Photo by peterkreder, courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons.

A State Supreme Court justice has overturned a tariff meant to bolster income for the Metropolitan Transit Authority.

The tariff, called the metropolitan commuter transportation mobility tax, requires employers in all 12 New York counties served by the public transportation provider to contribute 34 cents to M.T.A. for every $100 in payroll costs. The State Legislature passed tariff in May 2009 to save M.T.A. from an annual $2 billion short fall.

Suburban government officials and business owners opposed the law, however, because they believed that it forced them to support an agency that mostly benefited New York City. Counties including Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester filed a lawsuit which claimed the tax unconstitutionally appropriated public funds for a local project.

Justice R. Bruce Cozzens Jr. agreed. In a six-page decision, he stated, “The M.T.A. payroll tax is a special law, which does not serve a substantial state interest,” his 6-page decision stated. “This law should have been, according to the State Constitution, passed with either a Home Rule message or by message of necessity with two-thirds vote in each house. This did not occur, therefore this law was passed unconstitutionally.”

M.T.A. would lose $1.26 billion in revenue this year if the tax is eliminated, according to spokesman Aaron Donovan. The tax’s supporters believe this loss would have far reaching consequences for the entire state.

“This decision threatens the foundation of the state’s economy,” said Paul Steely White, Executive Director of the transportation advocacy group Transportation Alternatives.
“Public transportation is critical to the New York City metropolitan area — an area which provides 45 percent of the state’s tax revenue, paying for countless public services from Niagara Falls to Montauk.”

M.T.A. “will vigorously appeal today’s ruling,” a spokesperson told NY1.

The authority’s chances may be high: they pointed out in a statement that four previous challenges to the tax “making the same argument” have already been dismissed.

(by Alissa Fleck)

In the middle of a July night last year, Clara Hayworth was crossing the street in Fort Greene with her husband, when she was fatally struck by a car. The driver was 43-year-old Anthony Webb, who held only a learner’s permit, making his solo drive illegal.

Officers on the scene administered a breathalyzer an hour after the crash, which proved Webb was likely drunk at the time of the accident. From there unfolded a breakdown in the chain of evidence collection.

The breathalyzer results were not admissible as evidence because the device had not been properly calibrated in over four years. The NYPD Accident Investigation Squad (AIS), the only department authorized to investigate fatal crashes, took three days to investigate the case. At that time, a plethora of evidence, including skid marks, surveillance footage and potential witnesses were no longer available.

This past February, the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office announced Webb would not be charged in Hayworth’s death. Two days following this announcement, the City Council held a hearing about the NYPD’s response to serious and fatal crashes. 2,500 people signed a petition asking the police commissioner to change NYPD policies so victims of traffic violence in New York City would receive justice.

Unfortunately there have been many similar incidents in the past year leading up to this hearing. Last October, 30-year-old Brooklyn artist Mathieu Lefevre, was fatally struck in a hit-and-run while biking. Police ultimately made no charges in the case. In the February hearing, Transportation Alternatives Executive Director Paul Steely White condemned the AIS for taking photos of the scene on broken cameras and ultimately losing evidence. Lefevre’s mother told Gothamist the NYPD was not forthcoming with information, and she learned through the media there would be no charges in her son’s case.

There have also been no charges filed in the case of Michelle Matson, another Brooklyn cyclist struck recently in a hit-and-run. Matson survived the accident but sustained numerous debilitating injuries, including a broken neck. White reported there was little investigation whatsoever into Matson’s case either, which was ultimately treated as a “fender bender.”

The examples of similar investigative shortcomings in serious NYC crashes seem endless. White calls the failure to properly investigate these cases a disturbing trend. Transportation Alternatives will hold a rally at City Hall on June 11th to raise awareness about the city’s failure to properly examine serious traffic crashes.

These are obviously the reasons I’m writing about bike and street safety—except they aren’t. I had already decided to write about this the night before, at a neighborhood meeting a few blocks away from the site of both incidents.

The meeting, organized by a political club in Chelsea, was called “Pedestrians & Bikers: Do They Have to Collide?”

It’s not an easy question to answer. You see, I have biked these streets on and off for about 20 years. I’m like many New York City riders: I often don’t wait for green lights. I have also been walking in the city since I learned how and I’m now like many city pedestrians: I often don’t wait for green lights.

I also drive from time to time, and I always wait for green lights. The city would be terrifying if drivers violated the rules of the road as often as bikers and pedestrians do.
It’s scary enough. About 150 city pedestrians a year are killed in auto accidents, as Paul Steely White, executive director of the cycling advocacy group Transportation Alternatives, told the meeting’s attendees, mostly senior citizens. Bike-related pedestrian deaths rarely happen, about once every two or three years, White added.

“Someone with a two-ton SUV might have more responsibility than a bicyclist,” White said. “That’s not to say a bicyclist doesn’t also have responsibility.”

The audience, though mostly civil, was not in a mood to shift their anger from bikers to drivers. “They’re a menace—they’re a pest,” said one of cyclists.

Many want to require bikers to register their vehicles like drivers. White thinks it’s problematic for many reasons: the NYPD does not want the added enforcement burden, bike license plates would be too small to have the desired deterrent effect and it would discourage people from starting to bike.

The explosion of bike lanes in the city has doubled the number of riders in10 years, White said, yet total cycling injuries have actually gone down, an indication that the lanes have encouraged bikers to ride safer.

Reported accidents with pedestrians, bikers and drivers have also been reduced on streets with bike lanes, according to the city. It could mean overall accidents are down, but it’s hard to know for sure. Many mishaps like my wife’s don’t get reported.

White, for his part, wants to see riders like me get ticketed. I’m sure anti-biker readers out there agree. They may never have gotten past my admission of violations.

Obeying the rules and riding safely are important, but it’s possible to do one without the other. Bikers are not required to slow down if they see a cluster of pedestrians on a sidewalk—it’s a good bet at least one walker will step in the street without looking—but it’s smart to slow down anyway. When I blow a light, I go very slowly and look every way to make sure it’s safe. I see many riders do the same thing.

In all my years of riding, I have hit pedestrians twice. Both times, they were jaywalkers crossing at midblock. One woman was dodging between stalled traffic on 34th Street when she stepped in front of me. The other time, a man was looking in the wrong direction when he stepped into a bike lane and me, knocking both of us to the ground. Fortunately, no one was hurt either time.

White acknowledges there is “rampant lawlessness” among bikers and pedestrians, but he doesn’t say they do it more often than city drivers, who often go faster than 30 miles per hour.

“Most New Yorkers don’t know what the speed limit is,” he said. “Can we start there?”

Josh Rogers, contributing editor at Manhattan Media, is a lifelong New Yorker.

Traffic in NYC. Photo courtesy of Wiki Commons.

If there is anything that makes sane people act crazy, it’s traffic. In Manhattan, transportation congestion is a constant problem, causing safety risks, environmental issues and extensive time delays.

On Thursday, May 10, Community Board 2 and New York University hosted the panel discussion “Dealing with Downtown Bridge Traffic: Are Tolls the Answer?” The four members of the panel discussed the possibility of tolls for the East River bridges and the benefits of congestion pricing. Throughout the event, audience reaction was sometimes angry and always loud.

(By Courtney Holbrook for Our Town Downtown.)

“Traffic is just a pain,” said Shirley Secunda, chair of the Traffic and Transportation Board of CB2 and the panel moderator. “Traffic overruns our neighborhoods, blocks people from commuting, affects safety, causes air pollution and loud noises, threatens our vulnerable historic infrastructure and impedes the conduct of business.”

The four members of the panel were Kate Slevin, executive director of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign (TSTC); Paul Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives; Hope Cohen, associate director of the Regional Plan Association’s Center for Urban Innovation; and Charles Komanoff, an energy policy activist and transport economist.

The members came to an agreement about the benefits of tolls on the East River bridges, which carry travelers from Brooklyn to Manhattan.

“Currently, on the isle of Manhattan, bridges and tunnels are operated under three different policies and price structures,” Cohen said. “For example, the Hudson River Tunnel is owned by the Port Authority. It charges tolls, and that bridge is in the best condition.”

New York State, however, controls the East River bridges; they are paid for through tax revenue rather than tolls. According to Cohen, the lack of tolls on the East River bridges creates “an uneven distribution of traffic patterns…if you were to install tolls, you would level out the pricing of the different crossings into Manhattan, and thus lead to a more evenly distributed traffic pattern.”

Komanoff acknowledged that the process of proving the benefits of such an action would require some political maneuvering.

“We don’t want to create a war on the car,” Komanoff said. “But we need to change the car from a sacred cow to a cash cow. If we want to improve our pollution and our traffic, we can’t ban cars—we must bill cars.”

The next question raised was where, besides on the East River bridges, tolls would be most effective. Cohen noted that the tolls could not be issued in isolation. In fact, some of the most-trafficked roads were not in Manhattan—the BQE, the Staten Island Expressway and the Long Island Expressway.

“If we don’t deal with those traffic issues elsewhere as well as those in Manhattan, we take the risk of creating a certain political argument,” Cohen said. “We play into the idea of Manhattan as this elite fortress wanting to keep everyone out. We must attend to other traffic problems as well.”

At this point, a specific cost for those tolls is unavailable, though the plan suggested by CB2 would make tolls comparable to those on the other tolled bridges.

Slevin insisted tolling would not render Manhattan a “fortress of elites,” keeping low-income households out. According to a study conducted by TSTC in 2007, Brooklyn households without vehicles earned an average yearly income of $32,000. Households with vehicles earned almost double that figure. The average yearly income of Bronx residents without a vehicle was $27,000; those with a vehicle earned a median yearly income of $60,000.

“The facts can show that only 2.5 percent of our lowest-income earners would be affected by the congestion charge,” Slevin said. “If we, in turn, took the money we earned from the tolls and directed it toward public transport—the transport those low-income workers use—we would be creating one of the most progressive pieces of legislation in years.”

The idea of donating funds generated from tolls to the MTA transport system was met with support from the rest of the panel. Currently, vehicles traveling the two tolled tunnels contribute more than $200 million per year. If the free East River bridges had tolls, the MTA could earn approximately $800 million per year in new revenue. These funds would offset transit service cuts, according to a statement issued by CB2 to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo.

Slevin noted the funds would need extensive monitoring.

“We have to be able to give the funds directly to the MTA, not Albany,” Slevin said. “Once the funds go to Albany, they have to be allocated to an agency and then they can get tied up in other projects.”

In order to ensure the funds from tolls would go to cheaper, improved transit, transportation boards would have to “set up an entity within the MTA to protect revenues,” Slevin said.

Certain audience members protested they opposed congestion pricing because they had to drive for health or job reasons. Some opposed tolls and congestion pricing in general. But most agreed traffic was a problem that needed a solution. The panel encouraged audience members to contact their legislators and push for change.

White noted these ideas would help New York City take “control of its transit destiny and improve the city’s transportation efficiency.”