Posted on 05/28/2021 12:55:12 PM PDT by BenLurkin
Federal Railroad Administration officials approved a Record of Decision Friday for the Environmental Impact Study for the tunnel project between New Jersey and New York, that’s part of the larger Gateway Project. That will allow rehabilitation of the existing 110-year-old tunnels currently used by 450-plus Amtrak and NJ Transit trains a day.
The decision allows significant work to begin on a tunnel project that has been sought since October 2014 when an Amtrak engineering study that found the original 1910-era tunnels built by the Pennsylvania Railroad were on borrowed time. Flooding from Hurricane Sandy in October 2012 and the wear and tear of a century of use meant new tunnels needed to be built so the old tunnels could be taken out of service, gutted and renovated.
The lack of an environmental approval was a roadblock to moving the Gateway Project further along to prepare for construction. The actual environmental work was done in two years under an expedited schedule and submitted in February 2018.
That Record of Decision was supposed to be rendered by a March 30, 2018, the deadline the U.S. Department of Transportation imposed to issue it after reviewing the Environmental Impact Statement.
Instead, that decision stalled after former President Donald Trump opposed funding for the tunnels and a companion project to build a new Portal Bridge to carry Northeast Corridor trains across the Hackensack River in Kearny.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
Related:
Gateway to waste: Amtrak’s Hudson rail boondoggle is even more boondoggley than we feared
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS |
MAY 12, 2021 AT 4:00 AM
Doubling passenger rail capacity under the Hudson is essential, as we’ve said for years and there’s a faster, cheaper and better to get there than Amtrak’s $30 billion Gateway boondoggle. But we must now confess that our criticism was wrong.
The truth, revealed in Amtrak’s Fiscal Year 2022 General and Legislative Annual Report to Congress, is that Gateway’s cost is now $33.7 billion: A new tunnel is $9.8 billion. Add $1.8 billion to fix the old tunnel, and $1.9 billion for the Portal North Bridge. Building Penn South, to allow more trains into Manhattan, is $10.9 billion. Add on top another $9.3 billion for a slew of Jersey projects necessary for the whole rotten jigsaw puzzle to fit together.
Gateway was concocted by Amtrak, under the terrible Joe Boardman, who was fired as head of the railroad in 2016. Former Gateway chief John Porcari broke the mega project into pieces, but none of it works until the whole $33.7 billion thing is built, breaking the bank.
Also related:
President Trump is Right to Stop the Gateway Boondoggle
March 16, 2018 — Peter Klensch
The most eye-catching feature in H.R. 3354, the omnibus appropriations package, that passed the House on September 14, 2017, was a $900 million earmark for the Gateway Project, a series of “strategic rail infrastructure improvements designed to improve current services and create new capacity that will allow the doubling of passenger trains running under the Hudson River” from Newark, New Jersey, to New York City.
During the debate on H.R. 3354, Rep. Ted Budd (R-N.C.) proposed an amendment to reduce and reallocate Gateway funding in order to allow all state projects to compete for the money. “North Carolina and the other 48 states should not have to foot the bill for this hall of fame earmark...
The $900 million earmark is a drop in the bucket for a comprehensive transportation project that will cost an estimated $29.5 billion, including a new tunnel under the Hudson River that was originally cancelled by former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) in 2010 because it was “not a financially viable project.” The $29.5 billion is more than double the 2011 estimate of $13.5 billion. That amount will undoubtedly grow further, and could reach astronomical levels if the tunnel goes past New York City’s Penn Station out to Long Island (which means digging a new tunnel under the East River), as some transit proponents are recommending.
As long as there are no mean tweets.
Tunnels in and out of Manhattan!?
Everyone is leaving New York. What? They’re getting federal funding for this?
Wouldn’t it be cheaper and easier to just build a bridge?
The Pennsylvania Railroad built the original tunnels for a fraction (even in 2021 dollars!) of what the federal government wants to spend today. Big difference between public and private sectors highlighted here.
Also, those tunnels were never designed for all the traffic they host now. NJ Transit crammed most of the former Lackawanna Railroad commuter train traffic through them and into Manhattan back in the early 90s.
Tunnels for more sex trafficking?
At this point, wouldn’t the whole “Escape from New York” plan be a whole lot more viable?
Why should taxpayers in other states pay for New York and New Jersey commuters?
....Environmental Impact Statement.
I think the environment impact statement would probably say something like: New York and New Jersey adversely impact the environment and should be deconstructed.
I believe there are two PATH tunnels under the Hudson these probably could be linked through subway tunnels and new train tracks for far less money.
Another possibility is to run trains all the way through Manhattan so a NJ Transit train would become a LIRR train. Doing this would bring LI City and Newark office space to a more even playing field with Midtown office space.
Yet another possibility is to run train tracks through the Lincoln Tunnel and then through Number 7 train tunnels.
And yet another possibility is to make NJ Transit trains and platforms longer.
These tunnels go to Penn Station:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_River_Tunnels
These are the PATH tunnels:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uptown_Hudson_Tubes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downtown_Hudson_Tubes
After the Mob gets their cut...and the Rat Party unions get theirs...that’ll only cost around $4,544,779,251,499.27
Bkmk
It’s safe to say that the ultimate cost will be two or maybe even three times the $33 Billion.
A year or two ago I started listening to Mark Simone on WOR in New York.He often comments that projects like this (roads,bridges,tunnels,etc) cost 10 times more,per mile,than in the rest of the country.
LIRR/NJT “through-running” is not happening. Two different power systems (LIRR 750-volt DC third rail, NJT 11.5 kV AC overhead wires); aside from the bureaucratic mess with state agencies and the associated unions plus FRA rules about route qualifications, the privately-owned LIRR and Pennsylvania Railroad never did it.
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