Signs of life stir for rail tunnel under Hudson
SEPTEMBER 21, 2014, 10:25 PM LAST UPDATED: MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2014, 12:32 AM
BY CHRISTOPHER MAAG
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD
When Governor Christie, citing potential cost overruns, canceled a project to build new tunnels under the Hudson River, many thought the effort to build rail connections between New Jersey and New York was dead, possibly forever.
Just weeks after Christie’s announcement, however, powerful forces in both states announced initiatives to jump-start the process in other forms. Now, the first phase of one of these projects, a Hudson River tunnel from New York Penn Station, is nearly complete. Other plans, such as expanding Penn Station, extending the New York subway to Secaucus, and modernizing New Jersey’s railroad tracks, are making quiet progress. But plans, approvals, and, most important, funding for the largest portions of the project have not been secured.
Each of these parallel efforts is a race against time. It may take years — even decades — to muster the money and political will necessary to complete new cross-Hudson tunnels. Meanwhile, the 104-year-oldtunnels that carry 160,000 commuters every day will fail completely within 20 years, Joe Boardman, CEO of Amtrak, announced in April.“All this planning will take years, and that’s part of the problem,” said Richard E. Barone, transportation director at Regional Plan Association, a non-profit planning group. “The system is bursting at the seams. We have no choice but to figure this out.”
– See more at: https://www.northjersey.com/news/signs-of-life-stir-for-rail-tunnel-under-hudson-1.1093168#sthash.NjLVzb3M.dpuf
Hopefully, by the time they get this sorted out, I won’t care.
But they do need to do it, and tunneling technology has come a long way in the last hundred years.
We are one natural disaster or terrorist attack from a devastating blow to the regional economy.
Money would be better spent on another bridge.
Who gives a shit if some commuter wants to save 20 minutes on their daily travel.
The trains are usually empty except for the 2 rush hours (7-9am and 5-7pm) and already are heavily subsidized by taxpayers.
OR how about a unique idea.. let the commuters pay the REAL cost of the travel.
The ability to go to and from NY by public transportation is a huge reason for Ridgewood’s appeal and property values.
I can see #2 has never commuted to NYC through Secaucus or the Port Authority building in NYC !!! It is truly mind numbing. 20 minutes X 2 times per day X 5 days per week X 49 weeks per year = a time savings of 9,800 minutes a year, or 6.8 days a year. That would make a world of difference, it might even mean more after school activities with the kids and higher real estate values in Ridgewood on par with NYC commuter suburbs like Summit, Greenwich/Stamford and Edgemont/Scarsdale which all have direct train access in to NYC. In terms that maybe even you could understand, that’s 170 days over 25 year public safety career which is about as many days as you took in accumulated leave at your highest final comp rate + longevity pay when you retired. So in dollar terms, that’s probably worth over $80,000 in 25 years.
This tunnel will cost 2-3x more than the federal funds earmarked for it, just like everything else controlled by the mob and their union thugs in this state. It will be worse than Boston’s “Big Dig” in terms of graft and corruption. Christie was right to quash it. As soon as the federal funds run out, NJ taxpayers would be on the hook to pay for the “cost overruns” and “delays”, which in NJ means graft, corruption and greed.