Clues but No Full Account of Order That Turned a N.J. Town Into a Parking Lot

[jeffandnicole]

Doesn't mean it cannot be converted.  The Illinois State Toll Highway Authority (ISTHA) converted the entire system to ORT in the early 2000s.  Much of this mileage (Tri-State, Northwest, East-West) was opened in 1958.  The original system had barriers like the one at the GWB.  ISTHA solved the problem by having cash lanes off to the side of the ORT lanes.  Usually there is also an I-Pass lane with the cash lanes as there is an exit/entrance that can only be accessed via the toll plaza cash lanes.

ISTHA also doesn't fine every violator immediately.  Usually they wait until the violator has gone through multiple toll plazas without paying.  Enough to mark them as a chronic toll violator.  A lot of the out of state ones will slip through on this.  However, they do go after Indiana and Wisconsin violators as much as they do Illinois violators.

They also, IIRC, have a toll collector union (Chicago is a big a hotbed of unionism as are a lot of east coast areas), and yet they were able to implement ORT with cash lanes.  A lot of what was eliminated were the automatic lanes, the coin buckets.

ORT has been implemented on many east coast toll roads, including but not limited to the NJ Turnpike, PA Turnpike, DE Turnpike, DE Rt. 1, Garden State Parkway, and AC Expressway and has been talked about on many other roads as well. 

Bridge toll plazas are a different story, due to nearby ramps. short sight distances, etc.  It can be done, depending on the circumstances.  The GWB tolls would not be an ideal candidate because of the tight toll plaza conditions, both before and after the plaza.  Besides, traffic will generally jam up going into the crossing anyway, and sound engineering practices would not recommend high speed ORT when the vehicles will only hit congestion anyway.

Dang, that's a lot of scout cars parked in that porkchop.  One would think that if the lanes are dedicated that concrete barriers might be a better choice than cones.

They're not there to keep people in the correct lanes.  They're there to do random checks on trucks, or other surveillance.

[jeffandnicole]

For another example of how small and tight the GWB toll plaza is:

Using the Cermak Road Plaza 35, at 200 feet, one can barely see the end points where the ORT lanes meet the cash toll lanes: http://goo.gl/maps/8xqXL

Using the GWB plaza, at 200 feet, one can see the toll plaza takes up only about a quarter of the room: http://goo.gl/maps/VLp3f  And if you notice, you can see all THREE toll plazas for the bridge...at the same height distance that doesn't even allow the entire Tri-State Tollway plaza to be seen!

That's another reason why ORT would never be considered at the GWB, unless they went AET.

[hbelkins]

The real key in this will come when Bridget Kelly talks, which she most assuredly will at some point. If Christie is lying, she'll call him out on it since he disparaged her so greatly today.

[Duke87]

Dang, that's a lot of scout cars parked in that porkchop.  One would think that if the lanes are dedicated that concrete barriers might be a better choice than cones.

They're not there to keep people in the correct lanes.  They're there to do random checks on trucks, or other surveillance.

They're there to look tough and ward off evil terrorist spirits. This bridge is operated by the same people that own the World Trade Center, so they tend to be rather security paranoid.

[Alps]

The real key in this will come when Bridget Kelly talks, which she most assuredly will at some point. If Christie is lying, she'll call him out on it since he disparaged her so greatly today.

NOW you're talking rationally. Don't leap to judgment or predictions ("much ado about nothing") while the story is developing.

[Jardine]

I'd think Christy would be precluded from complicity because his IQ is clearly out of the house plant/nematode/lichen range.

I'm thinking if he was really annoyed with Fort Lee, New Jersey, it would have disappeared during the night and dumped in the pine barrens.

[NE2]

Finally a reason Bridge-T thought the closure would cause commuters to blame the Fort Lee mayor. (Fuck the police.)
http://www.businessinsider.com/fort-lee-mayor-port-authority-blamed-me-for-the-traffic-jam-2014-1

Fort Lee, N.J. Mayor Mark Sokolich (D) wrote a letter to a top Port Authority official on Sept. 12 complaining that the agency's police officers were telling commuters it was the mayor's fault that lanes were closed on the George Washington Bridge, causing massive traffic jams.

And an interesting bit from the dump: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/01/10/1268754/-There-WAS-a-traffic-study-but-Wildstein-s-test-actually-screwed-it-up

[DeaconG]

This crap's getting deeper by the minute. If it was any deeper you'd need SCUBA gear.

[bing101]

N.Y. Times: Clues but No Full Account of Order That Turned a New Jersey Town Into a Parking Lot

It would seem a minor whodunit for a small suburb: On the first day of school in September, three access lanes leading from Fort Lee, N.J., streets to the George Washington Bridge were unexpectedly and mysteriously shut down. Cars backed up, the town turned into a parking lot, half-hour bridge commutes stretched into four hours, buses and children were late for school, and emergency workers could not respond quickly to the day's events, which included a missing toddler, a cardiac arrest and a car driving into a building.

But the George Washington Bridge is the world's busiest, and New Jersey is led by one of the nation's most pugnacious and prominent politicians, Gov. Chris Christie – who also happens to appoint the people who control the bridge.

So the unfolding story of the lane closings has become something of a cause célèbre, resulting in a hearing before the New Jersey Legislature on Monday, as well as a window into the proudly aggressive and often secretive dealings of Mr. Christie's team.

Where's the NYDOt in all of this since they have some jurisdiction on some New York to NJ Highways. The Problem here is that New York City, and New York State was forced to watch this Garbage.

[cpzilliacus]

Where's the NYDOt in all of this since they have some jurisdiction on some New York to NJ Highways. The Problem here is that New York City, and New York State was forced to watch this Garbage.

I don't think the NYCDOT or NYSDOT has much of a say-so here.  This section of road is under jurisdiction of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

[cpzilliacus]

N.Y. Times: Bridge Scandal Papers Point to Cover-Up by Chris Christie Allies

Washington Post graphic (this is describes what happened in graphic detail): For Christie, perhaps a bridge too far

[empirestate]

What I can't understand, and this is with tongue only partially in cheek, is how that many New Jersey drivers allowed themselves for that many days to be constrained by mere traffic cones?

[vdeane]

I-95 is fully owned by PANYNJ between US 9W and I-87.  NYSDOT and NYCDOT have very little/no authority there.

And that's just one bridge.  Including all the little bridge authorities, transportation in NY is divided between 11 different organizations (NYSDOT itself is also split into 11 semi-autonomous regions, making for a grant total of 22-23 authorities)

[Zeffy]

And that's just one bridge.  Including all the little bridge authorities, transportation in NY is divided between 11 different organizations (NYSDOT itself is also split into 11 semi-autonomous regions, making for a grant total of 22-23 authorities)

New Jersey has the main DOT, the NJ Turnpike Authority, the South Jersey Transportation Authority (ACE), all of the local county DOTs, and then has each of the bridge divisions like the DRJTBC, the D[E]RPA, the PANYNJ, and I believe there are other that I missed.

[cpzilliacus]

N.Y. Times: Lane Closings Scandal Shows Port Authority's Status as 2 Warring Fiefs

After a top New Jersey political appointee at the Port Authority, David Wildstein, ordered the lane closings at the George Washington Bridge that clogged Fort Lee, N.J., for four days in September, the authority's New York-appointed executive director, Patrick J. Foye, exploded with anger and ordered the lanes reopened. But then the authority's New Jersey-appointed chairman, David Samson, expressed outrage over Mr. Foye's outrage, accusing him of leaking the story of the lane closings.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is a bistate agency that was designed to take politics out of the operation of the region's trade and transportation infrastructure. But as portrayed in email traffic released this week by investigators of the lane-closing scandal, it appears consumed by politics: a split personality beholden to the whims of the two rival governors who control it.

[cpzilliacus]

N.Y. Times editorial: After Chris Christie's Performance

Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey issued repeated apologies Thursday for the abuse of office that now threatens to undermine his political future. Though he sounded remorseful – and clearly sorry that this scandal might sink his ambitions for national office – he blamed his staff for making him a victim. Unbeknown to him, he said, they shut down lanes to the George Washington Bridge to create a four-day traffic jam to punish a local mayor who failed to endorse him in last year's election.

He said he fired his "stupid"  and "deceitful"  deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, "because she lied to me"  about the gridlock scheme. Mr. Christie has also asked a Republican operative and former campaign adviser, Bill Stepien, to withdraw as a candidate to take over the state Republican Party. He, too, was on the email chain. Two of Mr. Christie's appointees to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, David Wildstein and Bill Baroni, resigned in December as news of the traffic vendetta became public.

[vdeane]

And that's just one bridge.  Including all the little bridge authorities, transportation in NY is divided between 11 different organizations (NYSDOT itself is also split into 11 semi-autonomous regions, making for a grant total of 22-23 authorities)

New Jersey has the main DOT, the NJ Turnpike Authority, the South Jersey Transportation Authority (ACE), all of the local county DOTs, and then has each of the bridge divisions like the DRJTBC, the D[E]RPA, the PANYNJ, and I believe there are other that I missed.

I was just doing state; below that, we have the county/town/village/city ones.  Fun fact: Nassau County has its own bridge authority!

[empirestate]

Fun fact: Nassau County has its own bridge authority!

Yes, and from what I hear they have the corruption skills to make Bridgegate look like kindergarten-level shenanigans. (Oh wait, it already does...)

[ixnay]

Rachel Maddow offers up an alternative theory (Christie may have been getting back not at the mayor of Fort Lee but at the state senator representing same)...

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/maddow-nj-bridge-scandal-was-political-revenge-but-maybe-not-for-the-reason-you-think%E2%80%A6/

From the article...

In 2010, Christie took the unprecedented step of refusing to reappoint a New Jersey Supreme Court justice for another term, which set off the New Jersey Democrats, who got back at Christie by shooting down all the other Supreme Court justice nominees he put forward.

So when a Republican member of the New Jersey Supreme Court came up for reappointment last year, NJ Senate Democrats promised to make it a brutal fight, so Christie decided to stop the reappointment. He was furious at Senate Democrats, and held a press conference getting really angry with them.

That press conference, expressing much anger with Senate Democrats, was held on August 12, 2013, a day before the Bridgegate e-mail was sent. And Fort Lee, the town that got backed up, is part of the legislative district represented by Loretta Weinberg. The leader of the Senate Democrats.

ixnay

[cpzilliacus]

N.Y. Times: A Bridge to Scandal: Behind the Fort Lee Ruse

By his own account, Mark Sokolich rarely asks people for anything. "When you ask,"  he said, "you usually have to give."

And that is how he likes to govern as the mayor of Fort Lee, N.J., a dot of a borough perched atop the Palisades in the shadow of the George Washington Bridge.

One day last spring, though, he was the person asked to give. A member of Gov. Chris Christie's re-election campaign staff came calling to see if Mr. Sokolich, a Democrat, would endorse the governor, a Republican. There was scant doubt that Mr. Christie would win. But his ambition was to win big. He joked that he wanted to eclipse the landslide record held by his mentor, former Gov. Thomas H. Kean, who prevailed by 40 points in 1985. His advisers hoped to demonstrate such broad support that Mr. Christie would become his party's logical presidential candidate in 2016. The campaign vigorously courted Democratic officials and notified reporters of fresh conquests.

[cpzilliacus]

Yes, and from what I hear they have the corruption skills to make Bridgegate look like kindergarten-level shenanigans. (Oh wait, it already does...)

This is the authority that refuses to participate in the E-ZPass IAG, right?

[empirestate]

Yes, and from what I hear they have the corruption skills to make Bridgegate look like kindergarten-level shenanigans. (Oh wait, it already does...)

This is the authority that refuses to participate in the E-ZPass IAG, right?

Yes.

[hubcity]

While I'm no fan of Chris Christie's, I've still thought "well, wait a minute. Who'd want to torpedo their career - or the career of their boss - over such a petty issue? No endorsement? Big deal. What's the real story?"

And in the back of my mind, "the real story" always involves money.

Said money may very well involve what's the center of this map:

https://goo.gl/maps/9Wrjm

Look closely. There's a very choice patch of undeveloped land to the south of the upper GWB ramps.

Apparently, the closures came at a relatively critical time for sealing up the funding for the billion dollar development Fort Lee's been trying to get built there, for which ramp access to the GWB was a crucial selling point. Note that when Fort Lee's mayor was hammering out an email to the Port Authority to clear up the situation, he wanted it done quietly, without political friction or press involvement.

So, hmm. On the one hand, this scenario gives us money to follow; it's easy to conceive of there being someone in a position of (port) authority that was interested in making sure they got their hand into this rather large pot of money, who used the potential ramp closings as leverage to have that happen.

On the other hand, it's also easy to conceive of this being a plot hatched (again, following the money) by folks in Christie's circle for their own self-interest, without involving Christie himself.  But then gain, Christie's on the record as being "sauced" about the number of lanes Fort Lee had, which is an opinion that he probably should have kept to himself.

Much of this speculation is informed by the following...

http://www.businessinsider.com/following-the-money-on-bridgegate-2014-1

So, in short...eh, who knows?

[bing101]

 http://www.nytimes.com/.../christie-cut-ties-with-mayor... Update mayor, Steven Fulop of Jersey City was another target  mentioned in the NY Times article. Damn Christie Cabinet Members used the Port Authority as a politcal Hitman and Cabinet act like members of the Mafia.

[bugo]

(Attempting to get back on topic)
I can confirm that this was done as a study. Any political implications about why it was studied are an exercise best left to editorials. It may not have been done thoroughly/properly, though, i.e. as someone mentioned, involving a thorough traffic engineering study. I haven't seen any materials related to the study or any of the traffic volumes involved, so as a traffic engineer I have to withhold any further comment.

But why?  Any baboon could tell you what was going to happen.  This is like touching your hand to a stove when you know good and well you're going to get burned.  The traffic study alibi doesn't add up.