Photo credit: Nout Gons
by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition
With the headline “Honking Complaints Plunge 69% Inside Congestion Pricing Zone,” The City website in New York reports on an unintended side benefit of a government intervention meant to decrease traffic and travel times in lower Manhattan. After years of discussion, New York City recently implemented a congestion pricing toll for vehicles entering Manhattan below 60th Street. The official name for this area is the Congestion Relief Zone. For those unfamiliar with Manhattan, this area includes midtown Manhattan, the theater district, Wall Street, and Manhattan’s major financial and commercial areas. New York City follows the example of London, which successfully implemented congestion pricing for vehicles in central London in 2003. Vehicles there that are not ultra-low emissions also pay an extra fee if they are in the Ultra Low Emissions Zone.
Payment is by license plate recognition technology and the E-ZPass system. Reports show that New York’s congestion pricing program is having the desired effect of reducing traffic and travel times in the congestion pricing zone. Some are not happy about congestion pricing, including the governor of New Jersey and Donald Trump, whose Trump Tower is located within the zone. However, most observers consider the program a great success.
A side benefit of congestion pricing is a reduction in horn use. It always struck me as silly for drivers in gridlocked traffic to pound their horns — the car in front of them can’t move if it is behind a car not moving, after all — although I do admit to having done that myself as an impatient young person.
Unexpected consequences of public policy are usually bad, but in this case congestion pricing led to a large decrease in horn noise complaints in the congestion pricing zone. For noisy New York City, this is a good thing. A quieter Manhattan is a better and healthier place for all its residents and visitors.
