The NYPD and city sanitation department have teamed up to target cars parked on the street with fake or obscured license plates, officials said on Wednesday.
Police officials said the agencies have already seized roughly 5,000 of the so-called “ghost cars” since September, a move that expands on an effort launched by the MTA last year to stop and impound vehicles that use fraudulent plates to evade toll readers.
The increased enforcement comes ahead of the MTA’s planned Jan. 5 launch of congestion pricing, which will charge motorists a $9 daytime fee to enter Manhattan south of 60th Street. MTA officials have for months worried drivers would use illegal plates to evade the charge. Drivers also use fake or obscured plates to skirt the city’s automated speed and red light camera tickets.
A report published by Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine earlier in August estimated cars with ghost plates cost the city up to $200 million per year.
“The days of operating these illegal ghost cars are over,” NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a Staten Island news conference on Wednesday. “We are seeing the same photocopied fake plates on different cars leaving crime scenes.”
Of the 7,500 ghost cars that have been seized this year, 5,000 were seized in the last three months, Tisch said.
Officials said car owners with illegal license plates will be fined and possibly arrested, and their cars will be seized.