From the NY Post:Like it or not, drivers will likely soon have to pay anywhere they cross the East and Harlem rivers.
Speaker Sheldon Silver all but guaranteed that the state Assembly would approve $2 tolls on 13 crossings that historically have been popular free alternatives to the Queens Midtown and Brooklyn-Battery tunnels and the RFK/Triborough Bridge, where E-ZPass tolls are $4.15 and cash tolls $5.
Silver said the option facing lawmakers was simple: Add tolls to the bridges to rescue the MTA from a $1.2 billion budget deficit, or force crippling service cuts and fare hikes on millions of transit riders.
Why don't you just open the other set of books the MTA keeps and find out what they did with all the money?
27 comments:
Trust that bullshit $2 toll will be jacked up within a 2 year time frame and the MTA will still give you shittier service.
You know screw these aholes because they aren't the ones who are crossing these bridges everyday and have to pay it. They live up state most of them! Damn I am sick of this shit!
It will initially cost $2 to cross the rivers. Wait two years and the MTA will still be incompetent idiots and watch it go up to $3, $4and more. How many times have tolls been raised in the last 10 years? Remember, tolls were placed on bridges and tunnels TEMPORARILY to pay for them. Once paid for, they were supposed to be removed. They've been paid for a million times over. Watch the middle class move out of NY in droves. North Carolina -- here I come!
"North Carolina - - here I come!"
A friend of mine in Brooklyn has a house in Durham. She periodically drives down there to vacation. She leaves early and makes it by nightfall. That's where she wants to retire. "What about the health facilities?" sez I. "No problem," sez she. "The great Duke Medical Center is smack dab in the area." (Research Triangle: Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill)
The only drawback? Too many New Yorkers already there.
Finally something that makes sense. Stop crying about having to pay for something in order to use it.
Someone tell me how a system that has not expanded in breadth but has expanded in ridership is suddenly too expensive to manage?! DOWN WITH THESE TWEEDERS!!!!!
You know, Manhattanites piss me off. Wait til all the shoddy worksmanship in their new $2M condos and the fender scratches from their parking garages start to build up on them.
HELLO QUEENS!!!
Imbecile said:
"Finally something that makes sense. Stop crying about having to pay for something in order to use it."
Gasoline taxes have been paying for roads and bridges since the beginning, imbecile!
But, here we are, the Stalinists of New York are just so much closer to the travel ban they want.
This is what your vote is supposed to be used for.
Dump them all!
yea makes alot of sense..the traffic is already a joke in Long Island City, and Brooklyn..cant wait to see how the streets are going to handle lines of cars waiting at tolls..Brilliant..
Why do you think the Bloomberg Administration proposed pedestrian malls in major intersections of Manhattan this summer? He wants less traffic in Manhattan. He doesn't want New Yorkers in his town. He only wants the tourists in his city, because of the tourist dollars. By making Manhattan only for pedestrians and charging for tolls and bridges, he figures the outer boroughs won't bother coming to Manhattan and clogging up his streets. Manhattan will only be for the rich.
Another thing.
Taxi fares will rise. Little people's borough into the city of the magnificent will cost 2 tolls because the taxi will have to return.
There are two cures:
(1) Use your vote to dump these jerks;
(2) boycott all Manhattan stores, theaters, restaurants, etc.. Let's see if Manhattan merchants have the sense to count the lost dollars and pressure the two Commissars.
You want control? Take it!
You guys are hilarious!
Boycott Manhattan??? Without Manhattan there wouldn't be a Queens, or a Hoboken, or a...
Throw Shedon Slippery in the East River. Why in God's name don't his constuients trow him out of office already - we gotta find him involved a scandal - really soon to throw him out of office.
The tolls hurt the folks whom are hurting the most - the middle class - the very folks who pay for everything.
I know some people in Astoria, within sight of Manhattan who have never traveled to midtown. You would be surprised how irrelevant Manhattan is to some.
Many Queens residents work, shop and live in Queens or spend their money further east in Nassau. In fact, Nassau was once part of Queens, they split because they did not want to join NYC.
No one has to buy in Manhattan, we have the internet, we have Long Island, We have Queens, Brooklyn and the other boroughs where the working slobs live.
I know some people in Astoria, within sight of Manhattan who have never traveled to midtown. You would be surprised how irrelevant Manhattan is to some.
Many Queens residents work, shop and live in Queens or spend their money further east in Nassau. In fact, Nassau was once part of Queens, they split because they did not want to join NYC.
No one has to buy in Manhattan, we have the internet, we have Long Island, We have Queens, Brooklyn and the other boroughs where the working slobs live.
Sheldon flip flopped. He was always opposed to tolls on the east river crossings. I am so disappointed in him.
Bloomberg gets his way.
Why should I pay more in gas taxes or subway fares because you want a free ride over the bridge?
Believe me, if the Archies on this blog decide not to go to Manhattan to eat, shop, see shows, etc. anymore, which it seems like you don't do much anyway, Manhattan won't be affected in the least.
You won't pay more because we want a free ride over the bridge. You will pay more because the MTA mismanaged our tax money and because the subway system which needs the money should pay for itself.
That's the point - now the bridges are subsidized by people taking the subway and other taxes paid by those who aren't using the bridges. Why shouldn't the people using the bridges contribute more toward them? Of course they should.
The traffic lights off the bridges slow the traffic more than EZ pass booths will. The EZ Passes should have little to no effect on traffic.
"now the bridges are subsidized by people taking the subway and other taxes paid by those who aren't using the bridges."
That's the funniest thing I've read in awhile. The tolls on the bridges and tunnels pay for them AND the subway. Has been like that for decades.
"Finally something that makes sense. Stop crying about having to pay for something in order to use it."
I could say the same thing about the Subways - I'm all for 100% fairbox recovery. Just think, as ridership goes up, they would not have to cut service etc - because it would be paying for itself
"That's the point - now the bridges are subsidized by people taking the subway and other taxes paid by those who aren't using the bridges. Why shouldn't the people using the bridges contribute more toward them? Of course they should."
What? Something like $3 of the toll to cross the TBTA bridges goes directly to subsidize mass transit. Mass transit doesn't subsidize anything. The revovery rate (aka how much they charge vs howmuch it actually costs to ride) is about 80%
The east river bridge crossings being tolled is BLOOMBERG GETTING HIS WAY.
The MTA has been mismanaged. I don't believe a word they say. They have more money than you can shake a stick at. This is another tax that will keep going up year after year.
And Sheldon.....shame on you for changing your stance. I hope that this does not pass. It will affect our pockets for years and years to come.
"You will pay more because the MTA mismanaged our tax money and because the subway system which needs the money should pay for itself."
Um, transit systems NEVER pay for themselves in full. They are always subsidized to some degree because the municipality/region understands their importance.
The fact is, NYC Transit receives far less of its operating funds from government subsidies than do transit operations in other large U.S. cities.
I know some people in Astoria, within sight of Manhattan who have never traveled to midtown. You would be surprised how irrelevant Manhattan is to some.
And these people will not give a flying hoot if there's a toll on the bridge now, will they?
TOLLS ARE NOT THE ANSWER.
We are bailing out every bank and corporation that has their hands out.
I don't want to bail out the MTA by paying a toll to enter Manhattan. Why should Queens and Brooklyn bear the price.
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