Silver wins

We hope that we can once again move forward as a community. It would be great to see some form of traffic control introduced in the district and in the city as a whole. Even requesting that Chinatown busses stop idling their engines would be a leap forward for air quality in this district. 

Good luck Mr. Newell, and we hope that Mr. Silver will now move the community forward.

Silver's Rebuttal

On WNYC this morning Sheldon Silver argued that the only reason he didn't support congestion pricing was that there was no MTA capital plan in place to provide local residents with transportation. 

Well, Mr. Silver, how is the MTA supposed to have a capital plan without any capital? 

Congestion pricing is one of the few sure fire ways to pay off the MTA's debts. Some have argued that the implementation and operation cost of congestion pricing would be high, offsetting the gains. However, the implementation and operation costs are already in play; the infrastructure is under construction as part of Operation Atlas, New York City's anti-terrorist operation.

As if we need more evidence...

A study by Paul Leigh and Estrella Geraghty in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine found that a 20% increase in gasoline prices over one year saves 2594 lives in the US. Of these, 1994 people are saved because there are fewer accidents and 600 are saved because there is less pollution.

So, why do so many of us own cars in a city with excellent public transit?