{"id":36232,"date":"2023-05-05T21:29:50","date_gmt":"2023-05-05T21:29:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/new-york-city-congestion\/"},"modified":"2023-05-05T21:30:06","modified_gmt":"2023-05-05T21:30:06","slug":"new-york-city-congestion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/new-york-city-congestion\/","title":{"rendered":"New York City congestion pricing plan clears key hurdle"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>(Reuters) -The Biden administration on Friday approved the release of the final environmental assessment for New York City&#8217;s congestion pricing plan for public comment, a key step before the project can be green-lighted.<\/p>\n<p>The Federal Highway Administration approval is a milestone in efforts to implement the plan announced in 2019 to reduce traffic and provide funding to improve mass transit by using tolls to manage traffic in central Manhattan. <\/p>\n<p>The approval means the New York project sponsors are cleared to put the environmental assessment and draft finding of no significant impact out for a 30-day public notice before the federal agency makes its final determination.<\/p>\n<p>In August, New York said drivers could face a traffic congestion charge of up to $23 a day in late 2023. A study released last year projected would reduce the number of cars entering Manhattan by 15% to 20%.<\/p>\n<p>The city wants to charge a daily variable toll for vehicles entering or remaining within the central business district, defined as between 60th Street in midtown Manhattan and Battery Park on Manhattan&#8217;s southern tip.<\/p>\n<p>New York, which has the most congested U.S. traffic, would become the first major U.S. city to follow London, which began a similar charge in 2003.<\/p>\n<p>New York lawmakers approved the plan in 2019, and it was originally projected to start in 2021. But the federal government under President Donald Trump did not take any action.<\/p>\n<p>The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) said on Friday congestion pricing &#8220;is a generational opportunity to make it easier for people to get around in, and get to, the Central Business District, by reducing traffic and funding improvements to the public transit system.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>MTA said it was grateful the Federal Highway Administration found the document met standards for legal sufficiency.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, MTA said passenger vehicle drivers could pay $9 to $23 to enter at peak times, while overnight tolls could be as little as $5. Drivers could apply existing bridge and tunnel tolls to congestion charges.<\/p>\n<p>The environmental assessment found the charge would cut traffic, improve air quality, make buses more reliable and increase transit use by 1%-2%. The toll would generate $1-$1.5 billion a year and support $15 billion in debt financing for mass transit improvement.<\/p>\n<p> (Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Leslie Adler and Marguerita Choy)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/new-york-city-congestion\/file-photo-people-walk-on-park-avenue-that-was-closed\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportDomesticNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ440RS-VIEWIMAGE.jpg\" alt=\"tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ440RS-VIEWIMAGE\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Reuters) -The Biden administration on Friday approved the release of the final environmental assessment for New York City&#8217;s congestion pricing plan for public comment, a key step before the project can be green-lighted. The Federal Highway Administration approval is a milestone in efforts to implement the plan announced in 2019 to reduce traffic and provide [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":36233,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1214],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-36232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-domestic","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportDomesticNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ440RS-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36232"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36232\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36237,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36232\/revisions\/36237"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}