Considering how fraught it is whenever someone suggests that Long Island could learn something from New York City, it\u2019s fitting that the dividing line between the two localities would be a bumpy road.<\/p>\n
The New Year brought with it two very different stories about the progress, or lack thereof, made in addressing deadly crashes in the region. In Nassau County, traffic fatalities rose<\/a>\u00a0from 67 in 2024 to at least 78 last year \u2014 the highest since 2022, according to data from Newsday\u2019s fatality tracker.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, New York City last week reported a 16% decline in traffic deaths, from 253 in 2024 to 205 last year \u2014 the lowest in recorded history<\/a>. Crashes had already been trending downward since the city\u2019s adoption of its “Vision Zero” initiative in 2014, and fell further with the advent of congestion pricing, which reduced the number of cars entering Manhattan by 73,000 each day since\u00a0launching one year ago<\/a>, according to officials.<\/p>\n Kate Slevin, executive vice president of the Regional Plan Association, believes\u00a0Long Island officials could stand to learn some lessons from their neighbor to the west.<\/p>\n “If you are able to reduce traffic, you tend to get better public health and less crashes,” he said.\u00a0“So I guess what Long Island can learn is to continue efforts to bring traffic down.”<\/p>\n Lest anyone panic over the notion of New York City\u2019s congestion zone being expanded to the 516 area code, Slevin said that effectively reducing traffic is as much about carrots as it is about sticks.<\/p>\n “It\u2019s about providing better options, investing in downtowns, in walkable areas, investing in areas near transit<\/a>, so new housing and new development can go in places where people are less likely to have to use a car for every trip,” Slevin said. “There are a lot of different strategies that go into reducing traffic and making communities safer and more livable.”<\/p>\n While New York City\u2019s congestion pricing model may not be a good fit for Nassau or Suffolk, Slevin said that the concept of charging vehicles for driving on public roads \u2014 like the New York State Thruway or New Jersey Turnpike \u2014 should not be ruled out as part of a broader effort to address traffic on Long Island<\/a> in the future.<\/p>\n “Our roads and highways are scare resources, and right now there\u2019s too many people using them at the same time … So, in the future, if there was an interest in managing congestion, that is one thing that could be looked at,” said Slevin, adding that any tolling plan would have to come with improved transit options. “You can\u2019t just do that in a vacuum. You have to give people other options to get around.”<\/p>\n Readers speak up<\/p>\n
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