Frustrated with traffic congestion and the hesitance of transportation agencies to consider a promising strategy to bust it, NYC Councilman James Oddo wrote yesterday to MTA, Port Authority and NYS DOT officials to inquire about recent developments - or lack thereof - regarding their various announcements and proposals to examine the potential benefits of congestion relief pricing at Staten Island bridges.

The region is becoming more familiar with the merits of congestion pricing thanks to the NYS Thruway Authority's successful truck toll scheme on the Tappan Zee Bridge, and the agency's recent finding that conclusion that a $1 price break between peak and off-peak tolls could reduce bridge traffic volumes 8%. Oddo wrote that he "hopes the Thruway's results will serve as an impetus for the other city and state agencies to advance their studies of congestion relief pricing."

Referring to a 1998 letter from the DOT to the Tri-State Campaign stating that results of MTA and Port Authority pricing studies would be incorporated in a long range Staten Island Expressway study, Oddo asked NYSDOT what it has done to further pricing initiatives and what interaction has occurred between NYSDOT and the MTA and Port Authority. He wrote that "congestion relief pricing would not only result in an ease of traffic congestion by requiring commercial vehicles to travel during off-peak hours, but would also allow Islanders to breath a little easier by reducing smog." He also queried MTA Chair Virgil Conway about the MTA's 1998 Request for Proposals to study pricing strategies at the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, and asked "what additional steps the MTA has taken, such as hiring a consultant, analyzing the success/failure of similar programs at other locales and establishing a dialogue with transportation experts if none currently exists." Oddo also asked the Port Authority whether and how it plans to incorporate results from its 1996 pricing study into the DOT's ongoing Staten Island study.

The multi-year major investment study for the Staten Island Expressway contains no analysis of pricing strategies at the Verrazano and Goethals bridges. In light of Oddo's initiative, it's looking more likely that Staten Island groups and elected officials will reject the study as incomplete unless it is amended to include pricing as an alternative to highway expansion.