Congestion pricing has finally come to New York City. After a last-minute reversal from Kathy Hochul that “indefinitely” paused the plan before it was meant to go into effect in June and another reversal that put the plan back on after Donald Trump won the 2024 election, potentially upending the whole thing, the toll finally went into effect the first Sunday in January. A lot of questions remain about the new arrangement, like, Will the lower toll still fund the MTA? Will 61st Street turn into a line of parking garages?, and Why didn’t anyone consult me individually about my very specific driving habits? Here, we try to answer all of your most pressing queries.
What is congestion pricing?
Basically exactly what it sounds like: a toll for driving into a heavily congested zone — in this case, Manhattan’s Central Business District, which is anything on or below 60th Street. The FDR Drive, the West Side Highway, and parts of the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel are excluded, but you will be tolled if you exit one of these roadways into the zone.
When does it actually go into effect?
It started on midnight on January 5.
So what are the tolls?
In the final plan, the tolls for entering the zone are $9 for cars and $4.50 for motorcycles. Commercial trucks will be charged $14.40 to $21.60, depending on their size. Non-commuter buses like tour buses will also pay between $14.40 to $21.60, but commuter buses are exempt if they’re open to the public and on a fixed schedule. (So the Hampton Jitney can put down its pitchfork.) You will not be tolled for exiting or driving within the boundaries of the zone.
And this is only during certain hours, right?
The tolls are in effect between 5 a.m. and 9 p.m. on weekdays and 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekends. A much lower toll, $2.25 for passenger vehicles, is charged during overnight hours.
What about taxis?
Yellow cabs add 75 cents to passengers’ fare, while Ubers and Lyfts add $1.50. This includes trips to the zone, from the zone, or entirely within the zone, and the fee applies at all times.
How many times can I be tolled per day?
Passenger vehicles are charged only once per day. Other vehicles can be charged multiple times.
Okay. Will I get charged if I drive from the Whole Foods in Fidi to the Whole Foods in Times Square, all within the zone?
No.
Will the tolls increase?
The tolls are set to go up to $12 by 2028 and to $15 by 2031.
What’s up with the tunnel credits?
If you enter the zone through the Lincoln Tunnel or the Holland Tunnel, you get money back for already paying the toll charged for entering the tunnel. (So New Jersey can put down its pitchforks.) The “refund” during peak hours is $3 for cars, $1.50 for motorcycles, $7.20 for small trucks and buses, and $12 for large trucks and tour buses. If you enter from the Queens-Midtown Tunnel or Hugh L. Carey Tunnel you also get a refund. (During peak hours, it’s $1.50 for cars, 75 cents for motorcycles, $3.60 for small trucks and buses, and $6 for large trucks and tour buses.) Got it? Got it.
What other exemptions are there?
They are, admittedly, a little convoluted. Drivers who make under $50,000 and drive to work in the district can get a 50 percent discount after their first ten trips each month. Vehicles transporting people with disabilities, as well as emergency vehicles (ambulances, fire trucks, police cars) and certain government vehicles (snowplows, garbage trucks), are exempt.
That doesn’t seem like a lot of exemptions.
It’s not! And many people are upset about this. But the MTA maintains, per its toll-recommendation report from November 2023, that by limiting the number of discounts, it can keep the toll rate lower to “consider the interests of the many over the few.”
But a lot of people drive for work!
Only 4 percent of outer-borough residents — around 128,000 people — drive into Manhattan to work, according to a Community Service Society study. Meanwhile, 57 percent use public transit. Only 2 percent of poor outer-borough residents commute to Manhattan by car. That’s 5,000 people in total. Meanwhile, 61 percent of poor outer-borough residents rely on public transit, and the rest drive elsewhere, walk, or bike to their jobs.
What about EMT or medical workers who drive to work?
Some shift workers do have to go into the city at irregular hours — times when public transportation might not be reliable or feel safe. Sarah Kaufman, director of the NYU Rudin Center for Transportation Policy & Management, noted to us back in March that congestion pricing “needs to go hand in hand with improving transit for off-hours commutes.” (For what it’s worth, the non-peak-hour toll for personal vehicles is $2.25.)
What about all the people who live in the zone who are mad about the zone?
Arguably, this is exactly the kind of person most capable of paying the fees if they’re very committed to driving around the city. But Kaufman suggested a shift in perspective for people who see it as a penalty. Instead, she says drivers should see it as an investment they make to cover “the cost of the wear and tear and externalities of operating a vehicle within the zone.” (Those externalities include the fact that by owning a car in the city, you are creating increased traffic risk for others and generating air pollution in one of the most transit-dense neighborhoods in the country.)
Will there be added pollution from traffic diverting to places like the South Bronx?
This is a concern. The MTA plans to spend at least $100 million to mitigate impacts to diverted neighborhoods. But as the plan rolls out, advocates say that transit and environmental overhauls to the borough are something they need to keep monitoring and pushing for. Fewer cars and trucks in the city is the overall goal.
How is this all be enforced?
The MTA has installed cameras that tag E-ZPasses and photograph license plates at 110 locations around Manhattan. For the FDR Drive and West Side Highway, the MTA said it installed readers at select points that records the time that vehicles pass through: “The system will charge a toll only if vehicles that originated outside the congestion zone stop being detected by toll equipment along these two highways.”
Okay, but what about all the people who just cover their license plates?
Yeah, it’s bad. Plate scammers are on the rise, and somebody should probably have figured this out by now.
Will the blocks above the zone just become parking garages with jacked-up prices? Will uptown just become a horror show?
Probably not, but the adjustment period might be annoying. But Kaufman pointed out that in London and Stockholm, things eventually normalized when people found themselves “spending more time or money looking for parking than either just paying the fee or taking transit.” Drivers changed their behavior in response to the policy, which is the point of the policy.
What else happened in London when it did this?
London flooded the streets with buses when congestion pricing went into effect and immediately saw traffic drop and air quality improve. The introduction of Ubers set things back, and the city had to be flexible in its response by upping fees. But, as Justin Davidson has written here before, London has a much more centralized transit system compared to New York, where one decision might have to go through the city’s DOT, the state-run MTA, New Jersey’s PATH and NJ Transit, and Amtrak. As he writes, to make congestion pricing more effective, this system needs to coordinate its strategies (or face an overhaul). Good luck to us!
I’m still so mad. This had better work. How much less traffic will there be once the policy goes into effect?
It’s estimated that the number of vehicles in the zone would be cut by 13 percent — which is still a lot, albeit less than the 17 percent estimated for the previous, higher toll.
Will the $9 toll still raise enough money for the MTA?
Yes, it will still raise the legally required amount for the MTA since the money is being used to borrow $15 billion via bonds. But because money is coming in more slowly, the projects it’s supposed to fund will be delayed (though no one seems to be able to say by how long, exactly.)
What are those projects?
They’re part of the MTA’s 2020–24 capital-improvement plan: track upgrades, modernizing the signal system, and generally bringing our very old subways into a condition of good repair. There will also be a lot more desperately needed elevators and accessibility updates, which, Kaufman pointed out, counterbalances many of the arguments about needing a personal car because public transportation is inaccessible.
That seems good.
Right?
But it will take time, which is annoying.
It will, which is totally annoying.
What about Donald Trump and all the lawsuits? Will they be able to stop congestion pricing?
Trump wants to end congestion pricing, but that will be much harder to do now that it has started. The plan has been approved by the Federal Highway Administration, and a federal judge denied New Jersey’s emergency request to stop the plan on January 3. If the toll money starts to be used for MTA projects, experts say it will also be much harder to rescind. But Republicans are looking to block the toll through a bill, and Trump might try any number of things outside the normal ways a president might attempt to stop it.
Will I ever feel good about congestion pricing?
In Stockholm, some critics were swayed by congestion pricing after it was implemented, maybe because they had less time to sit around fuming in traffic. Others begrudgingly accepted it as part of life. But some people might never come around — and that’s also part of life, in its own beautiful way.
Whose idea was this anyway?
William Vickrey, a Columbia professor and economist, introduced the idea in the 1950s. The concept was slow to take off, at least domestically: Vickrey presented his road-pricing plan to Congress in 1959 and described the reaction as “discreet silence.” It’s kind of a sad story, actually: He died of an apparent cardiac arrest three days after he won the Nobel Prize. He was in his car.
This post has been updated.