metro
Published December 16, 2023, 5:43 p.m. ET
An MTA sweep this week seized 44 vehicles belonging to persistent toll evaders who owed nearly $1 million in unpaid fees and fines, officials said.
“This is about fundamental justice,” MTA Chairman Janno Lieber told reporters Friday.
“It’s not right for motorists, some of whom drive Mercedes and Porsches, to come onto our bridges and through tunnels and avoid paying thousands of dollars in tolls.”
The four-day raid on the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge, which connects Staten Island and Brooklyn, resulted in the seizure of everything from a white BMW SUV and a black Mercedes sedan to a private hauler's garbage truck.
“There’s a Range Rover back there and the guy owes $50,000,” Lieber said.
MTA officers stopped this vehicle on the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge on Friday after a license plate reader identified it as a persistent toll violator. Marc A. Hermann / MTA
All vehicles carried fake foreign license plates, which New York's cashless tolling system cannot detect, or legitimate license plates disguised by plastic covers that thwart toll cameras.
MTA Chairman Janno Lieber showed examples of fake paper license plates at a news conference Friday. Marc A. Hermann / MTA
The 44 accused scofflaws owe the MTA a total of $922,500 — a fraction of the $46 million in revenue the MTA estimates was lost to toll evasion in 2022.
It turned out that some of the people caught in the dragnet were uninsured or were driving with a suspended license.
Vehicles affected by the MTA toll raid will be stored under the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge until tolls and fines are repaid. Marc A. Hermann / MTA
The vehicles were impounded and the cars' registrations were suspended until their owners reached an agreement, officials said.
Law enforcement officials from the MTA, NYPD and New York State Police have interdicted 2,705 vehicles for toll evasion this year – a 50% increase from 2022 – as the transit agency struggles to close a gaping budget gap it says justifies a controversial new congestion pricing system.
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