(The following editorial appeared on the Asbury Park Press website on May 19, 2009.)
ASBURY PARK, N.J. — The ongoing metaphorical train wreck that is the Monmouth-Ocean-Middlesex commuter rail line shows no signs of getting up and running anytime soon.
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The latest setback came with word from NJ Transit that the three proposed alternative routes are too costly to qualify for federal funding. So they have come up with four scaled-back alternatives dubbed “MOM light.” Unfortunately, once again it appears the three counties involved continue to be on divergent tracks.
NJ Transit needs to step in and work with the counties to get some movement. If no consensus can be reached on which alternative or alternatives are best, it needs to make a decision on its own and move forward with one or more of the options.
“We expressed concern that the three routes in their current forms would likely have difficulty competing against other transit projects nationally for limited federal new starts funding,” said Joe Dee, NJ Transit spokesman. “We suggested the counties use a phased approach, which we’ve employed with success on other lines.”
It seems certain that whatever happens is going to happen incrementally or not at all. And if it happens at all, no one will be completely happy.
Two options would reduce the proposed Monmouth Junction and Red Bank routes to a single-track railroad with sidings for trains to pass and fewer stations. The Monmouth Junction route would dead-end at a station to be built on the Northeast Corridor Line, where MOM line passengers would change trains.
A third alternative would be a branch off the Red Bank line to serve Freehold Township as a second phase of a Red Bank line, if that is built. A fourth option proposes widening shoulders for buses on three sections of Route 9 from Freehold Township to Route 18 to accommodate Bus Rapid Transit. BRT buses are given their own lane, often making fewer stops than a regular bus line and, in some areas, given preferential treatment at traffic lights. The NJ Transit documents do not consider the Matawan route.
One thing we don’t need is more studies on these proposals. MOM has been studied every which way for decades.
Now is the time for NJ Transit officials to sit down with all interested parties, including the New Jersey Association of Railroad Passengers, and hammer out an agreement that will finally get expanded commuter rail service in Monmouth and Ocean counties moving.