Now that New York City has finally flipped the switch on congestion pricing, the big question is: Will it work? And if so, how well?
To find out, all eyes turned to an unassuming new web tool called the Congestion Pricing Tracker. The brainchild of two college-age brothers, the tracker uses real-time traffic data from Google Maps to calculate traffic times for chosen routes and days. The data is presented as a line graph of traffic times before and after congestion pricing went into effect on January 5th. Compare one line to the other to see whether traffic times have increased or decreased.
Unsurprisingly, depending on the route and time of day, the new tolling scheme seems to be working — perhaps even better than expected. Since January 5th, most drivers entering Manhattan below 60th Street during peak hours will pay $9 — or $2.25 for late nights and weekends. And that fee appears to be doing what it set out to do, which is to change the behavior of the people behind the wheel and funnel millions of dollars into needed transit improvements.
That was what initially drew brothers Benjamin and Joshua Moshes to the project. Benjamin, a senior studying math and…
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