The New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) on Feb. 24 announced that since the Congestion Relief Program began on Sunday, Jan. 5, through Friday, Jan. 31, tolls from the Congestion Relief Zone (CRZ) generated $48.66 million in revenue with a net $37.5 million putting the program “on track to generate the $500 million that the MTA initially project.”
According to the agency, which will continue to report revenues from this program monthly, $48.66 million was generated from the tolling program, 22% of which comes from taxis and for hire vehicles ($10.6 million), 68% comes from passenger vehicles, 9% from trucks, and 1% from buses and motorcycles. Eighty-five percent of non-taxi and for-hire vehicles revenue was generated from passenger vehicles and 15% from trucks, buses, and motorcycles. Ninety-five percent of revenue was generated during peaking tolling hours. Expenses from the program, including operating camera infrastructure and customer service, amounted to $9.1 million and another $2 million for mitigation efforts totaling $11.1 million. This resulted in a net surplus of $37.5 million.
The revenue generated from the CRZ, MTA says, funds projects in the 2020-2024 Capital Program, including making more stations accessible, such as the Hollis and Forrest Hills Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) stations; installing modern signaling on the Fulton Street line in Brooklyn and Liberty Avenue in Queens on the A and C trains; new rolling stock, including 44 new dual-mode LIRR locomotives; zero-emission buses; extending the Second Ave Subway into East Harlem; and more.
“With an initial performance in line with projections, we can confidently move forward with projects that rely on funds from the Congestion Relief Zone,” said MTA Chief Financial Officer Kevin Willens. “We look forward to seeing similar results in the coming months.”
“We are on track for the projected $500 million in net revenue, especially as we get into warmer months when traffic will increase which provides confidence in the forecast,” said MTA Co-Chief Financial Officer Jai Patel. “All indicators show the program is reducing traffic but also projecting the revenue to be on target for what we had in 4,000 pages of studies and what we were looking at in the fall.”
Data on the volume of vehicles entering the CRZ and the excluded roadways is also available on the MTA’s data transparency website and can be downloaded on New York State Open Data. The dataset can be viewed by location, time, and type of vehicle down to 10-minute increments.
