The Big Apple's new congestion pricing regulations have turned one city block into an expensive proposition.
On a one-block stretch of First Avenue between 60th and 61st Streets, motorists will pay a $9 toll when exiting the Queensboro Bridge. Even if you head north and away from the zone.
Clement Foster, 42, of the Bronx, said as he sat in his black BMW on the corner of First Avenue and 60th Street on Sunday, the first day of the controversial new fees.
“I didn't think I would be prosecuted here,” said one scammer employee. “I don't even have an E-ZPass, so I'm probably the one paying the most. This sucks. I probably won't be in town for work. I'll stay in the Bronx.
“Please,” he said. “I'm going to ask my boss not to send me to Manhattan.”
Taxi driver Ilias Karanikolis, 41, called the whole thing “ridiculous.”
“I'm sorry to all the people this hurt,” the Astoria resident said. “It's going to hurt all the poor people here. There's no business right now. This will kill us. The city will do whatever it wants.”
Meanwhile, the bridge was transformed overnight thanks to a new tax imposed by the city of Albany on car access to Midtown. The bridge is no longer the only free ride from Queens or Brooklyn to Manhattan.
Drivers entering Manhattan across the bridge, also known as the 59th Street Bridge, will be charged a $9 toll, whether they are heading into the heart of Midtown or north into the Bronx or upstate. It turns out.
The Sunday Post discovered one possible way around that – an exit from the upper deck on 62nd Street.
“I wonder how many times I'm going to get charged,” complained Ali Mohamed, an Uber driver in Queens. “I don’t know how we’re going to do this, how we’re going to charge people extra today.
“I'm not ready. I'm not ready for that yet,” he complained. “I saw the sign yesterday, but I didn't know it would start this morning. Are they going to make a million dollars a day? Where is the money going? Someone is getting rich.”
Gov. Kathy Hochul's congestion pricing plan, which began Sunday, would charge new tolls on vehicles entering Manhattan from 60th Street and below from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m.
If you enter the toll zone during these hours, you will be charged a daily fee of $9 for cars, $4.50 for motorcycles, $14.40 for light trucks, and $21.60 for large trucks. Taxis, black cars, and rideshare drivers can get a short break, paying 75 cents per trip for taxis and $1.50 per trip for rideshare vehicles.
Tolls will drop by 75% overnight, but motorists without E-ZPass will receive an email notification and will pay a slightly higher toll, although the exact amount is unknown.
Funds raised by the controversial plan will go to the MTA to help pay for the transit agency's $15 billion capital plan, state officials said.
But for most New Yorkers, it's just a sore spot, and with the recent spike in crime in the Big Apple's subways, not many are keen on taking public transportation.
“Congestion tolls are no incentive to take the subway,” said Carlos Carvajal, a Manhattan lawyer. His building's parking lot faces 60th Street. “There's something that demotivates me from riding the subway. Crime and insanity. Riots on the subway. It demotivated me.
“If I was on my own for the weekend, I might consider taking the subway,” he said. “But with all the craziness and all the violent subway crime, I'm demotivated, especially when I have a wife and daughter. I'm really discouraged from riding the subway on the weekends.”
In the meantime, Carvajal said he may be looking for a new home for his car.
“We’re looking at moving the car from the building’s garage to a garage maybe a block or two north.”
