(TheConservativeTimes.org) – The Big Apple, or New York City, is one of the biggest cities dealing with intense traffic on a daily basis. In fact, New York City has had the world’s most congestion; according to transportation analytics from INRIX’s Global Traffic Scorecard, people in NYC spent over one hundred hours sitting in traffic last year.
Just last year, the city lost nine billion dollars of time with congestion on the roads, which is a cost of about one thousand and seven hundred dollars per driver. The average speed in the downtown area was eleven miles per hour; during peak hours the drivers went about fifteen miles per hour and thirty miles an hour during the slowest times.
Bob Pishue, transportation analyst at INRIX, said, “Traffic congestion is both a bane and a barometer of economic health; it symbolizes bustling activity yet simultaneously hampers it.”
“The surge in traffic congestion in urban areas indicated a revival of economic hubbub post-COVID, but it also led to billions of dollars in lost time for drivers,” said Pishue.
The busiest corridor in the nation is I-4 W in Orlando, Florida while New York’s busiest road was a four-mile stretch of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway with eighty-two hours lost during the commute.
The plan is to charge drivers fifteen dollars to enter Midtown Manhattan south of Sixtieth Street, which could potentially help combat the congestion or at least bring in more funds to combat the amount lost. The MTA board is recognizing the “first-in-the-nation congestion toll” that will go into effect at the end of June this year.
The MTA anticipates a generation of one billion dollars every year for congestion tolls to help finance a fifteen billion dollar repair plan that would target capital repairs, maintenance upkeep, and system expansion.
This proposed toll has been put on hold as Hochul recognizes that those in NYC are dealing with a cost of living crisis at the moment.
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