It's the Brian Laird Show on WNYC.

Welcome back, everybody.

I'm Kusha Navadar filling in for Brian, who is on vacation this week.

Up next, we're turning to some local transit news.

Construction on the new 2nd Avenue subway extension is back in business.

The project is one of many that was halted when Governor Kathy Hokel indefinitely paused the much-aw-aw-ated but controversial congestion pricing program back in June.

But Hockel announced last week that she managed to squeeze $54 million in state funding

to continue work on the project and bring the line further uptown.

Phase one of the 2nd Avenue subway opened in 2017, and it was the result of a decades-long

effort to bring better public transit to historically underserved communities like East Harlem.

But so far, it only extends up to 96th Street.

And just to jog our memories, congestion pricing is a program that would have charged all

vehicles a $15

base fee to drive below 60th Street in Manhattan.

When Hockel indefinitely paused the program, which was supposed to take effect in July,

there were more than $16 billion worth of crucial transit upgrades that got put on hold.

So some people are pretty happy that the Second Avenue subway work will continue,

but a lot of transit advocates are still frustrated at what they see as a Band-Aid approach

because ultimately that project is only a fraction of what the MTA had planned for

in capital investments across the city.

We're a little past the one month anniversary of when congestion pricing was supposed to start, but didn't.

So today, along with the second Ave subway expansion, we're going to take a look at some of the fallout more broadly of the governor's decision to pause the program.

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