Motorists upset about price increases as high as 110 percent in municipal garages should consider hopping the subway, a Department of Transportation official said yesterday at a City Council hearing on parking.
“Luckily for us we have a wonderful transportation system and less than 50 percent of people own cars,” assistant DOT commissioner Kate Slevin said when asked about the onerous increases.
“So there’s a lot of options.”
To which City Councilman James Vacca — chair of the council’s Transportation Committee — said, “I hate to break to DOT that some people — who don’t live in Manhattan especially — need a car.”
Slevin also admitted that DOT goofed in sending out letters to customers at city-operated garages telling them the price increases were okay’ed by the City Council and will go into effect in January.
In reality, the City Council — which has no authority on the pricing in the garages — had nothing to do with the hikes.
Also, the hikes will likely go into effect in February, not January.
“I’m not going to have my fellow members on the hook for this,” Vacca said.
“These increases are going to effect the lives of many people who can barely make ends meet.”
The DOT made the same mistake last year, he said.
Slevin said the city chose to hike prices on city garages to be more in line with private competitors.
All of the garages are priced differently depending on location.
A municipal garage on White Plains Road in the Bronx will see an increase from $165 every three months to $350.
That amounts to an extra $740 a year.