Diesel-powered refrigeration units that have long spewed toxins into neighborhoods with some of the country’s highest rates of respiratory ailments are being phased out at the Hunts Point Produce Market.
Officials on Wednesday unveiled the first 20 electric-hybrid transport refrigeration units that will eventually replace up to 1,000 diesel-powered pieces of equipment used for cold storage on trucks at the sprawling market in the South Bronx.
The rollout is an outgrowth of congestion pricing, the Manhattan vehicle-tolling program launched in January 2025, which MTA officials credit with funding upgrades to the mass transit network and reducing the number of vehicle trips south of 60th Street by 27 million.
“That’s a lot less traffic, a lot cleaner air and a lot of other good stuff,” Janno Lieber, MTA chairperson and chief executive, said Wednesday at the sprawling 113-acre South Bronx facility. “But many people don’t realize that we’re using the revenues not just to improve mass transit — but also to pay for clean investments including right here at the Hunts Point Produce Market.”
Replacing transport refrigeration units is among congestion pricing’s promised mitigation measures for The Bronx, where total asthma emergency room visits from 2022 to 2024 far outpaced rates from other boroughs, according to state Health Department data.
“Repeat asthma hospitalization is so common here in The Bronx that we accept it as normal,” Rep. Ritchie Torres said. “We accept it not as a bug, but as a feature of growing up in The Bronx, so we’re fighting to change that reality.”
The 20 new units cut into emissions from trucks at the market that annually distribute more than 2.5 billion pounds of produce. Another 75 will be replaced later this year, officials said.
“Replacing just one of these units avoids the particulate matter, the emissions, of 330 truck trips per day on the Cross Bronx Expressway,” Lieber said. “Times 20 — which is what we’ve already done — that’s enough emission reduction to be the equivalent of removing 6,000 trucks per day from the Cross Bronx Expressway.”
The refrigeration units are among the first visible gains from congestion pricing for the South Bronx, which historically has been disproportionately impacted by air pollution.
Bronx communities have been promised $330 million in mitigation steps that include the creation of asthma case-management centers, parks renovations and the expansion of the city Department of Transportation’s Hunts Point Clean Trucks Program.
Since 2012, the DOT initiative to replace, retrofit or scrap diesel trucks has taken 711 particulate-spewing vehicles off the road, according to the agency.
Officials also said the fear of an increase of more vehicles from motorists taking alternate routes to dodge Manhattan congestion tolls has not materialized in Bronx neighborhoods or other so-called environmental justice communities.
“Before we turned the cameras on, a lot of people were worried — and it was understandable concern — that there would be an influx of cars and pollution in The Bronx from drivers who were avoiding the toll,” Lieber said. “So far, that has not happened, not at all.”
A December 2025 study from Cornell University found that air pollution has fallen by more than 20% within Manhattan’s “congestion relief zone,” with reductions also seen elsewhere in the city and the surrounding suburbs.
It’s among the benefits of the first-in-the-nation congestion-tolling plan that has also increased bus speeds and improved trip times for New Yorkers with disabilities who rely on the MTA’s Access-A-Ride service.
In a statement, Gov. Kathy Hochul called congestion pricing a “once-in-a-lifetime success story,” whose benefits extend beyond Manhattan.
Jeffrey Miner, a 68-year-old Hunts Point resident who suffers from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and carries a portable oxygen tank, said he welcomes any efforts to make breathing easier in the South Bronx.
“Say, from one to 10, with 10 being the worst, it’s an eight,” Miner said of the air quality while waiting for a Bx6 bus on Hunts Point Avenue. “Sometimes, it’s hard for me to breathe, like on a daily basis.”
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