The objective of this tax, which would be levied at the entrance to the center of Manhattan, one of the five boroughs of New York, is threefold: to relieve congestion on the main avenues that irrigate the island from north to south, improve the air quality of the Big Apple and financially bail out the subway network in poor condition.

Introducing "a tax against traffic jams is a historic opportunity," said John McCarthy, spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), the public operator of the New York subway and suburban trains.

Nearly nine million souls inhabit New York City, plus millions in suburban counties to the north and east and New Jersey across the Hudson River.

About $20 a day

This urban toll of 17 to 23 dollars per day, at the entrance of 60th Street in Manhattan -- knowing that it already exists on all the highways that surround the megacity -- is to come into force in spring 2024 but it is hotly contested.

Some 21,000 taxi drivers in New York - whose yellow cars have made the legend of the city - are standing up against the measure: the president of their union, Bhairavi Desai, believes that the tax will sign the death warrant of some taxis already brought to their knees by the pandemic and competition from ride-hailing like Uber.

Like Wein Chin, 55, who came from Burma in 1987 and who, with his 300 or 400 dollars a week, confides to AFP fear not to "survive with a credit to pay and a family to feed".

In the face of the grumbling, officials have proposed flexible tariffs for the lowest incomes, in a city already hit by runaway inflation.

New York's famous yellow taxis want to be exempted from the future tax that New York wants to introduce at the entrance to Manhattan © Angela Weiss / AFP

The urban toll would affect 700,000 cars, vans and heavy goods vehicles per day and would, according to its promoters, reduce daily traffic by 10% and therefore CO2 emissions.

New York officials cite environmental studies done in London, which has long had a congestion charge: polluting emissions there have reportedly fallen by 20%.

"We know that car pollution is a major factor in the climate crisis that is damaging the planet and our health," said Tim Donaghy of Greenpeace, adding that abandoning cars for public transport is in line with history.

All winners

"Everyone wins, traffic and the environment," said Danny Pearlstein of the Riders Alliance, a group of public transport users.

Especially since the MTA, which manages the metro, with its sprawling network but infrastructure in poor condition, has estimated at a billion dollars per year the manna it could draw from urban tolls.

The project dates back to 2007 when billionaire Michael Bloomberg was mayor of New York City.

Manhattan congestion charging project would reduce congestion and pollution © Ed JONES / AFP

But the municipality and its legislature did not agree until 2019 under the mandate of the very left-wing mayor of the time, Bill de Blasio, predecessor of the current mayor Eric Adams, a former police captain with a grip.

The federal government gave the green light in June for an implementation next spring in a city classified rather to the left and with social and environmental concerns.

But New Jersey, a popular border state and dormitory suburb of Manhattan, is challenging in court this future new urban toll believing that it will weigh on professionals who use every day the bridges and tunnels already paying to cross the Hudson River.

Nevertheless, New York Governor Kathy Hochul, Democrat, has pledged that the tax against traffic congestion and pollution will be a reality in the spring.

© 2023 AFP