Congestion Pricing Cameras Starting to be Installed

From W42st.com

On Friday, New York started installing the first of the 120 toll readers on W61st Street and West End Avenue, which will be empowered to monitor and charge congestion fees for drivers heading below 60th Street in Manhattan from Spring 2024.

When we dropped by to take photographs of the newly installed cameras, a driver was double parked in the street, shooting a video for his social media account. Jimmy Gomez, known on Instagram as @blacktiger12, posted and shared with his colleagues: “The city is ready to kill us with the tolls. Enjoy!” Gomez lives in the Bronx and is an UBER driver. He said that even though the city might charge the livery drivers just once a day, it was an extra cost they could not afford, adding: “But for the people who are coming to the city, it’s gonna be insane.”

Gomez is not the only one against the congestion charges. Phil Murphy, the Governor of New Jersey, filed a lawsuit to block New York’s congestion tolling program on Friday. Governor Murphy said on social media that he wanted to prevent the implementation of the controversial charges, suggesting that the federal government may have side-stepped conventional channels. Murphy said that the tolls were “anti-environmental, anti-commuter and anti-business.”

Congestion pricing cameras at West 61st Street and West End Avenue (from W42st.com)