Ideas For Dealing With The Problem Of Traffic Congestion In New York City

Overview of the Problem

I was, first, exposed to the problem of traffic congestion in New York City by an astute MIT trained Economics Professor at Queens College (C.U.N.Y) - Dr. Michael Dohan. In his Price Theory & Distribution class (during my first Master's Program), he suggested many economical ideas to address the problem. As a matter of fact, he approached me to write a thesis on the N.Y.C. traffic congestion problem for my Master's program (concentration in Economics). (For the sake of disclosure, I chose another 'non-traditional' topic for my thesis.)

Later, I started an extensive research on the problem of traffic congestion in New York City (N.Y.C. traffic problem). N.Y.C. traffic problem's socioeconomic costs are exponentially growing each year. The socioeconomic costs will be expensive for everyone if we do not expeditiously and gingerly address New York City transportation challenges pointed out by the following quote - In New York City, the biggest infrastructure challenge is our transportation system. Our mass-transit system carries a third of America's commuters every day via commuter rail, subways and buses. We have 7 million trips a day and we are at capacity. There has not been an expansion of our system since the 1940s. Similarly, the streets and highways that service New York City have not grown and there is little possibility of expanding them (Wylde, 2007, para 2).

Causes of the Problem

Limited Resources

Presently, New York City has 'many irons in the fire.' In other words, it is subsidizing (at least requested by Forest City Ratner) the Atlantic Yard Projects to the tune of $200 million (Naparstek, 2005). According to the distinguished Harvard trained Queens College professor and World Trade Center consultant Dr. Martin D. Hanlon, the new World Trade Center will costs N.Y.C. over 10 billion dollars. Similarly, according to Wylde (2007), construction of the well advertised (by the local media) new subway line on 2nd Avenue in Manhattan is estimated to equal the cost of the construction of the new World Trade Center. These huge capital projects will take years to complete. If we learn anything from the Iraqi War/Project/Fiasco - the costs will be greater than the original calculations/estimates.

Short Term Thinking

During the flight from the urban centers to suburbia after World War II to the 1970s, New York City transportation system remained stagnant and/or reversed. Public policy implementation was geared toward suburbia's and Upstate New York's transportation systems. In the mid 80s to the present time, N.Y.C. population rebounded to the amount of over 8 million residents. N.Y.C remains the de facto capital of the world where millions of people visit the city via the regional airports. For example, La Guardia Airport (L.G.A.) annually processed 25 million passengers while John F. Kennedy Airport (J.F.K.) annually processed over 40 million passengers. Millions more commuters commuted to work in the financial hub of the world from the Tri-State areas and Pennsylvania. Despite the present circumstance of the influx of people, goods and services into N.Y.C as demonstrated in the preceding paragraph, N.Y.C is very slow to make visionary/long term improvements in its transportation system and infrastructure. For example, yellow cabs traffic can be greatly reduced if a train system similar to the MARTA's train system in Atlanta, Georgia links Manhattan to L.G.A.

Effect of the Problem

Economic Costs

Again, the socioeconomic costs will be expensive for everyone involved as pointed out by the following quote - "So today, as a result of the limitations of our transit system and our highways and roads, traffic congestion is among the biggest threats to our city's competitiveness and its ability to attract business and talent into New York. We are unsure where the tipping point is, but there will come a time when it is simply too inconvenient, too unreliable and too expensive to conduct business in our central business districts because the difficulty of moving goods and people" (Wylde, 2007, para 5).

Proposed Solutions

Recommended Solution

In my opinion, congestion pricing is the answer to the N.Y.C. traffic congestion problem as proposed by Professor Michael Dohan. According to the professor, congestion pricing is the pricing for the use of roads during certain peak time of the day. Going by Dr. Dohan's analysis, congestion pricing would be the most effective tool against traffic congestion. For example, London (a city similar to N.Y.C.), England and Stockholm, Sweden are very successful in their respective implementation of congestion pricing (Wylde, 2007).

Alternate Solutions

Naparstek (2005) recommended other solutions such as: improve subway service and facilities; create incentives to take transit; limit and manage parking space; design a great pedestrian environment; get bus rapid transit rolling (B.R.T.), and make N.Y.C. more bike-friendly. For example, N.Y.C. parking spaces are very cheap and abundant in comparison to parking spaces in London, England. Naparstek (2005) recommended N.Y.C. to make prices more expensive and reduce parking spaces. In turn, commuters will be more inclined to take cheaper public transportation rather than paying high parking fees. These solutions are answers to the N.Y.C. traffic problem. In other words, congestion pricing is only one piece of the N.Y.C. traffic puzzle.

Opposition to Recommended Solution

According to Schaller (2006), congestion pricing opponents decried it as punitive and additional taxation. Other opponents claimed that the congestion pricing experiment in London is unsuccessful because 62 percent of businesses in London reported a drop in customers since its implementation (Schaller, 2006). To the first claim, the present cost suffered due to the 'taxing' (pun intended) traffic congestion is more costly than congestion pricing. For example, the adage - "foregoing a college education is more expensive than obtaining a college education." To the second claim, London was suffering a severe recession at the time of the implementation of congestion pricing as per Schaller (2006).

Next Steps

In conclusion, congestion pricing is a solution your administration should seriously consider to implement. Other viable solutions were proposed in the above paragraphs. The alternate solutions should be considered. Howbeit, the priority should be placed on congestion pricing due to the limited resources of N.Y.C. Opponents of congestion pricing will continue to attack it from their 'anti-tax' platform. For the long term, you have to do what's necessary for the benefit of the socioeconomic vitality of our city.