The Trump administration announced on Wednesday it intends to rescind approval of New York City’s congestion pricing program that is designed to reduce traffic in the heart of busy Manhattan and, in the process, raise billions to upgrade New York’s subway train and bus systems.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), the public-private entity that provides public transportation services in the New York metro area, immediately sued the government in an effort to block its move.
The system – the first of its kind in a US city – has only been in operation for a few weeks, starting on 5 January after previously being blocked last year. But Sean Duffy, the US transportation secretary, said the federal government’s move will now halt the program. Donald Trump pledged on the campaign trail to use federal power to revoke approval for the program that was approved in the final months of the Biden administration.
On Wednesday, Trump wrote on Truth Social: “CONGESTION PRICING IS DEAD. Manhattan, and all of New York, is SAVED. LONG LIVE THE KING!”
Kathy Hochul, the New York governor and a Democrat, who has been strongly behind the scheme, said earlier that the money raised from charging tolls to drivers would underpin $15bn in debt financing for mass transit capital improvements.
But in a letter addressed to Hochul on Wednesday, Duffy said: “I share the president’s concerns about the impact to working class Americans who now have an additional financial burden to account for in their daily lives. Users of the highway network within the CBD [central business district] tolling area have already financed the construction and improvement of these highways through the payment of gas taxes and other taxes.”
He added: “The recent imposition of this [congestion pricing program] upon residents, businesses, and commuters left highway users without any free highway alternative on which to travel within the relevant area. Moreover, the revenues generated under this pilot program are directed toward the transit system as opposed to the highways. I do not believe that this is a fair deal.”
Duffy also cited concerns expressed by New Jersey’s governor, Phil Murphy, also a Democrat, and the state’s transportation commissioner, Francis O’Connor.
On 20 January, the day of Trump’s inauguration, Murphy sent a letter to Trump in which he asked him to re-examine New York’s congestion pricing program. “The resulting congestion pricing plan is a disaster for working and middle-class New Jersey commuters and residents,” Murphy wrote.
In Wednesday’s letter, Duffy also said that he believes the “imposition of tolls under the [congestion pricing program] appears to be driven primarily by the need to raise revenue for the Metropolitan Transit Authority system as opposed to the need to reduce congestion”.
“I recognize that preliminary project data published by the MTA reports a congestion reduction benefit, but the toll rate that is set … should not be driven primarily by revenue targets, particularly revenue targets that have nothing to do with the highway infrastructure,” he continued.
The US transportation department’s decision to rescind approval of the program will put a halt to the city initiative, which imposes a $9 fee on drivers who enter Manhattan below 60th Street between 5am and 9pm on weekdays and 9am to 9pm on weekends.
Last May, Trump vowed to end the program, writing on his Truth Social platform: “I will TERMINATE Congestion Pricing in my FIRST WEEK back in Office!!!”
The Guardian has reached out to Hochul’s office for comment.
In response to the transportation department’s decision, Jerry Nadler, the US representative of New York, said that the arguments are “utterly baseless and frankly, laughable”.
“The notion of revoking approval for a federal initiative of this magnitude is nearly without precedent. I firmly believe that there is no legal basis for the President to unilaterally halt this program,” he wrote, adding: “Mr President, we’ll see you in court.”
Duffy gave no date to end the program, and his announcement could bring other legal challenges. New Yorkers had mixed views about the scheme, but proponents of public transport and a cleaner environment were behind it and in the early days there were indications from MTA data that street congestion had eased in central Manhattan, the New York Times reported.
The MTA and a New York bridge authority filed a lawsuit in Manhattan against Duffy, saying the department’s decision to withdraw approval of the program is “for blatantly political reasons” to uphold Trump’s campaign promise.
“The administration’s efforts to summarily and unilaterally overturn the considered determinations of the political branches – federal, state, and city – are unlawful, and the court should declare that they are null and void,” the suit said.
Reuters contributed reporting
