats win a majority.
The decision happened 25 days before the tolling plan was set to begin on June 30. Hochul has said the decision was not politically driven, but was made out of concern for the small number of motorists who commute into Manhattan.
With $27 billion already committed to projects, the $12 billion on hand will be parsed out nearly in equal parts toward state-of-good-repair work, such as tracks, station infrastructure, rolling stock and program support and administrative operations.
Projects to improve accessibility for people with disabilities in 23 stations will be deferred while 38 stations that are currently undergoing the installation of elevators, acquisition of zero-emissions buses will also fall by the wayside along with $1.5 billion in improvements to the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.
About $3 billion in signal modernization projects to replace infrastructure dating to the subway’s inception won’t move forward, either.
Altogether, it equates to about $16.5 billion in deferred work.
How Hochul’s sudden change on the congestion pricing in early June will impact the MTA debt servicing has not been fully determined. Those projections are scheduled to be presented at the July meeting, board officials said.
The MTA also expects to incur an unknown number of costs associated with canceling work contracts and the possibility that the federal government may withdraw previously approved grant funding.
Mark Hallum can be reached at mhallum@commercialobserver.com.
