Zohran Mamdani’s victory in the New York mayoral election yesterday shines a spotlight on the potential for free public transport in the world’s biggest cities.

Making the city’s buses “fast and free” is one of Mamdani’s key election pledges.

His manifesto aims to “lower the cost of living for working-class New Yorkers”. It promises to scrap bus fares, freeze rents, provide free child care up to the age of five, and set up a chain of municipally-controlled grocery shops.

Abolishing bus fares will be no easier than keeping any other election promise. The scheme would have to be agreed with New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), which is run by the New York state government – most likely by New York City back-filling the $6-800 million/year hole it would leave in the MTA budget.

Transport campaigners in New York say that money could and should be raised by taxes on wealth. The huge public support for Mamdani’s proposals will hopefully carry them over the line.

Pearl Ahrens of Fare Free London said: “This win has international resonance. If New York City can consider making buses free, so can London and other big world cities.

“There are smaller cities successfully running free public transport – more than 130 of them in Brazil, and European capitals including Luxemburg, Belgrade (Serbia) and Tallinn (Estonia). Glasgow, with more than 600,000 people, is committed to running a pilot scheme next year.

“New York City, which, like London, has more than 8 million people, can take this to the next level.”

New York transport researcher Charles Komaroff said in an interview with Fare Free London that Mamdani’s election campaign – based on “affordability” via free buses, free child care and low-cost groceries – had powerful symbolism in the city.

While New York would have to find $6-800 million per year to fund the zero-fares buses plan, the cost of universal free child care would be more than $5 billion. Fare Free London says that’s money well spent, in pursuit of social justice.

Mamdani first pledged to make buses “fast and free” when seeking the Democratic nomination to be New York City mayor last year. Along with funding, another challenge to the success of the policy is traffic congestion, which slows down buses and makes journey times unreliable.

Last year, New York City finally put in place a congestion charging scheme for the city’s busiest areas, similar to London’s congestion charge.

Transport campaigners and researchers, along with social movements and a wide array of politicians, had been pressing for a congestion charge for years. In 2008 mayor Michael Bloomberg had tried to introduce it and been stymied in the New York state assembly. In 2023 the New York state governor, Kathy Hochul, approved a new version of the plan but then hit “pause” in June 2024.

In November 2024, the obstacles – including vociferous opposition by US president Donald Trump – were overcome. Charging started in January this year, 70,000 fewer cars per day have entered the charging zone, and buses are moving up to 20% faster through Manhattan in central New York.

It was London that first “took the beach-head” for congestion pricing in 2003, said Komaroff. “We could not have done it here without that breakthrough.”

Komaroff, who has been researching and advocating socially just transport policies in New York for several decades, recalled going to a pro-congestion-charging event in February 2023, when the political controversy was raging. Mamdani, then a little-known state assembly member, spoke in favour.

“He framed congestion pricing in a larger social context, far beyond the usual wonkiness of transport policy people. I was completely riveted”, Komaroff said.

A year and a half later, he heard Mamdani speak about fare-free buses – – this time during the race to be the Democratic mayoral candidate, which Zamdani eventually won.

Komaroff authored a detailed appraisal of the scheme, published in April this year by the Nurture Nature Foundation, that has been a potent weapon for supporters of free buses. It concludes that, in money terms, the scheme will produce benefits for New Yorkers worth at least twice as much as the $600+ million it will cost.

The report estimates that the scheme will increase bus use by 23%, and shows that it will simplify bus travel, as boarding will be quicker, and speed up journey times by at least 7%.

Komaroff said in interview that funds for the scheme would most likely have to be transferred from the city’s budget to the MTA. “Ethically and politically, this money should be raised by taxes on millionaires and billionaires.”

Fare-free travel was trialled on five New York City bus routes during the year to September 2024. The pilot “dramatically increased” passenger numbers, by 30% on weekdays and 38% at weekends, providing “clear economic relief to low-income riders”, Mamdani and New York state senator Michael Gianaris wrote afterwards. Assaults on drivers fell by 38%, a similar fall to that recorded in Kansas City in the year after bus fares were abolished in 2019.

Mamdani’s call for zero-fares buses has also won backing from John Samuelson, national president of the Transport Workers Union, which represents most of New York’s 41,000 public transport workers.

“Fare-free buses should be the future. It would drive up bus and subway ridership and be an economic engine,” said Samuelsen at a “support Mamdani” event in June. Fare-free buses would put an end to disputes over fare evasion, and so could reduce assaults on bus drivers, he said.

MTA chair Janno Lieber last week expressed scepticism about the zero-fares plan, suggesting it could affect the pricing of bonds issued by the company. You can hear Mamdani’s response here, in an interview with journalists. And here is an earlier Mamdani campaign video, “Who said public transit can’t be free”.