The Metropolitan Transportation Authority will send mitigation money to New Jersey as part of a final congestion pricing plan that has been submitted to the federal government, authority chair and CEO Janno Lieber said Wednesday.
“Lo and behold, the presentation we made to the feds does call for some allocation of mitigation dollars to New Jersey,” Lieber said at a Crain’s New York Power Breakfast. The unspecified commitment was part of a final analysis that the MTA submitted “in recent days and weeks” to show that the authority’s tolling structure is consistent with the Federal Highway Administration’s initial approval last year, Lieber said.
The commitment could be meaningful as the MTA tries to kill New Jersey’s lawsuit against congestion pricing, seen as the most serious of the various legal challenges that could delay the program past its planned mid-June start date. The MTA has long said New Jersey might be eligible for some money to mitigate adverse traffic effects but had not committed to it.
Lieber said Wednesday that as of this week, tolling infrastructure has been fully installed and connected to a 5G network. Most drivers will pay $15 to enter Manhattan below 60th Street.
“We’re looking forward to a June start date once the New Jersey litigation is put to bed, which I think it will be,” Lieber said. He declined to give details about the mitigation money, joking that “you’ll have to ask New Jersey’s most passionate representative, the soon-to-be corporation counsel of the City of New York” — Randy Mastro, New Jersey’s lawyer in the congestion pricing case whom Mayor Eric Adams is reportedly eyeing for a top administration job.
Lieber began the event on an upbeat note, saying the MTA has made the most of the financial bailout it received in last year’s state budget. He touted increased service on 11 subway lines and on the Long Island Rail Road, new tracks being laid along the F line and a relationship with the NYPD that he called the strongest in the MTA’s history.
But he took a different tone when it came to fare evasion, which “threatens to upend everything” as it grows to a $700 million-a-year problem for the MTA, Lieber said. Lieber took time to criticize former Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance Jr. — “a nice man, but misguided on an important issue” — for Vance’s 2018 decision to stop prosecuting turnstile-jumping on the subways.
Lieber said he remains committed to modernizing turnstiles in ways that could make it harder to beat fares and said he is “crazy passionate” about the idea of modifying subway exit doors to pause before opening, in order to deter would-be evaders.
Lieber acknowledged a recent spate of crime on the subway system as “demoralizing for riders,” and noted that most were committed by people with histories of prior offenses. Of the 38 people accused of attacking transit workers last year, only 11 were indicted, Lieber said, criticizing the lack of prosecutions in the other cases.
Other highlights of Lieber’s appearance on Wednesday included:
- He acknowledged that talk of rebuilding Penn Station has quieted in recent months, saying that the project was competing with other multibillion-dollar projects as the MTA gets closer to a new capital program. The MTA’s focus on Penn Station relates more to “modern amenities,” he said, such as wider concourses and better egress from the platforms, as seen in its new Long Island Rail Road concourse.
- Lieber dismissed the notion that the MTA might struggle to accommodate an influx of new riders once congestion pricing takes effect. “It’s bupkis,” Lieber said of the projected influx of about 30,000 riders, noting the number is smaller than a typical daily fluctuation due to weather.
- He was bullish about the proposed Interborough Express light-rail line between Brooklyn and Queens, whose environmental review and design are advancing thanks to new funding from Gov. Kathy Hochul. “It’s on its front foot,” Lieber said, although he declined to estimate what year it might be completed.
- The MTA is “on schedule” with the property acquisitions it needs to extend the Second Avenue subway to 125th Street, Lieber said. But he reiterated that the MTA will be unable to sign contracts for excavation and tunnel-boring work until the congestion pricing lawsuits are resolved.
- Lieber seemed excited by the potential $8 billion extension of the Second Avenue subway westward along 125th Street, which Hochul floated in her January State of the State address. Although far from confirmed, Lieber said the project would get “high marks” for its potential to connect to Columbia University’s Manhattanville campus and several West Side subway lines.
- Lieber called on city government to improve the city’s ability to absorb water during extreme rainfall. That storm surge threat is “the number-one issue for the subway system,” he said.
- As the MTA contends with widespread vacancies in subway retail spaces, Lieber said the authority is “pretty far along” on procurement efforts for new tenants at the Times Square and Rockefeller Center stations — and said that “major museums” will soon announce art installations at some retail spaces that are otherwise unviable.
Nick Garber , 2024-04-17 17:41:09
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