So: Bloomberg (at least, if not you, Doug, and Michael) agrees with me on this point: NYC needs more and better transit. Now we're down to paying for it. He says "Trust Me: we'll make $600M and transit can have all the net profits" ...well, in the real world it doesn't work that way: just like in Hollywood, there are no profits, just more costs. But once the simple notion of funding a transportation infrastructure that benefits everyone gets marginalized by this scheme, the normal money that would be used dries up.
........
Or, in other words, the problem - as you see it - is that Bloomberg is tying mass transit infrastructure improvements to congestion pricing; using congestion pricing as a funding method for the mass transit upgrades we all agree are both necessary and worthwhile. Cart before horse, yes?
This is wrongheaded -- you're saying -- because it's a flawed way to create a funding channel. It's flawed because:
* It would be more efficient (and less troublesome to people who, for a variety of reasons, are compelled to commute via car) to directly fund the desired improvements without the congestion scheme middleman.
Improvements will increase demand for mass transit and accomplish the congestion plan's objectives without all the tech and bureaucratic overhead.
and
* Such schemes almost always carry a lot of freight in the form of project inefficiencies and corruption: implementation problems, favors to contractors (who may or may not be qualified to engineer and oversee the project) and related obstacles. In short, it's likely to be fucked up from the start.
Is this a fair re-statement of at least a portion your view?
.d.