Remote View

1mo ago

Car owners in NY are devastated!

161 comments

I looked on the map. That overlooks Central Park.
If your home overlooks Central Park, I'm pretty sure you can afford a congestion charge.
- Some of the most frugal, penny pitching people I know are also some of the wealthiest people I know.
  
  Yep. I work in tech and there's a guy who cannot stop bragging about his millionaire status and is so ridiculously cheap.
  
  A good reason to feel sorry for his kids.
  
  Then he can walk.
- You don't get rich enough to afford such a location by paying fees that benefit others.

Dude: "I wish traffic in my area wasn't so bad"
Genie: "Ok, people driving in your area will be financially penalized for using their car instead of public transit, therefore alleviating traffic."
Dude: "hey wait, I want an exception made for me! I am special. I am the main character, I should be the only one driving a car!"
Genie: "That was your third wish. Goodbye."

The congestion zone starts at 60th Street and heads south, so traveling from 61st - 79th street won't even encounter the congestion pricing. This guy is dumb on so many levels.
EDIT: I just looked it up on a map and 61st is a one way going west towards Central Park, so if you enter 61st from Madison Ave, you're forced to exit at 5th Ave and go south entering the zone, which I guess is this guy's problem?. I also looked up the guy and he's a CEO Real Estate developer, so he's living in a multi-million dollar place right next to Central Park and can't afford to pay $9 because his private parking spot in his building forces him to drive into the congestion pricing zone. Come on!
- Another case of the big bad gubberment hurting the little guy!
- Wait, it's 9 dollars?
  Oh my God. I thought it was cheap. This poor bastard, does he have a GoFundMe I can donate to? This is highway robbery, it's going to drive him straight to the poor house or worse the public transportation system!
- Maybe he's a shady CEO scared his shit business practices will get him capped so he avoids all public transit.

Isn't the point of the congestion fee to relieve congestion? Each person that says "this fee is stupid & I'm not paying" is one less vehicle in the area.
Sounds like a win.
- That is indeed the goal, but there is still a PR battle to be had on the issue.
  To my knowledge this is the first time that congestion pricing has been implemented in North-America, and how people react to this will decide whether other North-American cities are willing to take the risk and do the same thing. Over the next couple of months there will likely be a lot of opinion pieces and articles that try to make you think that the congestion pricing is a failure and should be reversed.
  Edit: typo
  
  I hope they don't react the same way they did when roundabouts (rotaries/traffic circles) were introduced. Another thing that is only a problem in America and works well in many other countries.

I was wondering if there was more to the story. Like, maybe he has a disability and NYC doesn't have an exemption for disabilities. They do, however, have an exemption for disabilities as well as a reduced rate for low income residents. To me it sounds like this guy is just lazy.
Looking at this on Google Maps, he can get anywhere on 76th St using one bus or subway ride and a 5-10 minute walk.
Zero sympathy.
- Wow, I can't believe you'd suggest subjecting this poor man to something as horrible as being forced to use a public bus.
  
  "Ahh, the old number 22. Clean, reliable public transportation. The chariot of the people. The ride of choice for the poor and very poor alike!"
  
  A bus? With all the other peasants?
  
  Reminds me of the time I worked at the Sears repair call center... A woman who lived on the island of Nantucket needed her washing machine repaired - Sears only went out there two days a week, and they were booked for a couple weeks, so of course she asked "what am I supposed to do until then?" I suggested a laundromat. "Have you seen the kind of people who go to the laundromat?" I said "yup, I'm there once a week." Was quite proud of myself, usually I don't think of the perfect response until minutes later...
  
  Bedbug bus? :p

Imagine if we got this sort of coverage whenever someone was inconvenienced by public transit being cut, or a bike lane being blocked, or fares being raised.
- But that doesn't manufacture consent for the corporate dictatorship?
- https://youtube.com/watch?v=bzE-IMaegzQ

Isn't that less than two miles away?
I suppose he could also have to travel down 79th a bit, but Manhattan is only about 2 miles wide anyway, right? So like...worst case scenario, a four mile walk.
Okay. That would be a significant walk. Probably an hour or two. But in NYC, how likely is it that you can get to your car, travel to your destination four miles away, find parking, and then walk to your destination (1) in less than an hour, and (2) for less than $9?
Get a bike, bro. Or hey, I hear New York has this fancy new doohickey called a "subway."
- It's about a 24 minute walk or a 17 minute journey by bus
  
  Under 10m by bike
  
  For me, a brisk walk is 5.2 km/h (at 8% grade, 135 strides/minute, and I'm totally sweaty after 30 minutes, it would take me about 45 to go 2 miles) because I'm short and 65. With my husband, we would take over an hour because he can only drive his wheelchair so fast before the vibrations make him lose control of his lip-joystick. Add in crappy curbcuts for another 10 minutes. I (or we) would take the bus because I'm not a privileged idiot like him, (and the subway is still not wheelchair accessible) but you should also be aware of your own privilege of youth, stride length, and health.
- You expect this man to mingle with the poors? What if he had to talk to someone or got bumped into? Perish the thought of this man interacting with anyone below his socioeconomic status.
- Well he says it's 18 blocks so probably a straight shot up 5th. It's a 20 minute walk and he can go through the park if he likes.
- Isn’t that less than two miles away?
  I have a coworker who lives less than two kilometers from work and he complained that our workplace doesn't have enough parking spots. There is a bus stop right in front of our building and two bus routes connecting to his neighbourhood, yet he refuses to ever take the bus
  
  2km?
  I wish my commute was that short, I'd be walking every day to work.
- Are blocks shorter in new york? Where i live each block is a quarter mile
  
  On average, a city block is 1/20 of a mile. But that can vary greatly depending on direction (N/S vs E/W) and location in the city.
  https://streeteasy.com/blog/how-many-nyc-blocks-are-in-one-mile/
  
  Blocks are a quarter mile where you are? That's huge!
  In Chicago, they are an 8th of a mile, which usually means blocks are 2x2 big buildings downtown.
  
  I don't live in New York. But it was my understanding that most cities with numbered streets generally adhered to 10 street numbers = one mile. 79 - 61 = 18 = 1.8 miles.

I drove once in NYC. Never again. I'd gladly walk 3x that distance to avoid having to use a car. Or, ya know, use (gasp) public transportation.
- Nobody drives in NYC! Too much traffic.
- I drove in Kuala Lumpur once, traffic was crazy, super crowded, improvised lanes and bumper to bumper traffic with motorbikes going all over the place. LMAO no are you kidding? I didn't drive, I used their awesome metro system I got a week card for cheap so I could go all around the city without even thinking about it.
- I've driven a few times in Manhattan, but most of those times were on a Sunday - it was a different world. Ghost town is not an exaggeration. The one time it was a weekday, I was hauling a motorcycle trailer, and when I saw 2 parking spots in a row on 5th Ave, I couldn't resist stopping for an hour to walk around. Someone actually stopped to watch me parallel park. Must've been a tourist, New Yorkers don't stop for anything.

Congestion fees are a very capitalist way of solving it. This law basically exists for everyone except rich people (i,e. Those who can afford to pay fees).
All this is based on a false assumption that money has an objective value. But in reality, 1$ means different things for different classes.
- I mean, you are right and the fee should be proportional to wealth, but it is not gonna affect the poor people because they use the public transit. Maybe anywhere else in the US may be true that "even the homeless need/have a car" but NYC would be the exception.
- Yes but the money goes 100% to public transit so it benefits the lower income public transport commuters too.
- According to Wikipedia "Low-income residents receive a 50 percent discount on daytime tolls after their first ten trips into the congestion zone in a calendar month". So to some extent the system does take your concern into account.
  
  Well it pretends to but no system like that will equalise it.
  Do the same as we do with fines, based on income.
  So that the congestion charge for a billionaire is also actually significant. Enough for then to reconsider using a car.
- In NYC in particular though, I have a feeling that very few low income people drive into Manhatten instead of taking transit.

Driving in Manhattan is for truck deliveries and taxis only.
If you try to drive a car from point to point in Manhattan, you're an asshole.
- That goes for every densely populated city. In Europe we have similar problems and still there are those SUV Assholes driving their cars in areas even delivery vehicles fear to enter. (Imagine Roads made for horse carriages... they are now one way and barely fit those dick extensions)
- 25 years ago, I felt safer riding a bicycle in Manhattan than I did in Boston...

Just take the 6 like 2 stops you absolute donkey

It’s hard to believe this is real. Who would try a car for a trip like that? It would be so inconvenient
- I don't it's real? But there are definitely some annoying yuppies over there in that area.
- You underestimate how car-brained Americans are. If a destination is more than a few blocks away, most people will hop in their car without a second thought.
  
  More than a few blocks? I've seen people who need to take the car a quarter of a mile and even less than that. Granted, I'm talking about rural Americans where they're used to living on rural highways applying the same logic to the small towns that support their homes, but you get the idea

Dude is complaining because even though he just lives out side of the zone he still has to pay the fee even when he travels north to 79th which is also outside zone. That area is all one way streets and if he wants to go north he has to travel south first into the zone and then he can turn around and drive to 79th. Though I have zero sympathy if you can afford to live right next to Central Park you can afford to pay the fee hundreds of times per week.
- Yeah he could also walk like 1 block east and then he can go on madison.

it's almost like that's the point of congestion pricing

Awww he might have to go on the big scary subway and desk with the poors.. A sad day indeed
- He could save his $2.75 and avoid it by... walking.
  
  That guy looks like an uncle who can barely walk from the end of a parking lot to the store, let alone 18 blocks

They may take our lives, but they will never take our DRIVING 18 BLOCKS TO SEE OUR CHILDREN

His kids live on 79th street and he will have to pay congestion price every time he goes to see them.
So like, what, Christmas and their birthdays?
- That was my first thought as well. Why doesn't his kids want to live with him?
  
  Not having primary custody can be due to lots of things, I won't judge anyone male or female for it unless there's abuse involved.

Can somebody share a better measurement than "18 blocks" for the rest of the world?
- 18 blocks in NYC is approximately 1.5 km to the rest of the world.
  
  That is literally 15 minutes lol. But hes a ceo so thats why a 15 minute walk is so hard for him.
- A block can vary, but in a city like NY a safe estimate is 0.1 mile per block. So 18 blocks is something like 1.8 miles or 2-3 km.
  It's you-shoud-probaby-walk-this-distance-for-your-health walking distance.
  
  He's less than a block from the N R W line too. Such an inconvenience.
- A "block" is not a fixed measurement, it is the distance between cross streets in a grid. They have blocks in Europe and people definitely understand the concept in my experience.
  
  Its also significantly worse for Manhattan because depending on if you turn 90 degrees its like 4.5 times the distance.
  
  I understand the concept of a block (even if they don't really exist in my city), but that doesn't really give me an idea of the actual distance, so it's a pretty useless information to me. Using proper standard metrics makes much more sense.
  
  North South blocks in Manhattan are fairly uniform, and a standard measurement there. Just hard to get across to someone that doesn't know

Property shark CEO inconvencied. Sad trombone.

Love how this is in the one US city where you need a car the least as far as I know. You've got the subway, the sidewalks, cabs... I mean sure, the latter exists in the form of ride sharing apps basically everywhere now, but NYC had cabs even in old movies. Though I suspect most other cities of any real size had them as well
- I dunno about NYC but Chicago has a pretty large and diverse public transit system.
  That said the first bus I got onto in Chicago clearly hit a parked car that was too far over the line and the driver just sorta shrugged and kept on truckin'.
  
  That's why you dont park over the line. Seems fine to me.
- There are buses too. Last time I visited NYC I used buses all the time. They were clean, frequent, cheap, and I had great conversations with other passengers. 10/10.
- The cabs actually get a surcharge for the congestion pricing but who cares.
  
  Only a buck 50. Cabs and rides have get a greatly reduced rate, and it gets packed onto the ride charge.
- I had a girlfriend from Phoenix who was surprised you could hail a cab on the street in Boston, she thought that only happened in NYC...

What I've read says that you aren't charged unless you cross the boundary. If you reside inside the zone and never leave and enter again, you won't be charged a toll.
- Even better, he's north of the boundary. It ends at 60th st.
  
  I think his complaint is that he lives outside the boundary (on 61st at 5th) but that because of one way streets he is forced into the tolled area even if he wants to go the other way.

Someone should tell these people about gasoline (or electricity) if they think "having to pay to use your car" is an insane notion.

It bugs me when screenshots are posted by themselves.
Here's 10 min of work getting all sources in the screenshot.
Reddit - r/NewYorkCity
X - ScooterCasterNY
Youtube - FredomNews.TV
In the video clip, the guy explains he's not paying to go 18 blocks. He's paying because the one-way streets force him to go south one block, charging the $9, before he can go anywhere north. That is understandably annoying.
- It is annoying and expensive, but owning and regularly using a car in the densest part of the densest city in the country should be annoying and expensive. If he likes driving so much he should move somewhere else or pay the cost of his driving to the city, and considering he lives on the upper east side he can probably afford it.
  
  I don't really disagree.
  I can just see how it's annoying for him, because the roads force him to drive one block in the wrong direction, and then charge him for it. I wouldn't be surprised if he made that $9 back in the time it took him to drive around the block. But it would still be annoying.
- Yes but he's a multimillionaire so that makes his complaint irrelevant.
- What's even more annoying is his house is on Central Park... which means the fee is a nothing burger to him.
  He just doesn't wanna pay to Improve the MTA.

He chooses to pay a congestion fee to travel because he's wealthy.
- He's mad because he's a CEO and probably believes from the bottom of his heart that he shouldn't have to pay that fee the way everyone else does.
  To quote Immortal Technique "only little people pay all these taxes fees."

I asked Google and told me that's like one mile distance.
This fucker is serious that he has no other way of traveling that then by car?
I bet taking the car actually takes longer if there's any traffic at all.

There are some issues with the way they've implemented congestion pricing, in my infrequently-visits-NYC mind, but this complaint is outside of them.

He gets charged every time he moves his car?
Yes cars cost money to maintain.
Is there a camera pointed at his car or something? Ready to swipe his credit card as soon as anything happens to the car?
- 2 is actually true in this scenario
  
  What? How?
- No, the toll gets charged only once per day.

Car owner.

Why is a person with a scooter emoji next to their name and the word "scooter" in their handle going to bat for fucking cars

He could walk, but I can also see why he might not want to. It's more than I would probably want to walk.
Biking is also an option, although maybe biking is uncomfortable or inconvenient for him for some reason. Also, I don't know what the biking infrastructure is like in that area. Maybe it's not ideal. I don't know if e-bikes are allowed in bike lanes, but if they are, that might be an option.
He could take the subway. That's probably what I would do, although I've never been on the New York subway. I only know about it through its portrayals in various media, which is often negative. I've heard it described as "a public toilet in rails." I can't personally speak to how accurate that is, that's just what I've heard.
I think making better cities requires a holistic approach. It's not just about having more bike lanes, or public transportation, it's about designing cities for maximum efficiency and convenience, and for the promotion of maximum health and well being. I think cars are a symptom of our skewed priorities, not necessarily the root cause of the problem themselves. I think we need to change our priorities, first and foremost.
- This is right next to Central Park. He could ride his bike (or his e-bike) through what is widely considered one of the most beautiful urban parks in the world without having to worry about cars or red lights.
  The subway is also fine. It's by no means a public toilet on rails. The platforms are a bit grungy, but inside the cars it's comparable to London or Paris.
  In addition to the subway, there are no less than 4 bus routes along Madison & 5th Avenues.
  
  If that's true then it sounds like this man has a lot of options, and hopefully he will recognize the benefits to availing himself of one or more of these options.

I thought the congestion pricing starts at 60th down to the south of Manhattan. Why would he have tolls to go north, away from the congestion pricing zone? I just plugged the corner of 61st and fifth into Google with directions to 79th and told it to avoid tolls, and it plotted a direct route north with an 8 minute drive.
An I confused on the boundary of the zone?

The one time I was in NYC, I was flabbergasted by the traffic because it was literally the opposite of what I expected from hearing about it and having seen jokes about it for literally my entire life.
There was basically no cars on the road, but so many people on the sidewalk it was hard to walk anywhere unless you walked in the street. Also everytime I hailed a cab to go somewhere thinking it was pretty far, they would be like "Bruh! You don't need to pay me for that, it's literally just down the street!" So I ended up walking all over the city and never taking any kind of vehicle.

Public transportation in the USA sucks shit and it should be improved before unleashing a congestion toll.
- NYC has one of the biggest public transportation systems ever built
  
  Yeah that's a good point. Also, the congestion pricing could fund improvement to public transport And motivate a change in perspective for the residents.
  Wendover productions did an interesting video on this recently.
  
  Travel to Japan and visit any large metropolitan area equivalent to NYC. Yeah, that's the dust trail left behind by the Japanese.
- I take it you've never heard of new york, then?
- Don't put the cart before the horse. The Wikipedia article says that "The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) estimates $15 billion in available capital will be generated by bonding revenues from the tolls, which will be available to fund repairs and improvements to the subway, bus, and commuter rail systems."
- Mass transit in Manhattan, and NYC as a whole, is actually a very good system, that just needs upgrades.
  
  It's a good system in terms of "if you look at the map and see all the places it goes". You ever use it daily though?
- My brother lived way out in Brooklyn and commuted to Manhattan for decades. Never had a car the entire time. Apparently New York's public transportation isn't a big issue.
- How are you this way?

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