What New York’s congestion charge could teach the rest of America

SAM SCHWARTZ, better known as Gridlock Sam, unsuccessfully tried to introduce congestion pricing to New York in the 1970s, when he was a city traffic engineer. Some 50 years later, on January 5th this year, the city finally implemented the charge—the first of its kind in America. Congested cities across the country will be taking note. It is too soon to say what effect the pricing will have on New York’s roads, but three charts below offer some clues from the first 24 hours.The scheme is modelled partly on that of London, where since 2003 a daily charge (currently £15, or $19) has reduced the number of cars, improved air quality and funded transit upgrades. New York’s version costs $9 for most drivers (with different rates for lorries and low-income New Yorkers). The zone includes Manhattan’s central business district, south of 61st Street, and most of the roads, tunnels and bridges that connect surrounding areas (see map). The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which oversees the city’s transport system and some suburban lines, hopes that the scheme will reduce traffic in these areas by 10-20% (traffic in central London fell by 18% in the first year). Revenues from the congestion charge are earmarked for much-needed improvements to New York’s ageing subway and other public-transport systems.Will it work? Joshua and Benjamin Moshes, students at Northeastern University and Brown University respectively, are monitoring how commuting times into Manhattan have changed since the charge came into effect. Their congestion tracker collects traffic data from Google Maps every 15 minutes across 19 routes into Manhattan.Early results are encouraging. The tracker shows that the time to drive the 1.6 miles (2.6km) through the Holland Tunnel, which connects New Jersey to lower Manhattan, was cut by half during rush hour: from an average of 23 minutes on most Monday mornings, to just 12 on January 6th. The time spent crossing the East River via the Queensboro Bridge was also cut by half. Drivers from Brooklyn still faced heavy traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge, however, and travel times within the congestion zone were reduced overall by just 1%. Snowfall and other unrelated factors may have played a role. It will take months to fully assess the impact of the charge.American cities are some of the most congested in the world. Los Angeles is considering its own pilot scheme to ease traffic ahead of the Olympics in 2028. But many Americans are unwilling to ditch their cars, in part because public transport is not as efficient as it is in parts of . New York’s roll-out was delayed last year by political wrangling, and Donald Trump—an —and other Republicans might still attempt to end the scheme when he returns to office. But proponents remain cautiously optimistic. Gridlock Sam had said that he would not celebrate until the first car was charged. On Monday he sent your correspondent a photo of himself raising a glass.