That Bowser consistently refused to release the congestion pricing report (until today) consistently frustrated the council, which passed additional laws imposing consequences as long as the report wasn't made public. (Those consequences were mostly ignored.)
It's also worth noting that late last year @ggwash.org sued the Bowser administration for refusing to release the report under open-records laws. A status hearing was set for later this month, but Bowser's aides said today's sudden release was unrelated to the lawsuit.
"If all our mayoral candidates are looking at it as an option, that says to me the conversation may happen in future budgets," said @cmcharlesallen.bsky.social to me just now. "Why has the mayor been so afraid to have this conversation over the last 3 years? It seems weird."
As I mentioned in a prior post, three of the mayoral candidates say they support congestion pricing. @janeese4dc.bsky.social went farthest in explaining why in a @ggwash.org questionnaire:
Read the full report here: www.scribd.com/document/101...
And the letter to the D.C. Council: www.scribd.com/document/101...
Bowser's letter to the council says the report had "methodological flaws" and relied on pre-pandemic traffic data and assumptions. Her aides also basically say there's no way Congress would ever let congestion pricing happen.
Traffic volumes could decrease up to 11 percent, representing almost 65,000 fewer weekday car trips; transit use would jump by almost 25 percent in the most optimistic scenario; and people who still decided to drive would save up to 24 hours of time lost in traffic.
So what did the report find? Well, it considered a variety of congestion pricing models, from tolls on bridges and roads from Maryland and Virginia to a cordon around downtown that drivers would pay $5 to $10 to enter. Annual revenue would range from $110-667 million.
No one on the council has recently been advocating for congestion pricing. But at least three mayoral contenders – @janeese4dc.bsky.social, @kenyanmcduffie.bsky.social, and @garygoodweather.bsky.social – have said they would implement it if elected to succeed Bowser.
But why is Bowser making public this long-awaited and never-released report on congestion pricing? She says it "has taken on a certain mythology among some," and her administration worries that the council will use it to close budget gaps this year. BUT...
"Downtown D.C. is an invaluable part of Washington’s identity and economic vibrancy, but it is not Midtown Manhattan," writes Bowser in a letter to the D.C. Council. "Taxing people up to $10 to drive into Downtown D.C. is a bad idea – especially now."
NEWS: @mayorbowser.dc.gov has very unexpectedly released a report @ddotdc.bsky.social finished five years ago on what implementing congestion pricing in D.C. would look like. She had refused to make it public since it was done, but now calls congestion pricing "the wrong policy at the wrong time."
Bowser touts the economic benefits of the IndyCar race coming to D.C., noting that it will occur during a relatively slow month for the city.
“When Secretary Duffy and I talk, we’re not usually talking about speeding,” says @mayorbowser.dc.gov, probably referencing rumors that Duffy’s DOT might push to get rid of traffic cameras in the city. “But here we are talking about speeding.”
“If you’ve been a resident of D.C. you’ve walked past dozens of fountains that haven’t worked for decades,” says Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, noting the Trump administration is spending $120 million to fix federal fountains in the city as part of the country’s 250th anniversary.
Honestly, had D.C. not demolished the old Dave Thomas Circle (RIP), I would have paid to see anyone try to navigate that hellish intersection at speed.
Some images from the press event for the race:
It’s official: The Freedom 250 Grand Prix IndyCar is coming to D.C. on August 21-23. The promotional video that was just shown is… something. The course is 1.66 miles with seven turns.
Today in fun ways my 8-year-old messes up words: “bankruft” (instead of bankrupt) and “Delmartians” (instead of Dalmatians).
Well done!
Pretty great ideas I heard at a public meeting on revitalizing H Street NE: Bring H Mart to the corridor (the ad copy writes itself), use soon-to-be decommissioned streetcars for new bars on empty lots (kinda like Metrobar off the MBT).
UNION FIGHT: In January the D.C. Public Employee Relations Board ordered a new union election for employees of the D.C. Department of Corrections to choose whether they wanted to join AFGE or FOP. AFGE claimed FOP broke electioneering rules during the first election last year.
One more thing: The judges that tossed out D.C.'s ban on magazines that can hold more than 10 bullets didn't engage in whether the city's entire gun licensing law is constitutional or not. But it has been a target for gun owners over the years.
The court's entire ruling is here: www.dccourts.gov/sites/defaul...
Now I'm curious if the D.C. Council decides to write a law banning magazines with a much larger number of bullets.
This entire case is additionally interesting because last year the Trump administration said it believed that D.C.'s ban on large magazines was unconstitutional, reversing what the Biden administration has believed. I reported on that here: 51st.news/high-capacit...
Blackburne-Rigsby makes a point D.C. was making: If popularity is a standard to consider whether something can be banned or not, then gun manufacturers can rush a dangerous weapon to market and then say it can never be regulated because it's suddenly popular.
Now, there was a dissent from Chief Judge Anna Blackburne-Rigsby. She argues that regulating large magazines is within the U.S.'s historical tradition, and that the majority mistakenly says they can't be regulated because they are popular.
Interestingly, the two judges didn't rule out that D.C. could simply ban magazines that hold a very large number of bullets, say 30 or 50 or 100, and that might pass constitutional muster. But they said that was unrelated to D.C.'s impermissible law banning 10+ magazines.
The two D.C. judges that ruled in his favor, tossing out the city's ban on magazines that can hold more than 10 bullets, made somewhat clear that their hands were tied by Supreme Court rulings that make it much harder to justify many restrictions on guns.
The ruling arises from an arrest a few years ago of a D.C. man who was found with an unregistered gun and a magazine capable of holding more than 30 bullets. He challenged his conviction on Second Amendment grounds.
