In 2010, Filolaos Kefalas, an electrical engineer, drove a black Corvette into Manhattan. for a first date with Lisa Daglian, a transit attorney. He was not impressed.
“You know you can take the train,” Ms. Daglian, 61, remembers saying.
To this day, the two people keep laughing about Mr. Kefalas’ car. But Mr. Kefalas had reasons for driving, he said. He works in Bayside, Queens, which has limited transit options, and he likes to drive.
“Time is money,” Mr. Kefalas, also 61, said. “I’m trying to move as quickly as possible.”
The crack between Ms. Daglian, who now chairs the Permanent Residents’ Advisory Committee to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, and Mr. Kefalas did not break up their romance – they were married. But it’s an example of a perennial debate between two New York groups: car users, many from outside Manhattan and some with a very personal connection to driving, and transit loyalists, who believe mass transit isn’t just the cheapest and fastest travel option. but also a moral choice.
The split comes as the city prepares to introduce the first-ever congestion pricing program in the United States. The program, scheduled to begin on June 30, seeks to ease traffic and raise money for the authority – the state agency that operates the city’s transit system – by charging most motorists $15 to enter Manhattan below 60th Street.
Transit leaders say they hope congestion pricing, which has been successfully rolled out in major European and Asian cities, convinces some commuters who drive to switch to public transport. The tolling program is expected to reduce traffic in Manhattan’s core by about 17 percent, or about 120,000 vehicles per day.
About 1.87 million New York City residents commute to work by public transportation, and about 1.06 million drive alone or in carpools, the latest census data shows. More than 700,000 vehicles from across the region enter the congestion pricing zone on average every day, authorities have estimated.
From the limited parking and many tolls to the traffic jams that are common throughout the day, this city is a very difficult place for motorists.
But some people who live outside of Manhattan don’t consider mass transit a viable option because they live on the fringes of the system. Many people said they would continue to drive into the city center despite the new tolls.
Helen Keier, administrator for online learning at John Jay College, said she had no choice but to drive to work. He lives in the Locust Point neighborhood of the Bronx and commutes to his office on 59th Street in Manhattan several times a week.
“For me to even get to the subway, it’s a 20-30 minute bus ride for 6,” Ms. Keier, 57, said.
Mrs. Keier, hobbled by severe osteoarthritis, struggles to navigate the subway station. The MTA is working to make the subway fully accessible, but only about 32 percent of the system is now, officials said.
An exemption for disabled drivers will be available in the congestion pricing program. Ms Keier said she plans to apply for one and continue driving.
Even though he regularly drives into the crowded price zone, Julius Johnson, a home care nurse practitioner from Brooklyn, isn’t interested in throwing away his car keys either.
“Driving in New York was a status symbol for people who grew up in a low-income neighborhood because you didn’t have to rely on the subway,” said Mr. Johnson, 40, who also teaches in New York University’s nursing program. is in the toll zone.
Citywide, car-owning households have a median income of $110,000 compared to $87,000 for transit users, said Replica, a transportation data and analytics company.
Mr. Johnson bought his first car in 2005, a cream Ford Explorer. She recently graduated from nursing school but only felt that she was done when she got behind the wheel of her new car.
He says that as a healthcare worker, he can appreciate the potential for air quality improvements that congestion pricing can bring. But they don’t want to pay extra for driving.
Driving has been “transformed into the American dream,” said Sarah Kaufman, director of the Rudin Center for Transportation at New York University. “Owning a car, owning a house and driving so that you can control your domain, regardless of the negative externalities it may cause,” are all part of gaining status, he said.
There are eight lawsuits pending in New Jersey and New York filed against congestion pricing. The program has angered critics, including New Jersey’s governor, the trucking association and some residents of Battery Park City in Lower Manhattan.
Proponents say congestion pricing would ease some of the worst traffic in the country, improve air quality and provide a lifeline to the city’s public transportation network. The MTA is expected to collect about $1 billion per year in tolls, which will be used to secure $15 billion in bond financing to help pay for much-needed improvements in the city’s subway, bus and rail commuter systems.
The nearly 120-year-old subway system is one of the city’s defining characteristics. The vast 472-station network is a masterpiece of civil engineering that unites the five boroughs into a modern city.
“The bottom line is: no subway, no New York,” said Rachel Weinberger, director of research strategy at the Regional Planning Association, a nonprofit advocacy organization.
Weinberger said congestion pricing would help pay for important improvements to mass transit. But, he adds, it can also make driving more fun.
Motorists love to complain, but congestion pricing will open the way, Ms Weinberger said. “Transit is really a big benefit to motorists,” he said.
From December to March, the transport authority held an open comment period to gather public opinion on congestion pricing. Most of the more than 25,000 comments were in support, according to the MTA
“The great news for transit users is that the funding from the congestion pricing directly benefits them,” said John J. McCarthy, the authority’s chief of policy and external relations. “There are new subway cars, electric buses, more accessible stations, more reliable modern signals on lines like the C train in Brooklyn.”
For many New Yorkers, using transit is often the cheapest and most available option for getting around.
For those who can’t drive, commuting to the subway is often an economic necessity, said Nicholas J. Klein, an assistant professor in Cornell University’s department of urban and regional planning.
But there are New Yorkers, he added, who identify with the transit system, and are proud of a particular train, bus or ferry. For others, transit is an environmentally conscious choice.
Sproule Love, an executive for a company that operates independent and assisted living communities, is among those who have a soft spot for the subway even though she owns a car.
Leaving a friend’s apartment in Lower Manhattan one night in 2000, Mr. Love, 52, couldn’t find a cab and decided to take the train. Waiting on the platform, he said he realized it was the only time he’d ever “experienced a New York where there were no guards.”
“Everyone is tired and resigned to waiting 40 minutes for the F train,” he said.
Mr. Love, who lives in Harlem, is a vocal supporter of noise pricing. Even though learning to drive a car is a life skill, he said, using one to travel to one of the largest cities in North America doesn’t make sense.
Many critics of mass transit highlight what they see as the risk of crime on the subway, while many transit advocates argue that driving presents a greater risk.
“I feel safer on mass transit,” said Emily Rose Prats, 36, of Crown Heights in Brooklyn. A 2022 New York Times analysis of MTA and police statistics shows that the likelihood of being a victim of violent crime on the subway is relatively remote.
Although she is a proponent of congestion pricing, Ms. Daglian, a transit advocate, understands why people like her husband, who work or live in areas without access to public transportation, use cars.
“I understand why people drive,” he said. But that doesn’t mean he likes it, even close to home.
“The conflict is not over,” he said. “We still have a live chat.”
