Spin Cycle

Perhaps it won't win the man a lot of muscular friends on Rte. 111 in Suffolk. But one urban scholar, Owen Gutfreund, in a Times Op Ed today makes a pretty logical argument that new tolls should be weighted toward the oversized gas-guzzlers and against the more fuel-efficient vehicles. This is a worthy read when you consider that New Jersey, Massachussetts and now New York have all sputtered in their highly-emotional efforts to get a grip on gridlock and fund mass transit through toll policies. Congestion pricing is like Rasputin -- keeps getting killed, keeps getting up, which is kind of why we didn't load this site with daily updates in recent days on its life-death cycle. Plus, Bloomberg leaves at the end of next year due to term limits, making him a lame duck -- private funding power or none -- who is unlikely to get any major initiatives through Albany.And say, isn't that a city SUV that drops him off at the subway station when he goes to City Hall? Will his successor be downsizing to a Prius?

Dan Janison