Harrumphs In Staten Island About New Congestion Pricing Panel

The panel of seventeen State and City-appointed representatives tasked with rubber-stamping re-examining Mayor Bloomberg’s congestion pricing plan has been announced. The panel has to approve parts of the plan before a big chunk of the federal funds allocated to the city will be released. A look at the appointees finds that no members of the panel reside in or represent the borough of Staten Island–probably not the smoothest move to get the plan moving smoothly.

The Staten Island Advance reported that “City Councilman Vincent Ignizio (R-South Shore) harrumphed, ‘If this was any other borough they would not be allowed to get away with this,” and that City Council Member Michael McMahon said “to me it’s shockingly disturbing and disconcerting…Staten Island deserves a seat at that table. We’ve earned it the hard way by sitting in hours of traffic.”

If people in the boroughs and counties outside of the potential ring of tolls around Manhattan (anyone else see a potential “Escape From New York” angle here down the road?) were dubious about the impartiality of the panel–a whole bunch of the panel already strangely seems to support the Mayor’s plan–this is not going to help their perception. And why did they have to go and piss off the good people of Staten Island who love their cars so much (partly because the public transportation infrastructure, planning, and investment in the borough has been so poor).