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) to Empire Station?
bleet wrote:A couple of reactions:The last couple of fairly recent times I was at NYP, the block of 33rd Street adjacent to the station/MSG was closed to motor vehicle traffic, except perhaps to deliveries to the buildings along that block.
I would hope that NJ Transit would be brought into the process too since you can't fix what's wrong with Penn Station without including that half of the station. Which leads me to wonder why if you are closing 33rd street you wouldn't close 31st street too and do the same kind of passage way on both sides. In fact there already is a LIRR concourse on the 33rd street side, but not one on the NJT side.
Also, this ignores Amtrak's plan to build a Penn Station south station...so how does that get worked in?
I like the idea of opening up the 8th Ave side of the station but other than that I don't see anything that actually will make a tremendous difference. On the other hand I give Cuomo credit for trying to make something happen.
Beyond aesthetic improvements, the real need is to increase capacity at Penn Station, which was not built to handle 650,000 passengers a day. The test will be to see what flesh is put on these and other proposals that have been flying from the governor’s mouth and press office. Mr. Cuomo, who seems to have gone from zero to Robert Moses in 60 seconds, is also talking about building a third L.I.R.R. track on part of the Main Line in Nassau County and digging a tunnel to connect Long Island to points north. He will get no complaint from New Yorkers who like it when governors tackle big infrastructure. Now he needs to fully explain with what money, and — the forever question — when?
Gilbert B Norman wrote:Gray Lady seems to have her doubts about the latest initiative. She's heard it all before;Mr. Norman- I would note that a civil war of sorts has broken out hereabouts between Gracie Mansion and the Governor's Mansion, and the metropolitan papers have taken sides. Something to bear in mind when reading editorial page coverage of the proposal.
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo entreated New Yorkers last week to “think big” again, invoking Robert Moses, New York’s take-no-prisoners planning czar of the 20th century.
He was talking about fixing Pennsylvania Station, and presumably he meant the good Moses, the young, public-spirited idealist who opened parks and beaches. The bad Moses displaced hundreds of thousands of poor people and foisted other calamities on the city. But yes, he thought big.
So, while it was encouraging that the governor championed Penn’s cause, it was odd that he channeled Moses only to come up with what sounded like glassy new lobbies and shopping malls to improve the station’s ambience.
The set of stairs that could change your commute forever
For commuters who squeeze together on crowded Penn Station platforms waiting to go up narrow staircases and escalators, the sight of new stairs to a new station is oh so tantalizing.
For now, those stairs and escalators are locked behind security gates. But they're scheduled to open this fall, which is when the first phase of a project to convert Manhattan's Farley Post Office into the new Moynihan Station will be complete, said Empire State Development Corporation officials.
The project is also the first phase of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's ambitious Empire Station plan, which would rehabilitate Penn Station and move Amtrak operations to Moynihan in a second phase.
...
Ultimately, plans call for a second phase of work, which will create a new train hall for Amtrak in the center of Moynihan, and is part of Cuomo's Empire Station plan. Private sector developers would finance that work in exchange for the rights to develop retail stores and restaurants in Empire Station.
...
“This plan is smarter and better for people who will use the complex,” Mr. [Andrew] Cuomo said in an interview, “and it will actually happen.”
