Waste of the Day: New York Drivers Dodged $5 Billion in Tolls
Topline: New York City angered its drivers with new “congestion pricing” for travel into Manhattan below 60th Street, but perhaps officials should be more focused on collecting the tolls they already charge.
Drivers across the state managed to dodge $5.1 billion in tolls in the four years from 2021 to 2024, according to the New York Post.
Key facts: The dollar total is much higher than New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority had indicated in previous statements. Officials claimed the state agency loses $800 million per year to toll and fare evasion from cars, buses and subways combined. In reality, cars alone cost $1.4 billion in 2024, the New York Post found.
The problem worsened when the MTA installed cashless toll booths in 2017. The old booths had gates that only lowered when drivers paid their toll. Now, most drivers use a special “E-ZPass” that pays the toll automatically.
But if drivers don’t have an E-ZPass, they get a bill in the mail — which goes unpaid 49% of the time, MTA reports have shown.
Of those missed payments, only 8.2% were eventually collected, the MTA said. An anonymous source told the Post that the MTA only has one collection agency on contract, but the missed tolls are “too much for any one firm to handle.”
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Critical quote: Rep. Mike Lawler, of the lower Hudson Valley, told the Post, the situation is “really pathetic.”
“Between fare jumpers and toll beaters, the MTA is losing a staggering $2 billion per year,” Lawler said. “This level of gross negligence is criminal, plain and simple. The MTA needs an immediate forensic audit and a complete purge of its incompetent management team.”
Background: Driving is only one way that commuters travel, specially in the city. Fare dodgers cost almost $700 million in one year by hopping subway turnstiles.
Luckily, the city has gained insight into the “psychobehavioral drivers” that motivate fare evasion, thanks to a $1 million study conducted last year.
Summary: The MTA’s budget deficit may reach $3 billion by 2028. Properly collecting tolls would go a long way toward fixing the crisis.
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