News Driven to Extinction
posted by on April 21 at 10:40 AM
So much for the mayor of New York City’s rumored plan to impose “congestion pricing” on idiots that insist in driving into that city’s most congested areas, which Erica wrote about yesterday. The New York Times reports today that any plan to impose fees modeled on the one that reduced traffic congestion in London by 17% would have to be approved by the state legislature—and the opposition of even a single state legislator could derail the whole plan.
Predictably enough, legislators that represent suburban areas have already “expressed concern.” Their constituents, of course, regard the ability to drive their SUVs where ever they like, when ever they like, without a thought for the environment or the quality of life of the people who actually live in, say, the most congested parts of Manhattan, a sacred constitutional right. It’s hard to see this thing happening.
Congestion pricing is perfectly rational in a place like nyc with vast 24 hour subway/bus options, but in the seattle area, where some people commute from areas w/ few or no public transporation options, they have no choice but to drive into the city.
You could ride on one of those digusting buses that Dan was ranting about yesterday.
You must have missed the article in the NY Times a few months back indicating that, despite the perception, at least half the traffic in NYC is actually from people driving in from another part of NYC. It's not just people from the 'burbs driving in.
It's too late to do anything about global warming so we should stop pretending we can make a difference
fnarf: It's too late to do anything about global warming so we should stop pretending we can make a difference
Fnarf is right. We're already too far gone to prevent 100% of the effects of global warming. Therefore, we should resign ourselves to preventing 0% of the effects of global warming.
It's like during World War II, if the Allies had come up with an aggressive plan to save Jews from the Holocaust. And someone says, "If we do everything we can now, a million Jews will still perish. So why bother?" I mean, one million, six million. What's the difference at that point?
It's like Stalin said, "One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic."
Um, I need to apologize for my last post. I went off-topic by discussing global warming. Back to the actual topic of congestion pricing in NYC. One passage from the NYT story caught my eye:
This feat requires a bit of explanation. I mean, does the New York legislature have its own Frank Chopp? Uh-oh, I think I'm going off-topic again.
fnarf: "Oops. I accidentally put a knife one inch in my chest. It's too late to prevent the injury, let's just cut all the way to the heart."
Dan: I've never been to NYC, but experience tells me public transit sucks in America. It's acceptable to have such a fee in London because you can get downtown with suburb trains from everywhere, but is it the case in NYC?
@7,
Yes.
Not just trains, trains with beer.
Oh, I remember, "Life, Liberty, and a really big, tank like vehicle to move around/run over people with."
new york better not have a frank chopp - they'll never get anything done.
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