MTA expected to pass 'modified Molinaro plan'

[Harry]

The MTA board is expected to approve a variation of Borough President James Molinaro's toll-hike suggestion at its meeting next week, sources said.

 

If the vote comes to pass as anticipated, the authority's Jan. 1 toll hike would take a small bite out of the wallets of E-ZPass drivers, while hiking the cash toll from $11 to a hefty $13.

 

The Staten Island resident discount E-ZPass toll would increase 28 cents from $5.48 to $5.76, and the non-resident E-ZPass toll would rise 46 cents, from $9.14 to $9.60.

 

Though he cautioned "it's not done until it's done," MTA board member Allen Cappelli confirmed that he expects the modified "Molinaro Plan" will be adopted by the board next week.

 

Read more: http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2010/10/mta_expected_to_pass_modified.html

[Santa Fe via Willow]

HOW did the VNB toll get so criminally overpriced to begin with?

[metsfan]

Criminally overpriced? Ok, so you go paint it and inspect it and repair the road deck for free. :tup:

 

- A

[Tokkemon]

Criminally overpriced? Ok, so you go paint it and inspect it and repair the road deck for free. :tup:

 

Don't be naive. It doesn't go to the bridge. It goes to the pool of funds.

[metsfan]

Try working on your delivery, hm? I'm not naive about anything, especially involving transportation.

 

The bridge is like the 2nd largest of its type in the world, it takes a lot to keep in working order.

 

- A

[aemoreira81]

HOW did the VNB toll get so criminally overpriced to begin with?

 

A measure slipped into a federal law in 1985 forcing the MTA to collect tolls in only one direction (the authority coming in because the Verrazano Narrows Bridge is a designated interstate highway), later made permanent in 1995.

 

See more here. http://www.ccrcnyc.com/2009/03/time-to-revisit-verrazano-bridge-toll.html

 

As I see it, there are only four ways to get rid of it:

 

1. Repeal the law.

2. Make a 10th Amendment case out of it. Prepare an ironclad EIS showing that Manhattan traffic has been adversely harmed by this (encouraging trucks to go through Manhattan to avoid the Staten Island Expressway tolls) to establishing standing, then have the MTA (with support from a Democratic governor) reinstate the two way toll, and dare the feds to punish them, then "plead the Tenth" and refuse to recognize federal authority on the grounds of interstates not being "post roads", or that since the Verrazano Narrows Bridge is not a road between two states, the Commerce Clause does not apply. In short, use the 10th Amendment against the feds. This should be done with a Writ of Quo Warranto, forcing the feds to show where their authority was to even pass the legislation.

3. Petition Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to decommission Interstate 278 within New York; federal law over the tolling the Verrazano would then become unenforceable thanks to the Tenth Amendment.

 

If all else fails, a Democratic governor should have the MTA stick it to Staten Island (which is no major loss legislatively speaking, as it leans Republican) and appoint members (in association with Bloomberg) to eliminate the SI resident discount and leave them on the hook for the full $9.14 (as it currently stands) toll...with a poison pill. If the discount is reinstated, Staten Island loses all express bus service for 10 years.

 

I normally don't support playing politics, but all's fair in love and war. And some defiance of the feds is probably warranted here, especially when they likely do not have the Constitutional authority to even impose it.

[Zman]

If all else fails, a Democratic governor should have the MTA stick it to Staten Island (which is no major loss legislatively speaking, as it leans Republican) and appoint members (in association with Bloomberg) to eliminate the SI resident discount and leave them on the hook for the full $9.14 (as it currently stands) toll...with a poison pill. If the discount is reinstated, Staten Island loses all express bus service for 10 years.

 

Fortunately that'll never happen.

[aemoreira81]

Fortunately that'll never happen.

 

You're missing the bigger point though; it's an unconstitutional intrusion by the feds into intrastate commerce.

 

Just because the toll booths are being removed doesn't mean that the tolls have to be - they can simply be made boothless.

 

Read the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. The feds can pass the law, but if the MTA were to defy them, the feds don't have a leg to stand on unless the judge legislates from the bench.

[T to Dyre Avenue]

3. Petition Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to decommission Interstate 278 within New York; federal law over the tolling the Verrazano would then become unenforceable thanks to the Tenth Amendment.

 

This would be the easiest option, especially given that Interstate 278 doesn't even connect with its "parent" Interstate highway, 78. I-78 starts at the Holland Tunnel and proceeds west through NJ and PA and terminates at I-81 just north of Harrisburg. Meanwhile, I-278 enters NJ via the Goethals Bridge, has an interchange with the NJ Turnpike, then ends at Routes 1 and 9 in Elizabeth. It was supposed to connect with 78 at the Manhattan Bridge, but the highway that would have extended 78 through lower Manhattan and Brooklyn was never built. Nor was the westward 278 extension that would have connected it to 78 in Springfield. Neither extension will be built, so just decommission I-278. It could become NY 278.

[aemoreira81]

This would be the easiest option, especially given that Interstate 278 doesn't even connect with its "parent" Interstate highway, 78. I-78 starts at the Holland Tunnel and proceeds west through NJ and PA and terminates at I-81 just north of Harrisburg. Meanwhile, I-278 enters NJ via the Goethals Bridge, has an interchange with the NJ Turnpike, then ends at Routes 1 and 9 in Elizabeth. It was supposed to connect with 78 at the Manhattan Bridge, but the highway that would have extended 78 through lower Manhattan and Brooklyn was never built. Nor was the westward 278 extension that would have connected it to 78 in Springfield. Neither extension will be built, so just decommission I-278. It could become NY 278.

 

Actually, I-278 was supposed to connect to I-78 in Springfield, NJ (and then continue past Springfield as NJ 24), but that highway was canceled, for a 7.2 mile gap in Union County, NJ.

[T to Dyre Avenue]

Isn't that what I said?

 

This would be the easiest option, especially given that Interstate 278 doesn't even connect with its "parent" Interstate highway, 78. I-78 starts at the Holland Tunnel and proceeds west through NJ and PA and terminates at I-81 just north of Harrisburg. Meanwhile, I-278 enters NJ via the Goethals Bridge, has an interchange with the NJ Turnpike, then ends at Routes 1 and 9 in Elizabeth. It was supposed to connect with 78 at the Manhattan Bridge, but the highway that would have extended 78 through lower Manhattan and Brooklyn was never built. Nor was the westward 278 extension that would have connected it to 78 in Springfield. Neither extension will be built, so just decommission I-278. It could become NY 278.