Poly's Dr. Falcocchio contributes his traffic expertise to The New York Times

Sunday, November 4's New York Times featured Poly professor and recognized transportation expert John Falcocchio’s take on readers’ ideas about curbing Manhattan’s congestion problems.

Falcocchio was joined by another area traffic expert, Jeffrey Zupan, a senior fellow for transportation at New York’s Regional Plan Association. The Times notes that Zupan’s group supports Mayor Blooomberg’s congestion pricing plan while Falcocchio “argues that congestion pricing should be used only as a last resort.”

Highlights from Falcocchio’s comments:

•    “…If you add the 13 southbound streets and highways at 60th Street, your plan [to charge tolls on all the bridges leading into Manhattan with varying costs based on the time of day] will produce more net revenue than the proposed congestion pricing plan would.”

•    “The city’s D.O.T. needs to install demand-sensitive controllers that would reduce unnecessary delays resulting from poorly timed signals.”

•    “Your proposal [to limit new development in high-density areas] should be one of the city’s guiding principles.”

Read the entire New York Times piece.

Professor Falcocchio is the Director of the Urban ITS Center at Polytechnic and teaches classes in transportation planning and engineering. Earlier this year, Falcocchio shared his insights on congestion pricing in the New York Sun op-ed piece “Traffic Troubles.”