Anyone in NYC, did congestion pricing help?
Because im driving in more traffic...
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ArishMell · 70-79, M
Direct comparisons between cities are fallible because they might not use the same types of scheme.
Congestion-charges hit two groups of people hard:
- residents of the affected area (if they own a car and have their own parking spaces),
- traders, both shopkeepers and their suppliers, and service people like builders and coach operators.
It may also be partly responsible for ending of what had been a large, annual exhibition I used to attend in London, where the scheme is not simply congestion-limiting. So I wonder what other cultural events in London, such as concerts, are also badly affected by such plans. The problem is not so bad for the event visitors, as many can share cars so share costs, can use public-transport (plentiful in and around London), or own cars exempt from the charge . Rather, it adds to trade-stand proprietors', performers', etc. already-high show costs.
London's complication is that the congestion-charge area is quite compact but accompanied by the "Low Emission Zone" ("Ultra ~ " close to the city-centre).
The LEZ is far larger than the congestion-charge area. It is most of the land enclosed by the M25 motorway, the capital's primary ring-road, forming a rough rectangle approaching 900 square miles (by measuring a road map), some in open countryside. Several million people live and work within this area, obviously by no means all motorists; but many from outside need drive into it regularly.
An "LEZ" is based on vehicle type, age and fuel, so by which EU-wide emission-control regulations band it occupies; and its present cost is £12.50 a day for those not exempted by meeting the appropriate standards. That the UK is no longer in the EU does not matter because the vehicles are the same, subject to Type-Approval laws imposed on their manufacturers, and the idea is to cut pollution as well as traffic-jams.
Several other British and continental-European cities have adopted their own versions of congestion and/or emission-control charging. Glasgow goes further, by simply banning some vehicles by their emission-standards bands!
So London's arrangements might not be totally comparable to New York's or Stockholm's, if those are purely "congestion charges" designed to limit only vehicle numbers, not directly air pollution as well. (Though fewer vehicles will mean less pollution, of course.)
Congestion-charges hit two groups of people hard:
- residents of the affected area (if they own a car and have their own parking spaces),
- traders, both shopkeepers and their suppliers, and service people like builders and coach operators.
It may also be partly responsible for ending of what had been a large, annual exhibition I used to attend in London, where the scheme is not simply congestion-limiting. So I wonder what other cultural events in London, such as concerts, are also badly affected by such plans. The problem is not so bad for the event visitors, as many can share cars so share costs, can use public-transport (plentiful in and around London), or own cars exempt from the charge . Rather, it adds to trade-stand proprietors', performers', etc. already-high show costs.
London's complication is that the congestion-charge area is quite compact but accompanied by the "Low Emission Zone" ("Ultra ~ " close to the city-centre).
The LEZ is far larger than the congestion-charge area. It is most of the land enclosed by the M25 motorway, the capital's primary ring-road, forming a rough rectangle approaching 900 square miles (by measuring a road map), some in open countryside. Several million people live and work within this area, obviously by no means all motorists; but many from outside need drive into it regularly.
An "LEZ" is based on vehicle type, age and fuel, so by which EU-wide emission-control regulations band it occupies; and its present cost is £12.50 a day for those not exempted by meeting the appropriate standards. That the UK is no longer in the EU does not matter because the vehicles are the same, subject to Type-Approval laws imposed on their manufacturers, and the idea is to cut pollution as well as traffic-jams.
Several other British and continental-European cities have adopted their own versions of congestion and/or emission-control charging. Glasgow goes further, by simply banning some vehicles by their emission-standards bands!
So London's arrangements might not be totally comparable to New York's or Stockholm's, if those are purely "congestion charges" designed to limit only vehicle numbers, not directly air pollution as well. (Though fewer vehicles will mean less pollution, of course.)