TCI Regional Policy Design Stakeholder Submissions

I support and appreciate the work being done on the Transportation and Climate Initiative. There are many parts that I laud and a few I'm wary of. I live in NYC and I have a skewed view of how transportation works or have limited insight how it could be improved for the rest of the region. I also am very lucky to live near work where all I need is to walk 10 minutes while my wife's commute is a combination of walking and taking the subway for 45 minutes. I would want the policymakers to be aware that some solutions work in one municipality but may not work for others. Because NYC is so densely populated it needs a vast subway and train network, other areas do not. I feel like many transportation initiatives in NY have given opportunities to small groups, while potentially inconveniencing others. For example, additional bike lanes have made safer and easier for some to commute, however may have increased congestion for cars with fewer lanes and slower speeds. Although I favor slower speeds in urban neighborhoods for safety reasons, I am also aware that slow speeds make transportation by car very inefficient and more polluting as ICE cars burn much more fuel and emit more pollutants per mile at lower speeds. With all of the transportation options, NYC has some of the slowest transportation speeds leading to potentially more emissions. Another problem I see that could be easily improved is the amount of tailpipe emissions coming from idled or parked cars. I hate trying to feel concerned about the environment and climate change while I see so many of my fellow New Yorkers do silly human things like burn fuel and emit pollutants to sit in a car. This tells me the public at large may say they want to see policies to "fight" climate change while they are not willing to change their behaviors. This also means that educating the public and fining outright unnecessary pollution. Where everyone can agree on is that using less and wasting less fuel is good for the environment and individual pocket books. Due to the tremendous waste and misuse of motor fuel, I believe there's room for a "substantial" additional tax of at least 10c/gallon. I am aware that it might be an additional burden on poorer individuals, however I believe it is overblown due to decreased miles driven and a small portion of total expenditures on fuel. There are many used cars that are compacts, hybrids, and even electrics that are available, but people are choosing to buy costlier, more polluting trucks and SUV's, even by people who claim to care about the environment. You could have incentive program as there have been in the past where you can trade in your car for a more fuel efficient car, with bigger rebates going to bigger increases in fuel mileage ratings, with the highest going towards purchases of electric cars. We should also fine individuals who idle their engines while parked (maybe make exceptions during winter and summer) but this behavior needs to be stopped. The same should go for increased enforcement of speeding on open highways, they are not enforced enough. As our cars improve and are safer people drive faster and faster. Again, faster freeway speeds lead to more fuel consumption per mile, pollution, and increased fatal accidents. I think that we need to take effort to work with our school bus makers to quickly transition to all electric school busses in our region and eventually nationwide. This would work on improving child health, reduce medical bills, and educate our young bus riders and their parents, while overtime becoming more economical. Also, if you choose to allow a ton of Ubers/Lyfts to come into your city to take over taxis, make sure they're follow the same regulations. Don't try to "fix" it by adding more charges to all taxis and Ubers to try to ease congestion. Make sure the cars are hybrids or incentivize electric vehicles. By now, there should be plans made that all municipal fleet cars should be either hybrid or electric and future taxis the same. Invest in some chargers at depots and parking lots and add more when needed.
Being a resident of NYC I also see how notoriously long construction projects can take and how much inconvenience they cause, along with how much burden they put on local budgets with cost overruns. Future rail and road work should only be done where necessary and in places where it adds convenience to their users. We do not to build new roads to coastal areas that will be prone to flooding and need repairs. We do not need many new rail systems that make 20-30 years to complete which by that time robo-taxis will have been around for years and be much more efficient and can take passengers door to door whether it's a 5mile journey or 100mile journey. I am not impressed by the plans for the much overdue rail link to Laguardia Airport and while there may be some users, I doubt that will greatly reduce auto traffic and pollution. I feel like the policy designers need to focus on making all future transportation improvements by focusing on making them environmentally friendly, convenient, and not overly costly, not doing so will add more headaches and will not help attain the goals of the initiative. Also make it reliable and keep costs down to ensure as most people take advantage of it. Regardless, people have to know that there will be some sacrifices and increases in usage taxes, but as long as there is transparency, more and more people will get on board. Again, convenience while polluting less and less over time is the key to success, and incentivizing lower pollution transport while putting a higher cost on higher polluting. One has to wonder why an average person going to the airport would pay 200-300% and even 1000% more by choosing taxi/Uber over subway/train for maybe only 20-50% improvement in time (possibly less if traffic); it's the convenience. Sorry for my rambling thoughts, I'm not a good writer and don't have the time to spruce up my writing, but I hope the committee listens to stakeholders but more so to experts and shows some leadership in these important endeavors.