(The following story by Larry Higgs appeared on the Asbury Park Press website on October 16.)
NEWARK — NJ Transit’s Board of Directors voted to spend an additional $124 million to complete the preliminary design and begin the final design of a second Hudson River Tunnel.
The project’s total cost is $7.6 billion.
Wednesday’s vote received both praise and criticism. Business leaders and a transportation advocacy group supported the decision for new job creation. Several rail advocates renewed their call to have the tunnel go to New York’s Penn Station and not to a proposed station deep under 34th Street.
“I know there is opposition and I can’t understand where they are coming from,” said Gerald T. Keenan, vice president of the Alliance for Action, a business, labor and government group that lobbies for infrastructure improvements. “If our grandparents didn’t build the Holland Tunnel, the Lincoln Tunnel or the George Washington Bridge, we’d be in a lot of trouble.”
The decision is a “boon to the environment as well as our regional economy and transportation network” that will bring 50,000 jobs to the region, Zoe Baldwin, New Jersey coordinator for the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, said after the vote.
The tunnel project is expected to create 6,000 construction jobs and 44,000 permanent jobs and reduce traffic congestion, said Richard Sarles, NJ Transit executive director.
The decision adds $124 million to a contract with THE (Trans-Hudson Express tunnel) Partnership, a joint engineering and design consultant venture, which has been working on preliminary designs for the tunnel and supporting projects, such as additional tracks, a loop and rail yard in the Meadowlands and a station to be built under 34th Street in Manhattan.
The $124 million will fund the remaining preliminary engineering through the rest of 2008 and cover the beginning of the final design on the project in 2009, pending a favorable record of decision from the Federal Railroad Administration, Sarles said. That contract will cover more than half of the final design for the tunnel and related projects.
“We expect the record of decision in (a matter of) days,” Sarles said.
NJ Transit received good news. The FRA approved a final environmental impact statement for the replacement of the Portal Bridge, which carries the Northeast Corridor, North Jersey Coast and Morris and Essex lines over the Hackensack River in the Jersey Meadows.
Plans call for replacing the two-track, 98-year-old swing bridge with two bridges totaling five tracks, estimated to cost $1.3 billion. Sarles said the project needs to be done to eliminate a bottleneck of 400 trains a day before the tunnel project is done.
Advocates from the Regional Rail Working Group reiterated their concerns that there will be a shortfall of funding for the tunnel and bridge project.
“The concept of using ($1.25 billion) in toll revenue is great, but it’s only a fraction of what’s needed. We’re still $2 billion short,” said Joseph Clift, a retired Long Island Rail Road planner working with the regional rail group.
A combination of NJ Transit and Amtrak funding will be used for the replacement of Portal Bridge, since both use the span, said Penny Bassett Hackett, NJ Transit spokeswoman. NJ Transit has set aside some funds for that project in its capital plan, she said.