New York Idles on Green Transportation Plan

As the state has backpedaled on congestion pricing, it has idled on other policies the climate scoping plan urged to clean up the transportation sector.

The Department of Environmental Conservation has not required certain trucks to be zero-emissions. The Department of State has not updated the manuals that cities use for street design. And the state legislature has not taken any of the actions that the scoping plan pushed it to. Most haven’t even been introduced as legislation.

In total, New York Focus reviewed 35 transportation policy prescriptions laid out in the scoping plan. Only one has been completed. Just over half have seen some signs of progress, ranging from lawmakers introducing (but not passing) bills to agencies administering small grants.

The rest have yet to see any meaningful action. State agencies and lawmakers have especially dragged their feet on a key component of the state’s decarbonization plan: efforts to reduce driving.

The state has made some headway on transportation electrification, as Hochul’s office highlighted in a statement.

“Governor Hochul is committed to reducing emissions from the transportation sector which is why she’s made nation-leading commitments to deploy electric school buses and zero emissions passenger vehicles across the state and is investing more than $1 billion in electric vehicle infrastructure,” a spokesperson told New York Focus.

But that leaves a lot more work to do. Transportation is still one of New York’s top sources of emissions, and the climate plan aims to cut those emissions by 30 percent by 2030. So far, there are few signs that the state is on track.

A big chunk of the scoping plan’s recommendations revolves around electrifying cars, trucks, and buses. Regulators have taken one key step toward that end: requiring that by 2035, all new cars and light-duty trucks sold in the state must be electric. The requirements gradually ramp up to that goal, starting with 35 percent of new car sales in 2026. But as of now, the figure stands at just 6 percent, according to the think tank International Council on Clean Transportation.

The state has also long promised to get 850,000 electric vehicles on the road by 2025, but it’s woefully behind. Currently, New York is just 15 percent of the way there, according to state data.

Aside from the 2035 clean cars rule, state agencies have yet to fully tackle any of the transportation items in the climate plan.

The legislature has not seized on them, either. About 10 of the to-dos New York Focus identified — many of which also appear in a tracker compiled by the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law — fall in its court, and so far, only a few have even been proposed as legislation.

The scoping plan recommends that lawmakers fund “car-free streets” and require state contractors to use more electric vehicles, for example — but no one has introduced bills to do either.

Beyond the federal grant application, the Department of State touted its “significant progress” in implementing smart growth items in the plan through initiatives like the Smart Growth Planning and Zoning program, which this year is offering $2 million in grants to local governments.

Most of the climate plan’s specific prescriptions for promoting smart growth, though, are still pending. They hinge in part on updating an existing law on the topic, a process that requires action from the legislature. No lawmaker has proposed such amendments yet.

The broader push to shift modes of transportation has likewise been slow to gain steam in the legislature, but it is starting. One bill introduced last year directly picks up a recommendation from the climate plan: creating a vehicle weight fee, designed to discourage sales of gas-guzzling SUVs. But the bill remains stuck in committee.

Senate transportation committee chair Jeremy Cooney did not directly answer questions about why the legislature hasn’t taken up more climate plan items, but he indicated that the committee would evaluate them ahead of next year’s legislative session. His Assembly counterpart, William Magnarelli, did not respond to inquiries.

The bill’s Assembly sponsor, Karen McMahon, represents the suburbs of Buffalo, on the opposite end of the state.

“Buffalo used to be a city that had great public transportation, back when, like, my parents were kids. There were electric streetcars all over the city,” she said. “Then the automobile took hold, and it kind of changed everything up here.”

Now, it can be a pain for her just to get to Albany without a car, she said, even though it’s a straight shot on Amtrak. The passenger rail line shares its tracks with the freight network, which gets the right of way, causing regular delays. McMahon hopes that steering more resources away from highways could improve intercity transit, too.

The Senate’s secretive working rules group considered the VMT reduction bill in the final weeks of session, according to an agenda obtained by New York Focus. But it ultimately remained stuck in committee.

Reynolds, of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, said it wasn’t surprising that such efforts to reduce car dependence haven’t taken off yet.

“If you’re talking about VMT, I think it’s a new issue, it’s new language that people are needing to absorb and understand. And that takes time,” she said.