Bridge Tolls
FAQ |
Bell Tolls For Bridges
Ellis Henican, Newsday
Mickey Carroll and his phone-bank posse at Quinnipiac University just released another of their public-opinion polls. If you look hard enough, you can often find fascinating little nuggets lurking in these polls. Buried in this one is a telling report on the way New Yorkers prefer to take their pain. Oh, the pain is coming. Don't worry about that. The city is broke and getting broker. Somebody's gonna pay. We're only three weeks into the new fiscal year. But on Thursday, Mike Bloomberg declared to Albany that he may have to whack another $1 billion in spending out of this year's city budget. At the same time, he warned his shell-shocked city commissioners to steel themselves for another 7.5 percent in cuts - cops and fire included this time. These are the same commissioners who just absorbed $1.7 billion in cuts July 1. And none of that even accounts for the giant, gaping hole that waits on the horizon - next year's projected deficit of $4 billion to $6 billion. No one said being mayor was always going to be fun. How 'bout a two-dollar subway fare? Perhaps unintentionally, Bloomberg put that ugly possibility on the table by warning that the city may no longer be able to afford subsidizing the MTA. And you know what that would mean: dirtier trains, longer waits, higher fares - probably all three, by the time George Pataki followed the mayor's lead and announced, "Hey, we're broke too." But hold on a second, Mr. Mayor, before things get totally out of hand. You must have missed this fascinating nugget in the Quinnipiac poll. The pollsters asked New Yorkers: If the busted city has to find money from somewhere, where would it be best to look? A subway fare increase? Tolls on the East River bridges? Higher city taxes? By a clear plurality, the people say: "Bridge tolls." Citywide, a solid 40 percent said charge the drivers. That's compared to 23 percent who'd opt for higher taxes and 20 percent who'd stick bus-and-subway riders. As Carroll put it with his usual succinctness: "The first choice is to toll the free bridges. The last choice is a fare hike." Those words, of course, sounded like a thunderbolt to my old friend Charlie Komanoff. He was one of smartest and best-connected sources when I used to work the subway beat. An economist, a maniacal bike rider and a tireless urban activist, he brought a rare, intellectual rigor to the business of making New York an easier city to live in. These days, Komanoff's consuming issue is East River bridge tolls. He has studied the data obsessively. He has brought serious scientific and economic analysis to the cause. He is already dogging politicians. He even has a Web site up, www.bridgetolls.org. Komanoff will eventually, I am certain, sway a skeptical city to the extraordinary intelligence of bridge tolls. And look, just as his efforts begin, here's this poll, saying a whole lot of people already agree with him. And not just car-less Manhattanites. Support for tolls on the Queensboro, Brooklyn, Manhattan and Williamsburg bridges is almost as robust in the boroughs whose residents would pay the most - Brooklyn and Queens. Thirty-nine percent of Queens residents and 35 percent of Brooklynites said they would prefer East River bridge tolls to tax hikes or a subway-fare increase. Yes, when times are tough, 718 carries its load. "We need the revenue," Komanoff was saying at week's end. "And these tolls also promise to make travel better for everyone by thinning out a small but strategic percentage of everyday traffic. It is quite an overwhelming combination." Bridge tolls would ease the city's horrendous traffic jams. A few more people would take mass transit or carpool. Which has economic benefits. Clean-air benefits. Frayed-nerve benefits. For everyone. "One positive result of this sudden transit-fare crisis," he said, "is that it will force people who care about the city to become advocates for East River bridge tolls." Tolls on the four bridges, he said, would produce about $2 million a day. That's not enough to single-handedly solve the city's entire fiscal crisis, but hey, every three-quarters-of-a-billion helps. So where are the politicians ready to champion bridge tolls? Actually, it was Bloomberg who floated the idea in February in his budget message. He penciled in $800 million for "road pricing fees," which everyone took to mean East River bridge tolls. He did hint later that city residents might get a price break, which could actually undercut the whole idea. Two-thirds of the traffic on those bridges now comes from people who live in Brooklyn and Queens. But at least the conversation has begun. "In a way," Komanoff said, "Bloomberg did what he was supposed to do. He put bridge tolls out there as an issue. "Now it's time for some politician to emerge as the advocate for East River bridge tolls, who will push this rock over the mountain." Look at the poll, he said. The time for bridge tolls may finally have come. "The first people who come out to lead the charge will end up with a big boost in their careers," said Komanoff. "This isn't political suicide. It's not the third rail of transportation policy. It's the brass rail." Copyright © 2002, Newsday, Inc. -------------------- This article originally appeared at: http://www.newsday.com/news/local/newyork/columnists/ny-nyhen212795082jul21.column |