January 6, 2025 • 42 mins
Boston, despite having the largest year-over-year decrease in traffic delay time for any city in the top 25 most congested American cities, ranks 4th in the U.S. for having the worst traffic congestion. This data comes from INRIX’s 2024 Global Traffic Scorecard. The report found Boston drivers lost 79 hours and $1,414 sitting in traffic, resulting in $2.7 billion lost city wide! Is there anything we can do to help alleviate congestion in Boston?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
It's Night's Side with Dan Ray. I'm telling you please,
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
All right, Well, a subject that we talk about often
is Boston traffic, and whenever there's a traffic report that
comes out that implicates Boston drivers problems for Boston drivers,
we like to talk about it. So the Boston Herald
Today interesting article by Grace Djakovic at Boston Herald dot
(00:29):
com says that Boston ranks fourth in the United States,
fourth worst in the United States, and twelfth in the world.
Twelfth worst in the world in terms of overall congestion.
Now in Boston, Boston typical driver lost eighty eight hours
(00:53):
to traffic throughout the year. This is an unbelievable amount
of time when you think about it. It also means
that when they lost eighty eight hours of time just
sitting in traffic, average speed of Boston's downtown driver is
thirteen miles an hour. Now, I know we're an old city.
(01:15):
I get all of that. I totally get all of that,
But this is crazy. We spent I think it was
twenty four billion dollars on the big dig back from
the late eighties through the nineties. Those of you who
weren't living here at the time, don't remember the inconvenience
of the big dig. But we were told, oh, when
(01:37):
the big dig is done, we're going to be just fine.
Well we're not. We're not just fine. In Boston, we
lost seventy nine Computing to the report found that Boston
drivers lost seventy nine hours. That's I mean, that's a
(02:00):
lot of time and and fourteen dollars sitting in traffic. Now,
this this is crazy. I was driving yesterday. I was
actually my wife was driving, and we were going down
(02:21):
Beacon Street. I try to avoid Beacon Street, all of
those streets whenever I can, put me on store drive
and let me get out of town. But my wife's
not a fan of store drive. So we were driving
down Beacon Street. Those of you who live in Boston,
no Beacon Street. So from Beacon Street and Charles Street
(02:44):
to Mass Avenue probably like two miles maybe tops two
and a half had to take us at least twenty minutes.
There are bike lanes all the way down on both
sides of the street, right side, left side. There are
parking lanes on both sides of the street on both
(03:07):
on the on the right side, I guess it's one
way street heading out bound, and basically we're down to
two lanes. It used to be three lanes on Beacon Street.
It was built as a y thoroughfare, Commonwealth Avenue, y thoroughfare,
and it's maddening. It's maddening because yesterday this was noontime
(03:29):
or show twelve thirty one o'clock, there was double park
People double parked and have banded their cars. So in
many areas of Beacon Street it was down to one
lane in traffic. There were I didn't see any police
cars out ticketing people. But now again I'm not looking
for people to be penalized, but when you lose, when
(03:53):
you have two bike lanes and then two sides of
the street for parking, you need parking. Living in the
back bay, and you're going to have double parking of
abandoned cars, SUVs, and for the most part you're down
to one lane. It took about twenty minutes to get
from Charles Street to Mass Avenue, which is insane. It's
(04:16):
absolutely insane. Now in New York they've come up with
congestion congestion pricing, and they had this funny phrase for it.
I think they call it What's the phrase they call
it congestion relief. They will have congestion relief by charging
(04:37):
you money if you want to be in Lower Manhattan
anywhere from the south side of Central Park south all
the way down through Soho and Wall Street nine dollars
for each car. This is insane. It is absolutely insane.
(04:59):
It is a continuing attack on automobile drivers. Uh, those
who are in power in major American cities want to
eliminate automobile traffic in their city. That's what it's all about.
And you can you can phrase it in terms of
climate change. What difference is that going to make? Not
(05:19):
going to make any difference at all, as long as
countries like Pakistan and India and trying to keep belching
stuff up into the atmosphere. Uh, the fact that that
you're going to be driving riding in the MBTA or
driving a tricycle to work, it won't make a difference. Yeah,
you can drive a tricycle. That that's they're allowed in
a bike lane. Let me go to Jim and Kansas City. Jim, welcome,
(05:41):
you are next on NIGHTSIDEM going to start us off
as our Jim gard ahead.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Dan, Hey, thanks for taking my call and then thinking
about this, since you talked about it on Friday night. Yeah, well,
I think the reason why we call it congestion relief
pricing is because if they call it, and if they
don't call it that, then it could be construed as
(06:07):
restricting people's rights under the first Article eighth section the
right to travel. It's it's it's not really a right
to travel. It's a right to have commerce or whatever,
but it's I mean, generally, I think it's it's viewed
as a right to be able to travel and unimpeded
(06:30):
from one municipality, one governments to another. And they say that.
So the only way they're going to get away with
it is if they say that they're trying to increase
people's ability to travel.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Rather than understand the point you're making. I think that
it's a tough point that you're trying to make legally.
Look right, do you.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
Think it's well, then do you think they should be
it's illegal under that? Under that, No, I don't think.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
You're going to win that argument because they're going to say, look,
we're not impeding people's right to travel. We're simply saying
that we need to regulate transportation within our community, and
if we in our community decide we want to have
do you know how much money they've spent on bike
lanes in Boston gym. Boston is on the same size
as a city as Kansas City. I mean, it's not
a huge metropolis. It's not New York, Chicago, Los Angeles.
(07:20):
Take a guest as to how much the city of
Boston has spent in the last couple of years on
bike lanes. Take a guess.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
I might I might have heard you say this before.
Fourteen million, one.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
Hundred and twenty one million dollars on bike lanes.
Speaker 3 (07:35):
Wow, that's a lot.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
Okay, yut, it's crazy, it's insane. And the number of
people who use bikes compared to the number of people
who use cars. We're an automotive society, but they want
us out of the cars. They want to make it
so expensive that people like you and me will say,
I give up, I'll take We call it the MBTA here.
(07:57):
I don't know what they call it in Kansas City,
but rapid transit, public transportation, or drive your bikes to work.
And every month somebody in Boston is killed riding a bike. Sad, horrible,
but you put people out of this sort of weather,
and you know, all all you need is one person
to make a bad decision and all of a sudden
(08:18):
they find themselves under a truck. It's but but they
could kill less. They could kill less about the lives
of bicyclists. They are only reacting to the bike lobby,
and which is, give us as many bike lanes as
you want, take, you know, take the roads away from
from drivers. Do you have bike lanes in Kansas City,
gym or no?
Speaker 3 (08:38):
They have a few of them, not very many. And
they don't have very many trains either. They have this
one train that they put kind of downtown and it's
a it's a big deal because it runs through places
where people used to park their cars. There's not very
much free parking either. There's parking, but so you have
to pay and then walk. And there's places where people
(09:01):
in high places used to park their cars, like right
in from a city hall, and that train runs right
path there now, so you can't park a car there.
And there was a big uproar, oh probably five years
ago about this real powerful city council person who insisted
on continuing to park a car there, and it turned
into a big fiasco.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Well, I don't mind seeing the politicians lose their parking spaces,
but really, you know, I mean, at least they're they're
giving up parking spaces in Kansas City. The city councils
in Boston they have nice underground parking and city Hall,
so they're taken care of. They don't have to want
a lot of thing.
Speaker 4 (09:41):
But I don't know, Oh, that's that's to me, that
that's one hope that you might have is to get
it struck down or prohib.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Well, you're you're a constitutional scholar. If you think that
that's if you can find some constitutional lawyer, good luck.
But like anything else, they're gonna say, Look, you could
make that same argument over parking meters. You could say, well,
parking meters tie up streets. This is a purely political
effort by a lot of the progressive city cities in America,
(10:14):
and Boston leads the way. If you get them in
Kansas City, stop them before they get going gym because
they know they want bike lanes everywhere everywhere. Trust me
on them. Okay, okay, they have some, but keep it
down to a minimum. Trust me, it's not worth it,
particularly in the city like Boston.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
There's one there's one place over here. There's a kind
of a street where it's it's kind of hard to explain,
but you have to unless you want to go way
out of your way, you have to take this street.
It's called in one place is called Truman, and then
it becomes I think something else, but end me a picture.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
So I it's tough to explain it on the radio. Gym.
I gotta run. I gotta break.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
There's a place where the road goes straight from two
lane so one lane, without almost no warning whatsoever, in
order to accommodate the bike lane.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
We got plenty of those in Boston. We got plenty
of those roads in Boston, Gym, trust me. Hey, I
gotta run, Jim, I gotta I got a commercial break.
I gotta get to Thank you much, appreciate you call.
We'll take a break. Six one, seven, two thirty, triple
eight nine two, nine, ten thirty. Are you looking forward
to congestion pricing in Boston? You know what that means.
It means that you and I will have to pay
nine bucks, ten bucks whatever just to drive for the
(11:27):
privilege of driving into the city. Uh. And all it
will mean is the only the uber wealthy, meaning those
who work in law firms and uh, they get their
their their vehicles, all their expenses are paid. The average person, uh,
and you know is gonna end up. They're forcing you
to ride in the MBTA, just like they're forcing you
(11:49):
in New York. We're gonna talk about congestion pricing. We
talked about it the other night. I want to continue
to talk about it tonight back on night Side six
one seven, two, five, four ten thirty six one seven, nine,
ten thirty. I'd love to hear from anyone in New York.
They had it yesterday and today was the first workday
of congestion pricing. I'm sure, I'm sure that New Yorkers
(12:11):
are the average person, the working people. They're the ones
who are really going to take it, take the brunt
of this, this this folly, nothing, nothing more than that.
Back on Nightside after.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
This, Now back to Dan ray Line from the Window
World night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
All right, we're talking about congestion pricing in New York City.
It's going to come to Boston, so be prepared. Let
me by the way, I just want to play a
little bit. This is Governor Hokel I said the other night,
has to be like the dumbest governor in America. But
she's trying to tell people it's going to cost the
(12:55):
average driver of an automobile nine dollars. Trucks will be more,
or SUVs, I think will be more. So this is
cut number thirty two, Rob. This is where she explains
how that charging you nine dollars a day to go
into New York City is actually going to save you
fifteen hundred dollars a year.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
And I'm proud to announce we have found a path
to find the MTA reduce congestion and keep millions of
dollars in the pockets of our commuters. Under this plan,
the MTA will can implement a congestion pricing plan with
a reduced daytime toll of nine dollars beginning in January.
(13:41):
You heard that correctly. It was fifteen dollars before and
now it is nine dollars.
Speaker 6 (13:47):
That is a forty percent reduction. This lower toll will
save daily commuters nearly fifteen hundred dollars annually, and that
kind of makes a big difference for our families.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
How stupid does she think the average New Yorker is
And if you're a New Yorker, how stupid. We were
gonna charge you fifteen a day, so now we're only
going to charge you nine. So you get a savings
there of forty percent. You're still out nine dollars a day,
but we're saving you fifteen hundred dollars a year. That
(14:27):
is just I mean, you talk about and when you
she has to be the most arrogant as well as
the dumbest governed in America. Six one, seven, nine, three, one,
ten thirty. That's the only line is open. Let me
go to Phil in Boston. I'll bet you Phil is
a little frustrated like myself.
Speaker 7 (14:47):
Then in this play, this is crazy. You mentioned that governor.
She may sound like we're paying fifty. They're paying fifteen
dollars already, so we're saving you six dollars and who's
gonna pay? Hey, how are they gonna pay it? I'm
so much gonna be coming off your little chess bitty
having a windshield.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Well, no, there's two ways. Here's how they're gonna get it. No,
two ways. One, if you are an easy pass person
and whatever they call the different states, it will just
click on to your monthly bill. But let's assume that
you're smart and you don't have an easy pass. You
got a license plate, they'll take a picture of your
license plate. They have all these they've spent millions of
(15:29):
dollars to put up all of these cameras, and you
know they've they could care less. But yeah, you know
it's jim. I'm I'm gonna stick you up with a
gun when I see you on the street, and I'm
gonna say, give me your wallet, and I'm gonna say, oh,
you got two hundred dollars in your wallet. Okay, I'm
gonna take one hundred and fifty dollars out of your wallet. Here,
(15:50):
you can keep fifty. So I've saved you by robbing you.
I've saved you one hundred and fifty dollars because it
could have been two hundred.
Speaker 7 (15:58):
Don't give any ideas. Then what happens if you have
to go in town and you pbably don't have the
answer to this, who does who? When you have to
go in towns that pick up someone in the city
hall would have pay a bill, then you have to
grow the new back end and pick up your daughter
or someone's friend, whatever, and.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Every every every time you go in.
Speaker 7 (16:20):
I can't even get my tax bill in the mill
because either it's gonna this is And you mentioned a
bike lane for bikes, and you mentioned a billion dollars
I have seen. The only things I see in the
bike lane is one gentleman with a little thing he
made up with a baby in the back that I
think it's crazy. And the rest of unicycles, uh mopens
(16:41):
and no helmets on. No, no, how are they gonna
get the plate? How is this? This is this? You're right,
they're trying to get us. They don't want to have
us all walking along with turkeys, and no one will
be able to drive.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Yeah, well that's the only people who will be able
to drive will be the uber wealthy who for them
nine dollars a day is like a.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Nickel right off or whatever.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
But I'll tell you, you keep electing the same politicians,
you're gonna get the same result. What do they say
if it's insanity? When you're doing the same thing over
and over again and you think to yourself that somehow
I'm going to get a different result. You know, you
beat your head against the wall, you have a headache,
You get up the next day, you beat yourself against
(17:29):
the wall, you have a headache. Keep going doing it
every day until you stop beating your head against the wall,
You're always gonna get headaches.
Speaker 7 (17:37):
Let me get this bully's bills? How can people survive
the tax? Bull of this and that the pizza coffee
is for? I mean it's crazy. I mean they keep
piling and olliver. They know we can pay. I think
we should go on Swike and don't no one drive
their car in a Boston within reason, you know, I mean,
is this crazy?
Speaker 2 (17:58):
They do not care? Uh, they do not care because
they think you're stupid. They think that you don't vote,
and they think that that people overall will just return them.
I've said, I've told you before. You go to the diner,
whether you're in Boston somewhere or you're in a suburb.
And every once in a while you're there and the
(18:20):
state rep comes by and pat you in the back.
He doesn't know you did. He gives you the big hey,
how you doing great to see you? Remember me? Come
to Alexandine Representative Smugsborg. Thank you very much? Now house
wife and kids? Oh you're not married. I'm sorry, I'm talking.
They think we're idiots.
Speaker 7 (18:39):
And thanks. I'm glad we agree on this, and then
maybe this might get the word out. It's it's got
a it's got the stop. Sweet. Oh you coun't even
get so much lemonade. I'm a lemon man.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
They could kill us. They could kill us. They they
will soak you until you're dead, okay, and they'll even
soak you after your dead. It's as simple as that,
because they got to keep the revenue coming in so
they can put their their their stupid brothers in law
on the payroll. What's going on? Thanks? Phil, talks talk soon.
You have a great one.
Speaker 7 (19:18):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Love your passion, man, love your passion. Coming back on Nightside,
I got Melissa and Oregon coming up, got Robert, Michael
and Maureen and I got room for you only line
open six one thirty. Will be right back on nightside.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
You're on night Side with Ray on Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Back to the phones. You're are going to go to
Melissa out in Oregon. Hey, Melissa, welcome. How many bike
lanes you got out there? Oh?
Speaker 8 (19:49):
Too many to count? Give a lot. And it's.
Speaker 4 (19:53):
And I'm a baker, you're important.
Speaker 8 (19:57):
Yeah, yeah, I actually live pretty close to the on
Town and there are these lanes that you stop a
little bit. All right, It's just it's I still can't
figure them out. So it's and I'm a biker and
I can't figure them out. And but my question to
you on the New York thing, and I've looked this up,
(20:19):
but I haven't been able to figure out an answer.
It sounded like the governor of New York said they
reduced it from fifteen. So was it already implemented au.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
No, no, no, no, no. They started oh yeah, oh yeah.
It was like, uh, well we're going to have this,
and they had some sort of a committee to come
up and said it we'll be fifteen dollars. Uh. And
so at that point the politician, the governor step say says, no,
I don't think it should be fifteen. Let's make it nine.
We're saving everybody six dollars. You were not saving anybody anything.
(20:54):
You're charging him nine dollars.
Speaker 8 (20:56):
It's exactly then the impact to live drivers, uber drivers's
going straight to the customer. And I'm curious how cabs,
you know, will they just stay within a certain zone,
because otherwise they're not going to want to leave the zone.
And then have to come back in and pay nine dollars.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Well, what it is, it's it's just anything south of
Central Park six sixtieth Street, So south of Central Park
all the way down you know, to to Soho and
Battery March or whatever. Yeah, so that's the place. I
(21:38):
just think what it's going to do anybody. First of all, look,
if you're uber wealthy and you can fly into New
York and you know, take a h an uber or
a limo and and you don't care what the cost is, great, great,
good luck. But if you're somebody from Boston who wanted
to drive down to the city, Boston's it's like four
(21:59):
hour drive from here. You're gonna drive down in the
city and pay one hundred dollars a night to park
your car, Pay five hundred dollars a night for some
fleabag hotel in New York City. I mean, give me
a break.
Speaker 8 (22:11):
Just mentioned you might not have a restaurant, sorry enough,
you might not have a restaurant to go to, because
that's going to be passed on to restaurants every time
they get a delivery to their location. So they may
not have any place to visit. They might have money
to go there. They might not have anything to visit,
and they might not have workers.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
And what they're saying is that the money will help
the the what they call the MTA, the Metro Transit
Authority or whatever is in New York. So yeah, take
the subway in New York, but watch your back because
someone might try to push you in front of an
oncoming train. And whatever you do, don't fall asleep because
(22:48):
someone might light you on fire.
Speaker 8 (22:50):
So and you know, so is your life worth nine dollars?
I mean, it's just it makes no sense. And you know,
one of the things that we have a very nice
metro system here, it's called TriMet and it's that they
do an excellent job with it and it does run
on time and all those and the buses are good here.
(23:12):
But I don't know that trains and buses and bike
lanes solve all problems. And it feels like the urban
planning folks they're focused on, I don't know what the
right way to say it is that they're they're just
missing the bigger picture and the costs are just killing people.
(23:34):
And it's just it's just something seems backwards.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
You know, how is Portland doing as a city a
couple of years ago. I mean they were in real
dire straits. They're homeless population, people setting up in people's backyards.
Is that you had police stations that were being burned
and people were protesting. I mean, Portland looked like like
a disaster area. Has there gotten any savory? Any better there?
Speaker 8 (24:00):
It has? I knew, you know. I lived here for
a long time and then I was away for about
four years, and I came back in May of twenty three,
and there were things that surprised me. I live about
a mile and a half from downtown in a very
quiet neighborhood, but there were things in my neighborhood that
I noticed had changed. They have started to clean up there.
(24:23):
The new mayor, things have changed.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
What they were. They had a mayor out there who
was a bit of a cuckle bird who I thought.
I think he was different.
Speaker 8 (24:35):
Yeah, cool, different, Yeah, I mean, hi, I like the
new gentleman. He wants city employees to come back to work,
and they're fighting him on. It's like, come on, you know,
get to work, you know. But I will say this,
it has cleaned up a lot. The other thing is,
(24:56):
and this is probably not politically correct, but I I
think it's something that should be said. I first moved
to Portland in two thousand and one. In Portland had
a homeless problem because of the weather, because of the services,
And you're gonna tell me it took the twenty nineteen
and twenty twenty to recognize there was a homeless problem.
(25:18):
So I think that's what bothers me. I will say
that I used to be someone, you know, that used
to walk by myself at eleven thirty twelve at night.
I don't do that anymore. I've curbed, you know, when
I feel that way when I'm in any city, I
think the city that And maybe this is just the
(25:39):
Portland and me talking. Seattle's dirty. Seattle doesn't feel the same.
You know, what is the statistics? I just heard they're
supposed to have two thousand people on their third shift,
and what did I hear? They might have eight hundred
or twelve hundred or something?
Speaker 4 (25:55):
So police, no police.
Speaker 8 (25:58):
Yeah, I spoke too quickly, but you know, and I
think that's what bothers me is that the most is
that Portland's always been a very clean city, and when
I came back, it didn't feel as clean. It felt,
you know, there's a lot of tagging, there's a lot
of buildings that it doesn't feel like people have taken
(26:21):
respect towards the city and the buildings. And I haven't
just seen that in Portland. I've seen it in Eugene.
I saw it in Chico, California, when I was there.
I saw it in Columbus, Ohio recently when I was there,
And it just feels like we've lost caring and feeding
of our cities, if that makes sense, our infrastructure. But
(26:42):
I'm biased again. I love Portland. I love being by
the ocean, I love being by mouth hoods. So maybe
I have a rosier view than what is really happening. Well,
and it has cleaned.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Up well, I hope it has for you. I mean,
they've had a lot of problems in that city over
the years, and uh, it used to be it used
to be a wonderful city. But everyone who I talked
to has has has a similar reaction as you do, Melissa.
Always great to hear your voice. Thank you. So we
(27:17):
count the days down to when the when the truck
leaves from Fenway Park, which is always early feeblies, so
it's even less. That's you're right, all right, thanks, Melissa,
talk soon. All right, let me keep rolling. You're going
to go to a Michael in Boston. Michael, you're next
on Nightsiger, righthead.
Speaker 4 (27:32):
Michael, Hi, Dan? How are you?
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I'm doing fun?
Speaker 4 (27:36):
How you should have told her we're four hundred short
on our police here in Boston too.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
I mean, oh, absolutely no. I was about to say that,
and I let and I let this slip at your
correct there's a lot of major cities that they can't
recruit police. Police used to be people wanted to be
police officers. But people don't want to be police officers anymore.
Speaker 4 (27:55):
Is that it or they don't want them?
Speaker 2 (27:59):
Well, I think that that there was a period of
time where a lot of police officers said I don't
need to deal with this aggravation anymore and left. And
I think the word came fourth. And I think that
a lot of young people say, I'll find another job
one it's dangerous. Uh, And you're not, don't You don't
(28:21):
have the respect that you used to have. They you
can listen to our station. They have ads now on
the station where they're talking about trying to get there.
There's a whole campaign going on by the city of
Boston to try to recruit police officers to get people.
I mean, I've never saw that before. It used to
be people would die and take the civil service test.
(28:44):
They don't do that anymore. It's it's as simple as
that's what's your taken? What's going on?
Speaker 4 (28:51):
I'm kind of confused. I heard about this yesterday on
your show, and I'm thinking in New York, if you
have a residence in the city. We're on West fifty
seventh Street. Let's say, and you commute to work, you
work in New Jersey, and you force us to come
home every night? Are you an exception or are you're
(29:13):
included in that?
Speaker 2 (29:14):
See, I have seen nothing to the effect. I have
seen nothing, and I've tried to read as much as
I could of exceptions. You know, you would think that
anyone who lived there. No, I can suggest that you
can go and look. Congestion they call it, by the way,
This is again one of those words I love, the
euphemism congestion relief zone total interest. Starting January fifth, twenty
(29:41):
twenty five, which is yesterday, vehicles will be told and
to congestion relief zone. The toll amount will depend on
the type of vehicle time of day, and whether any
crossing credits apply. I have no idea what crossing credits
are and the method of payment. There were also discounts
and exemptions that will apply to certain drivers or vehicles
entering the congestion release Zone using an Easy Past New
(30:03):
York account. But it just talks about the congestion relief
zone includes local streets and avenues in Manhattan south of An,
including sixtieth Street, which is the Subwits Central Park, excluding
the FDR Drive, West Side Highway, Route nine A and
Hugh Carry Tunnel connections to West Street. But I see
nothing about all it talks about. Oh, discounts and exemptions.
(30:26):
Here we go, discounts and exemptions. Discounts and exemption plans
are available for the congestion relief zone. A discount plan
is available for low income drivers, and exemption plans are
available for individuals with disabilities or organizations transporting people with disabilities,
emergency vehicles, buses and specialized government owned vehicles. Not a
(30:51):
mention of people who live. They assume everybody is wealthy
enough who live there.
Speaker 4 (30:57):
So do you think if this is done in Boston?
For example, I have a condo in Copley Square, and
I use my car very little, but when I use it,
one of the times I may use it, if not
to take a just to take a ride for the
day and then come back. But I'll take it for groceries.
(31:18):
I'll go to market Basket, which is outside of the city,
and I'll get groceries for myself and other people and
come back home. Yep, and say a fee. I guess so,
I guess so, yes, according to those well again you Boston.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
Boston can do it differently, but the bottom line is
the average. Can you imagine every person who has who
lives in the downtown area. If you have to have
an electrician or a plumber or someone come to your
home to do some work inside the home, that person
is going to be charged an additional fee that's going
to be passed on to you. These people are insane.
(31:58):
They're absolutely insane. They want to turn Boston and New
York into places where only the uber wealthy can live.
That's what their goal is.
Speaker 4 (32:09):
Well, coincidentally, I got my tax bill yesterday. Oh tell
me about that early tax bill which is due February first. Uh,
it's up thirty percent over last year. They did it
in two increments, so it's about five hundred a quarter
more than it was a year ago. So they went
(32:30):
up to last So give it up.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Give it. What were you paying in real estate taxes
in Boston last year overall?
Speaker 4 (32:36):
Roughly uh last year or last quarter? No, last year
last year about seven thousand.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Okay, And what will you be this year? What will
you be paid?
Speaker 4 (32:52):
This new bill is uh twenty two hundred for the quarter.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Times four is almost so your tax bill is going
to increase eighteen one hundred dollars. And you know on
a on the federal taxes are the tax deductions are
capped what they call the salt cap, at ten thousand dollars,
so you're gonna you know, you know, it used to
(33:22):
be that the amount of money that you would pay,
you know, to the state of Massachusetts along with your
real estate bill, uh, you know, could be taken as
a federal exemption. Now it's limited to ten thousand dollars.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
So yeah, it has been. But you can still take
the standard deduction. Thanks to Trump, that went way up.
So for most people it's worth taking just the standard.
You don't need that, that's fine, the standard that's almost
seventeen thousand.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
That's fine, you got it. You got it, Michael, I
let you run.
Speaker 4 (33:56):
Well, at what point I mean the tax rate went
up and the assessment went up with this bill? Yep,
I don't understand that.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Well keep well, just remember this. There's an election this year.
Keep it in mind.
Speaker 4 (34:09):
Oh yeah, but it doesn't do any good.
Speaker 2 (34:13):
Well, you know something, if you continue to believe that,
that's what they want you to believe. They want you
to believe that your vote doesn't matter, so you won't vote.
Your vote matters, everyone's vote.
Speaker 4 (34:23):
Your vote matters. But I think the only thing they're
going to listen to money talks. And I'm very tempted
to not pay this real estate bill and put a
letter in there. And if we all did that, we'd
get somewhere. You know.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
That's what the problem is. They might get you in
to court. They might get you to court. Be careful
of that.
Speaker 4 (34:42):
Break.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
We'll talk soon. Okay, thanks for calling. Good. We'll take
a quick break. Maureen is next that we got Matt,
and we may stay with this. At eleven, you will
decide and we may do something else. Coming back on
Night's side right after the break.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
Now back to Dan Ray Live from the Window World
Night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
By the way, I just got a text. Another high
school in Boston is being closed. A letter to the
Excel High School community. They will be closed. That school
will be closed. By the way, again, euphemisms given shifting circumstances.
I wanted to be sure you heard the news from
our team. On Wednesday, January twenty second, two thousand and five,
(35:30):
we will recommend next steps in implementing the long term
Facilities Plan to the Boston School Committee. This includes recommending
the closure of Excel High School at the end of
twenty twenty five twenty six school year. So once again,
another another Boston high school closing. We understand that news
(35:52):
of closures can bring a range of emotions for students, families,
and staff. We also know that these steps are necessary
to ensure that every student has a high quality seat
in each of our schools with high quality options close
to home. Yeah, it's all going to be wonderful unless
you happen to be a student there. Let me go
to Maureene and Cambridge. I had Marene welcome next on Nightside.
Speaker 9 (36:15):
Hi can even kenn, How are you.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
I'm doing fine? Little little wound up tonight because I
think the politicians think we're all stupid.
Speaker 9 (36:25):
Yeah, yeah, I kind of agree with that to a
certain extent. I was just always feeling that as a motorist,
my XI tax pays for the roads, repairs, whatever else,
that the bike should also pay a fee for using
(36:47):
the roads if they want to use it. As I
agree with you.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
No, I agree with you. But do you know how
much and maybe you're ware this maybe or not, do
you know how much Boston has spent developed putting bike
lanes in just Boston.
Speaker 9 (37:03):
I heard what you were saying earlier. Was it one
hundred and twenty.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
That's a lot. You can keep a lot of high schools.
You could keep a lot of high schools open for
that amount of money.
Speaker 9 (37:14):
Yes, you could, you could, definitely.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
But and Cambridge is no better. I mean you have
bike lanes Galord Cambridge, Well.
Speaker 9 (37:24):
Yeah, a lot of there's more bike lanes that are
taking away talking spaces for small businesses, and I know
that's happening in Boston as well, and it's that place
to park. So it's it's really it's a very difficult
situation which they do for the bikes, you know, for bikers.
(37:50):
But the only thing is when you throw in the
even the electric bikes, they go as fast as as
a car can.
Speaker 2 (37:59):
And the again, as long as long as they're a bike,
as long as they're bikes, they're all set. It's as
simple as that. Yeah, I mean, but again, bikes are
an effective political lobby. And the politicians vow to political lobbies.
The only people they don't vow to are residents and voters.
It's as simple as that. They they assume that that
(38:21):
that you will always be like a flock of sheep
and vote for them, and in most cases in Massachusetts,
that's what happens. So yes, anyway, good block and Cambridge
Marine run for city council. Over there, Come on, you
have you have a lot of common sense. Thanks Marin.
Happy New Year, you too. Gotta try to sneak to
(38:45):
in here if I can get Matt. Next, Matt, You're next,
night side, welcome.
Speaker 10 (38:50):
Hey man, Right back at you.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
You're in You're in Boston, right ahead.
Speaker 10 (38:59):
All right exactly, I'm in uh right brighton. So I
do have my own personal transportation, However, I personally found
it easier to use services like uber, Lyft.
Speaker 4 (39:16):
Et cetera.
Speaker 10 (39:18):
Now, while I was in Hold, I looked up in
New York, I looked up the gladia, and I looked
up the distance. Let's say to Fifth Avenue. It was
fifty right now, it was fifty five dollars, which is
a nine mile drive to do the same in Boston
about a nine mile drive to give or take to
(39:42):
go in Boston from Logan to Newbury Street, it was
twenty two dollars.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Yeah, and it's not and that's maybe about three miles
from Logan to Newbury Street.
Speaker 10 (39:57):
It was set on it was seven miles where I
put in.
Speaker 2 (40:01):
Okay, well, you didn't see that that long?
Speaker 10 (40:05):
Well, okay, so I guess my my point is that
there there there is an X like Sacks, and there
is absolutely how long I mean, I guess my question
would be how long has the mass passed? You know
that thing that you put on you if you don't
go through the tolls yourself? How long has that been in?
Speaker 4 (40:28):
It's been long, that.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
Easy pass for about fifteen years.
Speaker 4 (40:33):
Okay.
Speaker 10 (40:33):
So I was a little kid when that came around.
Speaker 11 (40:36):
Yeah, I would say that the parades.
Speaker 10 (40:40):
Of those I used to live down in Florida, and
when I would go through Miami, it would be four
dollars each time you would go through there, and I
thought there was in I thought there was yeah, incredible sports.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
It's you know, it's more expensive in Boston. It's only
going to get more expensive when they have congestion pricing. Matt,
I got to keep only want to try to get
one more in here before the break. Thank you was
always okay, talk soon, Thank you very much, Alex and
Millis Alice, you're gonna wrap the hour for us. What
can you do with about a minute.
Speaker 11 (41:08):
And a half, Dan, I was going to say where
I live in Miller's here. You know, our taxes went
up to but I try to avoid going into Boston.
Even when I had to have a procedure done and
it was at nass General on Fruit Street, I couldn't
believe the amount of construction that's going on over there.
I don't know how the people around that area function.
(41:31):
It's insane. And every time I go into Boston, when
if I have to go, there's a new building up,
you know, and the landscape has changed, and try to
find parking. So I avoid Boston, and it's you know, I.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
Think a lot of people. I think a lot of
people avoid Boston, and I think more and more people
are going to avoid Boston because it's more difficult to
get into, get out of, and it's more expensive. Parking
meters now, a quarter get you four minutes in Boston.
So if you if you're pumping quarters into a parking
meter in Boston, you've got to be very dexterous because
you've got to be able to get an hour. You
(42:08):
have to fire eight meters eight what's it? No, not,
what's it? It's fifteen. You got fifteen quarters to get
an hour four minutes an hour on Commonwealth Appen, you've
got to fire. By time you fire fifteen quarters into
the parking meter, you got to put a couple more
quarters in because it's taking you that long. It's nuts,
(42:29):
it's nuts.
Speaker 11 (42:30):
They have apps, but still it's very expensive.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
Yeah, a lot of people aren't familiar with apps, are
not as comfortable with apps and as as simple as that. Hey, Alex,
I sure change to hear, but I got you in
before the eleven o'clock news.
Speaker 11 (42:42):
Happy New Year, my friend, Happy new yea you also
Speaker 2 (42:45):
All right, talk to you soon coming back right after
the eleven If you want to continue to talk about this, great,
If not, I'm going to change topics back on night
side
It's Night's Side with Dan Ray. I'm telling you please,
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
All right, Well, a subject that we talk about often
is Boston traffic, and whenever there's a traffic report that
comes out that implicates Boston drivers problems for Boston drivers,
we like to talk about it. So the Boston Herald
Today interesting article by Grace Djakovic at Boston Herald dot
(00:29):
com says that Boston ranks fourth in the United States,
fourth worst in the United States, and twelfth in the world.
Twelfth worst in the world in terms of overall congestion.
Now in Boston, Boston typical driver lost eighty eight hours
(00:53):
to traffic throughout the year. This is an unbelievable amount
of time when you think about it. It also means
that when they lost eighty eight hours of time just
sitting in traffic, average speed of Boston's downtown driver is
thirteen miles an hour. Now, I know we're an old city.
(01:15):
I get all of that. I totally get all of that,
But this is crazy. We spent I think it was
twenty four billion dollars on the big dig back from
the late eighties through the nineties. Those of you who
weren't living here at the time, don't remember the inconvenience
of the big dig. But we were told, oh, when
(01:37):
the big dig is done, we're going to be just fine.
Well we're not. We're not just fine. In Boston, we
lost seventy nine Computing to the report found that Boston
drivers lost seventy nine hours. That's I mean, that's a
(02:00):
lot of time and and fourteen dollars sitting in traffic. Now,
this this is crazy. I was driving yesterday. I was
actually my wife was driving, and we were going down
(02:21):
Beacon Street. I try to avoid Beacon Street, all of
those streets whenever I can, put me on store drive
and let me get out of town. But my wife's
not a fan of store drive. So we were driving
down Beacon Street. Those of you who live in Boston,
no Beacon Street. So from Beacon Street and Charles Street
(02:44):
to Mass Avenue probably like two miles maybe tops two
and a half had to take us at least twenty minutes.
There are bike lanes all the way down on both
sides of the street, right side, left side. There are
parking lanes on both sides of the street on both
(03:07):
on the on the right side, I guess it's one
way street heading out bound, and basically we're down to
two lanes. It used to be three lanes on Beacon Street.
It was built as a y thoroughfare, Commonwealth Avenue, y thoroughfare,
and it's maddening. It's maddening because yesterday this was noontime
(03:29):
or show twelve thirty one o'clock, there was double park
People double parked and have banded their cars. So in
many areas of Beacon Street it was down to one
lane in traffic. There were I didn't see any police
cars out ticketing people. But now again I'm not looking
for people to be penalized, but when you lose, when
(03:53):
you have two bike lanes and then two sides of
the street for parking, you need parking. Living in the
back bay, and you're going to have double parking of
abandoned cars, SUVs, and for the most part you're down
to one lane. It took about twenty minutes to get
from Charles Street to Mass Avenue, which is insane. It's
(04:16):
absolutely insane. Now in New York they've come up with
congestion congestion pricing, and they had this funny phrase for it.
I think they call it What's the phrase they call
it congestion relief. They will have congestion relief by charging
(04:37):
you money if you want to be in Lower Manhattan
anywhere from the south side of Central Park south all
the way down through Soho and Wall Street nine dollars
for each car. This is insane. It is absolutely insane.
(04:59):
It is a continuing attack on automobile drivers. Uh, those
who are in power in major American cities want to
eliminate automobile traffic in their city. That's what it's all about.
And you can you can phrase it in terms of
climate change. What difference is that going to make? Not
(05:19):
going to make any difference at all, as long as
countries like Pakistan and India and trying to keep belching
stuff up into the atmosphere. Uh, the fact that that
you're going to be driving riding in the MBTA or
driving a tricycle to work, it won't make a difference. Yeah,
you can drive a tricycle. That that's they're allowed in
a bike lane. Let me go to Jim and Kansas City. Jim, welcome,
(05:41):
you are next on NIGHTSIDEM going to start us off
as our Jim gard ahead.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Dan, Hey, thanks for taking my call and then thinking
about this, since you talked about it on Friday night. Yeah, well,
I think the reason why we call it congestion relief
pricing is because if they call it, and if they
don't call it that, then it could be construed as
(06:07):
restricting people's rights under the first Article eighth section the
right to travel. It's it's it's not really a right
to travel. It's a right to have commerce or whatever,
but it's I mean, generally, I think it's it's viewed
as a right to be able to travel and unimpeded
(06:30):
from one municipality, one governments to another. And they say that.
So the only way they're going to get away with
it is if they say that they're trying to increase
people's ability to travel.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Rather than understand the point you're making. I think that
it's a tough point that you're trying to make legally.
Look right, do you.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
Think it's well, then do you think they should be
it's illegal under that? Under that, No, I don't think.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
You're going to win that argument because they're going to say, look,
we're not impeding people's right to travel. We're simply saying
that we need to regulate transportation within our community, and
if we in our community decide we want to have
do you know how much money they've spent on bike
lanes in Boston gym. Boston is on the same size
as a city as Kansas City. I mean, it's not
a huge metropolis. It's not New York, Chicago, Los Angeles.
(07:20):
Take a guest as to how much the city of
Boston has spent in the last couple of years on
bike lanes. Take a guess.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
I might I might have heard you say this before.
Fourteen million, one.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
Hundred and twenty one million dollars on bike lanes.
Speaker 3 (07:35):
Wow, that's a lot.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
Okay, yut, it's crazy, it's insane. And the number of
people who use bikes compared to the number of people
who use cars. We're an automotive society, but they want
us out of the cars. They want to make it
so expensive that people like you and me will say,
I give up, I'll take We call it the MBTA here.
(07:57):
I don't know what they call it in Kansas City,
but rapid transit, public transportation, or drive your bikes to work.
And every month somebody in Boston is killed riding a bike. Sad, horrible,
but you put people out of this sort of weather,
and you know, all all you need is one person
to make a bad decision and all of a sudden
(08:18):
they find themselves under a truck. It's but but they
could kill less. They could kill less about the lives
of bicyclists. They are only reacting to the bike lobby,
and which is, give us as many bike lanes as
you want, take, you know, take the roads away from
from drivers. Do you have bike lanes in Kansas City,
gym or no?
Speaker 3 (08:38):
They have a few of them, not very many. And
they don't have very many trains either. They have this
one train that they put kind of downtown and it's
a it's a big deal because it runs through places
where people used to park their cars. There's not very
much free parking either. There's parking, but so you have
to pay and then walk. And there's places where people
(09:01):
in high places used to park their cars, like right
in from a city hall, and that train runs right
path there now, so you can't park a car there.
And there was a big uproar, oh probably five years
ago about this real powerful city council person who insisted
on continuing to park a car there, and it turned
into a big fiasco.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Well, I don't mind seeing the politicians lose their parking spaces,
but really, you know, I mean, at least they're they're
giving up parking spaces in Kansas City. The city councils
in Boston they have nice underground parking and city Hall,
so they're taken care of. They don't have to want
a lot of thing.
Speaker 4 (09:41):
But I don't know, Oh, that's that's to me, that
that's one hope that you might have is to get
it struck down or prohib.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Well, you're you're a constitutional scholar. If you think that
that's if you can find some constitutional lawyer, good luck.
But like anything else, they're gonna say, Look, you could
make that same argument over parking meters. You could say, well,
parking meters tie up streets. This is a purely political
effort by a lot of the progressive city cities in America,
(10:14):
and Boston leads the way. If you get them in
Kansas City, stop them before they get going gym because
they know they want bike lanes everywhere everywhere. Trust me
on them. Okay, okay, they have some, but keep it
down to a minimum. Trust me, it's not worth it,
particularly in the city like Boston.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
There's one there's one place over here. There's a kind
of a street where it's it's kind of hard to explain,
but you have to unless you want to go way
out of your way, you have to take this street.
It's called in one place is called Truman, and then
it becomes I think something else, but end me a picture.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
So I it's tough to explain it on the radio. Gym.
I gotta run. I gotta break.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
There's a place where the road goes straight from two
lane so one lane, without almost no warning whatsoever, in
order to accommodate the bike lane.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
We got plenty of those in Boston. We got plenty
of those roads in Boston, Gym, trust me. Hey, I
gotta run, Jim, I gotta I got a commercial break.
I gotta get to Thank you much, appreciate you call.
We'll take a break. Six one, seven, two thirty, triple
eight nine two, nine, ten thirty. Are you looking forward
to congestion pricing in Boston? You know what that means.
It means that you and I will have to pay
nine bucks, ten bucks whatever just to drive for the
(11:27):
privilege of driving into the city. Uh. And all it
will mean is the only the uber wealthy, meaning those
who work in law firms and uh, they get their
their their vehicles, all their expenses are paid. The average person, uh,
and you know is gonna end up. They're forcing you
to ride in the MBTA, just like they're forcing you
(11:49):
in New York. We're gonna talk about congestion pricing. We
talked about it the other night. I want to continue
to talk about it tonight back on night Side six
one seven, two, five, four ten thirty six one seven, nine,
ten thirty. I'd love to hear from anyone in New York.
They had it yesterday and today was the first workday
of congestion pricing. I'm sure, I'm sure that New Yorkers
(12:11):
are the average person, the working people. They're the ones
who are really going to take it, take the brunt
of this, this this folly, nothing, nothing more than that.
Back on Nightside after.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
This, Now back to Dan ray Line from the Window
World night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
All right, we're talking about congestion pricing in New York City.
It's going to come to Boston, so be prepared. Let
me by the way, I just want to play a
little bit. This is Governor Hokel I said the other night,
has to be like the dumbest governor in America. But
she's trying to tell people it's going to cost the
(12:55):
average driver of an automobile nine dollars. Trucks will be more,
or SUVs, I think will be more. So this is
cut number thirty two, Rob. This is where she explains
how that charging you nine dollars a day to go
into New York City is actually going to save you
fifteen hundred dollars a year.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
And I'm proud to announce we have found a path
to find the MTA reduce congestion and keep millions of
dollars in the pockets of our commuters. Under this plan,
the MTA will can implement a congestion pricing plan with
a reduced daytime toll of nine dollars beginning in January.
(13:41):
You heard that correctly. It was fifteen dollars before and
now it is nine dollars.
Speaker 6 (13:47):
That is a forty percent reduction. This lower toll will
save daily commuters nearly fifteen hundred dollars annually, and that
kind of makes a big difference for our families.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
How stupid does she think the average New Yorker is
And if you're a New Yorker, how stupid. We were
gonna charge you fifteen a day, so now we're only
going to charge you nine. So you get a savings
there of forty percent. You're still out nine dollars a day,
but we're saving you fifteen hundred dollars a year. That
(14:27):
is just I mean, you talk about and when you
she has to be the most arrogant as well as
the dumbest governed in America. Six one, seven, nine, three, one,
ten thirty. That's the only line is open. Let me
go to Phil in Boston. I'll bet you Phil is
a little frustrated like myself.
Speaker 7 (14:47):
Then in this play, this is crazy. You mentioned that governor.
She may sound like we're paying fifty. They're paying fifteen
dollars already, so we're saving you six dollars and who's
gonna pay? Hey, how are they gonna pay it? I'm
so much gonna be coming off your little chess bitty
having a windshield.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Well, no, there's two ways. Here's how they're gonna get it. No,
two ways. One, if you are an easy pass person
and whatever they call the different states, it will just
click on to your monthly bill. But let's assume that
you're smart and you don't have an easy pass. You
got a license plate, they'll take a picture of your
license plate. They have all these they've spent millions of
(15:29):
dollars to put up all of these cameras, and you
know they've they could care less. But yeah, you know
it's jim. I'm I'm gonna stick you up with a
gun when I see you on the street, and I'm
gonna say, give me your wallet, and I'm gonna say, oh,
you got two hundred dollars in your wallet. Okay, I'm
gonna take one hundred and fifty dollars out of your wallet. Here,
(15:50):
you can keep fifty. So I've saved you by robbing you.
I've saved you one hundred and fifty dollars because it
could have been two hundred.
Speaker 7 (15:58):
Don't give any ideas. Then what happens if you have
to go in town and you pbably don't have the
answer to this, who does who? When you have to
go in towns that pick up someone in the city
hall would have pay a bill, then you have to
grow the new back end and pick up your daughter
or someone's friend, whatever, and.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Every every every time you go in.
Speaker 7 (16:20):
I can't even get my tax bill in the mill
because either it's gonna this is And you mentioned a
bike lane for bikes, and you mentioned a billion dollars
I have seen. The only things I see in the
bike lane is one gentleman with a little thing he
made up with a baby in the back that I
think it's crazy. And the rest of unicycles, uh mopens
(16:41):
and no helmets on. No, no, how are they gonna
get the plate? How is this? This is this? You're right,
they're trying to get us. They don't want to have
us all walking along with turkeys, and no one will
be able to drive.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Yeah, well that's the only people who will be able
to drive will be the uber wealthy who for them
nine dollars a day is like a.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Nickel right off or whatever.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
But I'll tell you, you keep electing the same politicians,
you're gonna get the same result. What do they say
if it's insanity? When you're doing the same thing over
and over again and you think to yourself that somehow
I'm going to get a different result. You know, you
beat your head against the wall, you have a headache,
You get up the next day, you beat yourself against
(17:29):
the wall, you have a headache. Keep going doing it
every day until you stop beating your head against the wall,
You're always gonna get headaches.
Speaker 7 (17:37):
Let me get this bully's bills? How can people survive
the tax? Bull of this and that the pizza coffee
is for? I mean it's crazy. I mean they keep
piling and olliver. They know we can pay. I think
we should go on Swike and don't no one drive
their car in a Boston within reason, you know, I mean,
is this crazy?
Speaker 2 (17:58):
They do not care? Uh, they do not care because
they think you're stupid. They think that you don't vote,
and they think that that people overall will just return them.
I've said, I've told you before. You go to the diner,
whether you're in Boston somewhere or you're in a suburb.
And every once in a while you're there and the
(18:20):
state rep comes by and pat you in the back.
He doesn't know you did. He gives you the big hey,
how you doing great to see you? Remember me? Come
to Alexandine Representative Smugsborg. Thank you very much? Now house
wife and kids? Oh you're not married. I'm sorry, I'm talking.
They think we're idiots.
Speaker 7 (18:39):
And thanks. I'm glad we agree on this, and then
maybe this might get the word out. It's it's got
a it's got the stop. Sweet. Oh you coun't even
get so much lemonade. I'm a lemon man.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
They could kill us. They could kill us. They they
will soak you until you're dead, okay, and they'll even
soak you after your dead. It's as simple as that,
because they got to keep the revenue coming in so
they can put their their their stupid brothers in law
on the payroll. What's going on? Thanks? Phil, talks talk soon.
You have a great one.
Speaker 7 (19:18):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Love your passion, man, love your passion. Coming back on Nightside,
I got Melissa and Oregon coming up, got Robert, Michael
and Maureen and I got room for you only line
open six one thirty. Will be right back on nightside.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
You're on night Side with Ray on Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Back to the phones. You're are going to go to
Melissa out in Oregon. Hey, Melissa, welcome. How many bike
lanes you got out there? Oh?
Speaker 8 (19:49):
Too many to count? Give a lot. And it's.
Speaker 4 (19:53):
And I'm a baker, you're important.
Speaker 8 (19:57):
Yeah, yeah, I actually live pretty close to the on
Town and there are these lanes that you stop a
little bit. All right, It's just it's I still can't
figure them out. So it's and I'm a biker and
I can't figure them out. And but my question to
you on the New York thing, and I've looked this up,
(20:19):
but I haven't been able to figure out an answer.
It sounded like the governor of New York said they
reduced it from fifteen. So was it already implemented au.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
No, no, no, no, no. They started oh yeah, oh yeah.
It was like, uh, well we're going to have this,
and they had some sort of a committee to come
up and said it we'll be fifteen dollars. Uh. And
so at that point the politician, the governor step say says, no,
I don't think it should be fifteen. Let's make it nine.
We're saving everybody six dollars. You were not saving anybody anything.
(20:54):
You're charging him nine dollars.
Speaker 8 (20:56):
It's exactly then the impact to live drivers, uber drivers's
going straight to the customer. And I'm curious how cabs,
you know, will they just stay within a certain zone,
because otherwise they're not going to want to leave the zone.
And then have to come back in and pay nine dollars.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Well, what it is, it's it's just anything south of
Central Park six sixtieth Street, So south of Central Park
all the way down you know, to to Soho and
Battery March or whatever. Yeah, so that's the place. I
(21:38):
just think what it's going to do anybody. First of all, look,
if you're uber wealthy and you can fly into New
York and you know, take a h an uber or
a limo and and you don't care what the cost is, great, great,
good luck. But if you're somebody from Boston who wanted
to drive down to the city, Boston's it's like four
(21:59):
hour drive from here. You're gonna drive down in the
city and pay one hundred dollars a night to park
your car, Pay five hundred dollars a night for some
fleabag hotel in New York City. I mean, give me
a break.
Speaker 8 (22:11):
Just mentioned you might not have a restaurant, sorry enough,
you might not have a restaurant to go to, because
that's going to be passed on to restaurants every time
they get a delivery to their location. So they may
not have any place to visit. They might have money
to go there. They might not have anything to visit,
and they might not have workers.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
And what they're saying is that the money will help
the the what they call the MTA, the Metro Transit
Authority or whatever is in New York. So yeah, take
the subway in New York, but watch your back because
someone might try to push you in front of an
oncoming train. And whatever you do, don't fall asleep because
(22:48):
someone might light you on fire.
Speaker 8 (22:50):
So and you know, so is your life worth nine dollars?
I mean, it's just it makes no sense. And you know,
one of the things that we have a very nice
metro system here, it's called TriMet and it's that they
do an excellent job with it and it does run
on time and all those and the buses are good here.
(23:12):
But I don't know that trains and buses and bike
lanes solve all problems. And it feels like the urban
planning folks they're focused on, I don't know what the
right way to say it is that they're they're just
missing the bigger picture and the costs are just killing people.
(23:34):
And it's just it's just something seems backwards.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
You know, how is Portland doing as a city a
couple of years ago. I mean they were in real
dire straits. They're homeless population, people setting up in people's backyards.
Is that you had police stations that were being burned
and people were protesting. I mean, Portland looked like like
a disaster area. Has there gotten any savory? Any better there?
Speaker 8 (24:00):
It has? I knew, you know. I lived here for
a long time and then I was away for about
four years, and I came back in May of twenty three,
and there were things that surprised me. I live about
a mile and a half from downtown in a very
quiet neighborhood, but there were things in my neighborhood that
I noticed had changed. They have started to clean up there.
(24:23):
The new mayor, things have changed.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
What they were. They had a mayor out there who
was a bit of a cuckle bird who I thought.
I think he was different.
Speaker 8 (24:35):
Yeah, cool, different, Yeah, I mean, hi, I like the
new gentleman. He wants city employees to come back to work,
and they're fighting him on. It's like, come on, you know,
get to work, you know. But I will say this,
it has cleaned up a lot. The other thing is,
(24:56):
and this is probably not politically correct, but I I
think it's something that should be said. I first moved
to Portland in two thousand and one. In Portland had
a homeless problem because of the weather, because of the services,
And you're gonna tell me it took the twenty nineteen
and twenty twenty to recognize there was a homeless problem.
(25:18):
So I think that's what bothers me. I will say
that I used to be someone, you know, that used
to walk by myself at eleven thirty twelve at night.
I don't do that anymore. I've curbed, you know, when
I feel that way when I'm in any city, I
think the city that And maybe this is just the
(25:39):
Portland and me talking. Seattle's dirty. Seattle doesn't feel the same.
You know, what is the statistics? I just heard they're
supposed to have two thousand people on their third shift,
and what did I hear? They might have eight hundred
or twelve hundred or something?
Speaker 4 (25:55):
So police, no police.
Speaker 8 (25:58):
Yeah, I spoke too quickly, but you know, and I
think that's what bothers me is that the most is
that Portland's always been a very clean city, and when
I came back, it didn't feel as clean. It felt,
you know, there's a lot of tagging, there's a lot
of buildings that it doesn't feel like people have taken
(26:21):
respect towards the city and the buildings. And I haven't
just seen that in Portland. I've seen it in Eugene.
I saw it in Chico, California, when I was there.
I saw it in Columbus, Ohio recently when I was there,
And it just feels like we've lost caring and feeding
of our cities, if that makes sense, our infrastructure. But
(26:42):
I'm biased again. I love Portland. I love being by
the ocean, I love being by mouth hoods. So maybe
I have a rosier view than what is really happening. Well,
and it has cleaned.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Up well, I hope it has for you. I mean,
they've had a lot of problems in that city over
the years, and uh, it used to be it used
to be a wonderful city. But everyone who I talked
to has has has a similar reaction as you do, Melissa.
Always great to hear your voice. Thank you. So we
(27:17):
count the days down to when the when the truck
leaves from Fenway Park, which is always early feeblies, so
it's even less. That's you're right, all right, thanks, Melissa,
talk soon. All right, let me keep rolling. You're going
to go to a Michael in Boston. Michael, you're next
on Nightsiger, righthead.
Speaker 4 (27:32):
Michael, Hi, Dan? How are you?
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I'm doing fun?
Speaker 4 (27:36):
How you should have told her we're four hundred short
on our police here in Boston too.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
I mean, oh, absolutely no. I was about to say that,
and I let and I let this slip at your
correct there's a lot of major cities that they can't
recruit police. Police used to be people wanted to be
police officers. But people don't want to be police officers anymore.
Speaker 4 (27:55):
Is that it or they don't want them?
Speaker 2 (27:59):
Well, I think that that there was a period of
time where a lot of police officers said I don't
need to deal with this aggravation anymore and left. And
I think the word came fourth. And I think that
a lot of young people say, I'll find another job
one it's dangerous. Uh, And you're not, don't You don't
(28:21):
have the respect that you used to have. They you
can listen to our station. They have ads now on
the station where they're talking about trying to get there.
There's a whole campaign going on by the city of
Boston to try to recruit police officers to get people.
I mean, I've never saw that before. It used to
be people would die and take the civil service test.
(28:44):
They don't do that anymore. It's it's as simple as
that's what's your taken? What's going on?
Speaker 4 (28:51):
I'm kind of confused. I heard about this yesterday on
your show, and I'm thinking in New York, if you
have a residence in the city. We're on West fifty
seventh Street. Let's say, and you commute to work, you
work in New Jersey, and you force us to come
home every night? Are you an exception or are you're
(29:13):
included in that?
Speaker 2 (29:14):
See, I have seen nothing to the effect. I have
seen nothing, and I've tried to read as much as
I could of exceptions. You know, you would think that
anyone who lived there. No, I can suggest that you
can go and look. Congestion they call it, by the way,
This is again one of those words I love, the
euphemism congestion relief zone total interest. Starting January fifth, twenty
(29:41):
twenty five, which is yesterday, vehicles will be told and
to congestion relief zone. The toll amount will depend on
the type of vehicle time of day, and whether any
crossing credits apply. I have no idea what crossing credits
are and the method of payment. There were also discounts
and exemptions that will apply to certain drivers or vehicles
entering the congestion release Zone using an Easy Past New
(30:03):
York account. But it just talks about the congestion relief
zone includes local streets and avenues in Manhattan south of An,
including sixtieth Street, which is the Subwits Central Park, excluding
the FDR Drive, West Side Highway, Route nine A and
Hugh Carry Tunnel connections to West Street. But I see
nothing about all it talks about. Oh, discounts and exemptions.
(30:26):
Here we go, discounts and exemptions. Discounts and exemption plans
are available for the congestion relief zone. A discount plan
is available for low income drivers, and exemption plans are
available for individuals with disabilities or organizations transporting people with disabilities,
emergency vehicles, buses and specialized government owned vehicles. Not a
(30:51):
mention of people who live. They assume everybody is wealthy
enough who live there.
Speaker 4 (30:57):
So do you think if this is done in Boston?
For example, I have a condo in Copley Square, and
I use my car very little, but when I use it,
one of the times I may use it, if not
to take a just to take a ride for the
day and then come back. But I'll take it for groceries.
(31:18):
I'll go to market Basket, which is outside of the city,
and I'll get groceries for myself and other people and
come back home. Yep, and say a fee. I guess so,
I guess so, yes, according to those well again you Boston.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
Boston can do it differently, but the bottom line is
the average. Can you imagine every person who has who
lives in the downtown area. If you have to have
an electrician or a plumber or someone come to your
home to do some work inside the home, that person
is going to be charged an additional fee that's going
to be passed on to you. These people are insane.
(31:58):
They're absolutely insane. They want to turn Boston and New
York into places where only the uber wealthy can live.
That's what their goal is.
Speaker 4 (32:09):
Well, coincidentally, I got my tax bill yesterday. Oh tell
me about that early tax bill which is due February first. Uh,
it's up thirty percent over last year. They did it
in two increments, so it's about five hundred a quarter
more than it was a year ago. So they went
(32:30):
up to last So give it up.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Give it. What were you paying in real estate taxes
in Boston last year overall?
Speaker 4 (32:36):
Roughly uh last year or last quarter? No, last year
last year about seven thousand.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Okay, And what will you be this year? What will
you be paid?
Speaker 4 (32:52):
This new bill is uh twenty two hundred for the quarter.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Times four is almost so your tax bill is going
to increase eighteen one hundred dollars. And you know on
a on the federal taxes are the tax deductions are
capped what they call the salt cap, at ten thousand dollars,
so you're gonna you know, you know, it used to
(33:22):
be that the amount of money that you would pay,
you know, to the state of Massachusetts along with your
real estate bill, uh, you know, could be taken as
a federal exemption. Now it's limited to ten thousand dollars.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
So yeah, it has been. But you can still take
the standard deduction. Thanks to Trump, that went way up.
So for most people it's worth taking just the standard.
You don't need that, that's fine, the standard that's almost
seventeen thousand.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
That's fine, you got it. You got it, Michael, I
let you run.
Speaker 4 (33:56):
Well, at what point I mean the tax rate went
up and the assessment went up with this bill? Yep,
I don't understand that.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Well keep well, just remember this. There's an election this year.
Keep it in mind.
Speaker 4 (34:09):
Oh yeah, but it doesn't do any good.
Speaker 2 (34:13):
Well, you know something, if you continue to believe that,
that's what they want you to believe. They want you
to believe that your vote doesn't matter, so you won't vote.
Your vote matters, everyone's vote.
Speaker 4 (34:23):
Your vote matters. But I think the only thing they're
going to listen to money talks. And I'm very tempted
to not pay this real estate bill and put a
letter in there. And if we all did that, we'd
get somewhere. You know.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
That's what the problem is. They might get you in
to court. They might get you to court. Be careful
of that.
Speaker 4 (34:42):
Break.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
We'll talk soon. Okay, thanks for calling. Good. We'll take
a quick break. Maureen is next that we got Matt,
and we may stay with this. At eleven, you will
decide and we may do something else. Coming back on
Night's side right after the break.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
Now back to Dan Ray Live from the Window World
Night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
By the way, I just got a text. Another high
school in Boston is being closed. A letter to the
Excel High School community. They will be closed. That school
will be closed. By the way, again, euphemisms given shifting circumstances.
I wanted to be sure you heard the news from
our team. On Wednesday, January twenty second, two thousand and five,
(35:30):
we will recommend next steps in implementing the long term
Facilities Plan to the Boston School Committee. This includes recommending
the closure of Excel High School at the end of
twenty twenty five twenty six school year. So once again,
another another Boston high school closing. We understand that news
(35:52):
of closures can bring a range of emotions for students, families,
and staff. We also know that these steps are necessary
to ensure that every student has a high quality seat
in each of our schools with high quality options close
to home. Yeah, it's all going to be wonderful unless
you happen to be a student there. Let me go
to Maureene and Cambridge. I had Marene welcome next on Nightside.
Speaker 9 (36:15):
Hi can even kenn, How are you.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
I'm doing fine? Little little wound up tonight because I
think the politicians think we're all stupid.
Speaker 9 (36:25):
Yeah, yeah, I kind of agree with that to a
certain extent. I was just always feeling that as a motorist,
my XI tax pays for the roads, repairs, whatever else,
that the bike should also pay a fee for using
(36:47):
the roads if they want to use it. As I
agree with you.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
No, I agree with you. But do you know how
much and maybe you're ware this maybe or not, do
you know how much Boston has spent developed putting bike
lanes in just Boston.
Speaker 9 (37:03):
I heard what you were saying earlier. Was it one
hundred and twenty.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
That's a lot. You can keep a lot of high schools.
You could keep a lot of high schools open for
that amount of money.
Speaker 9 (37:14):
Yes, you could, you could, definitely.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
But and Cambridge is no better. I mean you have
bike lanes Galord Cambridge, Well.
Speaker 9 (37:24):
Yeah, a lot of there's more bike lanes that are
taking away talking spaces for small businesses, and I know
that's happening in Boston as well, and it's that place
to park. So it's it's really it's a very difficult
situation which they do for the bikes, you know, for bikers.
(37:50):
But the only thing is when you throw in the
even the electric bikes, they go as fast as as
a car can.
Speaker 2 (37:59):
And the again, as long as long as they're a bike,
as long as they're bikes, they're all set. It's as
simple as that. Yeah, I mean, but again, bikes are
an effective political lobby. And the politicians vow to political lobbies.
The only people they don't vow to are residents and voters.
It's as simple as that. They they assume that that
(38:21):
that you will always be like a flock of sheep
and vote for them, and in most cases in Massachusetts,
that's what happens. So yes, anyway, good block and Cambridge
Marine run for city council. Over there, Come on, you
have you have a lot of common sense. Thanks Marin.
Happy New Year, you too. Gotta try to sneak to
(38:45):
in here if I can get Matt. Next, Matt, You're next,
night side, welcome.
Speaker 10 (38:50):
Hey man, Right back at you.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
You're in You're in Boston, right ahead.
Speaker 10 (38:59):
All right exactly, I'm in uh right brighton. So I
do have my own personal transportation, However, I personally found
it easier to use services like uber, Lyft.
Speaker 4 (39:16):
Et cetera.
Speaker 10 (39:18):
Now, while I was in Hold, I looked up in
New York, I looked up the gladia, and I looked
up the distance. Let's say to Fifth Avenue. It was
fifty right now, it was fifty five dollars, which is
a nine mile drive to do the same in Boston
about a nine mile drive to give or take to
(39:42):
go in Boston from Logan to Newbury Street, it was
twenty two dollars.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Yeah, and it's not and that's maybe about three miles
from Logan to Newbury Street.
Speaker 10 (39:57):
It was set on it was seven miles where I
put in.
Speaker 2 (40:01):
Okay, well, you didn't see that that long?
Speaker 10 (40:05):
Well, okay, so I guess my my point is that
there there there is an X like Sacks, and there
is absolutely how long I mean, I guess my question
would be how long has the mass passed? You know
that thing that you put on you if you don't
go through the tolls yourself? How long has that been in?
Speaker 4 (40:28):
It's been long, that.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
Easy pass for about fifteen years.
Speaker 4 (40:33):
Okay.
Speaker 10 (40:33):
So I was a little kid when that came around.
Speaker 11 (40:36):
Yeah, I would say that the parades.
Speaker 10 (40:40):
Of those I used to live down in Florida, and
when I would go through Miami, it would be four
dollars each time you would go through there, and I
thought there was in I thought there was yeah, incredible sports.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
It's you know, it's more expensive in Boston. It's only
going to get more expensive when they have congestion pricing. Matt,
I got to keep only want to try to get
one more in here before the break. Thank you was
always okay, talk soon, Thank you very much, Alex and
Millis Alice, you're gonna wrap the hour for us. What
can you do with about a minute.
Speaker 11 (41:08):
And a half, Dan, I was going to say where
I live in Miller's here. You know, our taxes went
up to but I try to avoid going into Boston.
Even when I had to have a procedure done and
it was at nass General on Fruit Street, I couldn't
believe the amount of construction that's going on over there.
I don't know how the people around that area function.
(41:31):
It's insane. And every time I go into Boston, when
if I have to go, there's a new building up,
you know, and the landscape has changed, and try to
find parking. So I avoid Boston, and it's you know, I.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
Think a lot of people. I think a lot of
people avoid Boston, and I think more and more people
are going to avoid Boston because it's more difficult to
get into, get out of, and it's more expensive. Parking
meters now, a quarter get you four minutes in Boston.
So if you if you're pumping quarters into a parking
meter in Boston, you've got to be very dexterous because
you've got to be able to get an hour. You
(42:08):
have to fire eight meters eight what's it? No, not,
what's it? It's fifteen. You got fifteen quarters to get
an hour four minutes an hour on Commonwealth Appen, you've
got to fire. By time you fire fifteen quarters into
the parking meter, you got to put a couple more
quarters in because it's taking you that long. It's nuts,
(42:29):
it's nuts.
Speaker 11 (42:30):
They have apps, but still it's very expensive.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
Yeah, a lot of people aren't familiar with apps, are
not as comfortable with apps and as as simple as that. Hey, Alex,
I sure change to hear, but I got you in
before the eleven o'clock news.
Speaker 11 (42:42):
Happy New Year, my friend, Happy new yea you also
Speaker 2 (42:45):
All right, talk to you soon coming back right after
the eleven If you want to continue to talk about this, great,
If not, I'm going to change topics back on night
side
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