Amtrak Gateway Tunnels

NYPost wrote: A source familiar with a meeting in September where Trump told local legislators he backs the new tunnel said the project isn’t sexy enough to interest him.

“He asked, ‘Why are we putting all this money toward a tunnel that no one can see?’ ” the source told The Post. “ ‘Why don’t we do something at LaGuardia’—because it’s visible.”

For those of you that thought calling it the "Trump Tunnel" would appease Trump, looks like it's not flashy enough.

For those of you that thought calling it the "Trump Tunnel" would appease Trump, looks like it's not flashy enough.

Nobody is going to see the HUUUGE TRUMP sign at the tunnel entrance (except the head end crew) and he can't profit from the tunnel unless he owns the construction companies that build it.

quad50cal wrote:For those of you that thought calling it the "Trump Tunnel" would appease Trump, looks like it's not flashy enough.

Wait and see ... Feels like negotiation right now to me.

Just imagine a nice fascia entrance at the mouth of the tunnel with the name done so that the passengers see if from the trains. This problem is one good aesthetic architect away from being solved.

It is hard to know if this is negotiation or not. Look at Gary Cohn -- more often than not it is Trump's way or the highway.

Also I thought that the Port Authority already budgeted a couple of billions in its 10 year plan for Gateway. That is definitely local money, so the claims that there are not any local money committed are pure BS. The states paying back the federal loans is also local money. I get it why the states want the federal loans -- so that the borrowings do not show up on their balance sheets and the Feds can definitely borrow at much lower rates. The Feds might not like the idea of lending their balance sheet, but as long as the money gets repaid by the states it is local money. All claims to the opposite are BS, but of course politics is 99% BS, so no surprises here.

EuroStar wrote: Also I thought that the Port Authority already budgeted a couple of billions in its 10 year plan for Gateway. That is definitely local money, so the claims that there are not any local money committed are pure BS. The states paying back the federal loans is also local money.

Let's review what money has been promised for the Gateway projects....
As of 14 December 2017; per
https://www.amny.com/transit/gateway-tu ... 1.15455694" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Projected costs for the Gateway Project: $24 billion
Projected costs for the new Tunnels: $12.9 billion (per NJ & NY)
NJ & NY total commitments for just the new Tunnels: $5.55 billion
NY commitments for just the new Tunnels: $1.75 billion
NJ commitments for just the new Tunnels: $1.9 billion
Port Authority (NJ & NY) for just the new Tunnels: $1.9 billion
USDOT projected costs for "all" the Tunnels: $14.9 billion (USDOT also includes costs for refurbishing the old tunnels)

Additional worthy to note:
The Port Authority, a bi-state agency, will also budget $1.9 billion in its capital program. NJ Transit riders will see the most personal impact. The transit agency will pay for its portion by implementing a per-passenger trip charge for all its rail riders. The fees will amount a $.90 charge each way beginning in 2020 and will increase to $1.70 in 2028 and $2.20 in 2038.

Double those fare increases for a daily round trip. Will anyone be able to afford to commute into NYC from NJ after they take effect?

"“[The] submission on file proposes the federal government pay 85 percent of the project costs, for a tunnel where nine out of 10 passengers are local transit riders,” the USDOT official said. “This is entirely unserious.”

When the parties are looking at the entire Gateway Project differently, they're going to have different costs and different sharing of those costs. Why two governors wait until December 2017, a year after Trump was elected, to come to an agreement between themselves and Obama is beyond me? t's not like they didn't know Obama's two terms expired in January 2017? Deals without signatures signed on the dotted line on paper between two organizations are worthless. They should have reached an agreement years earlier while Obama was still President.

Quite the Editorial appears in The Times today - including a reference to Scripture:

http://nytimes.com/2018/03/05/opinion/t ... unnel.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Fair Use:

..Assuming Mr. Trump doesn’t change his mind — he can be as constant as a reed in a stiff wind — the best hope may be that Mr. Ryan shows backbone, for a change, and supports money for Gateway as benefiting the nation. It may be worth noting that Mr. Trump urged the speaker to eliminate the funding when they were together at the Capitol for a memorial ceremony for the Rev. Billy Graham. It would have been a fitting time for both men to recall words from Luke 6:48, about the importance of building well and laying a foundation on rock so that “when a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake"

Under pressure from Republicans in Congress, Trump would probably change his mind (again) and support the Ronald Reagan Gateway Tunnels.

I'm also hearing rumors of how NYC was going to pay for it's portion: by shifting funds coming from the federal government to it's coffers to it.

If that's true, then maybe the loan idea would of been better for everyone.

Rep. Ted Budd (R-NC13) has authored an Opinion piece appearing in Today's Journal:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-northe ... nts_sector" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Fair Use:

..For federal taxpayers, the shifty details of Gateway’s history add insult to the program’s injurious costs. In 2012 New Jersey’s then- Gov. Chris Christie canceled a primarily state-funded version of the rail upgrade because it would have cost residents too much money. Mr. Christie took the estimated $3 billion in fees collected to finance the project and diverted them into the state highway trust fund—a bit of budgetary sleight-of-hand that helped him avoid raising New Jersey’s gasoline tax before his 2013 re-election bid.

Some of the reader comments I find interesting, but the piece just seems same old same old pitched to the Congressman's Pickup driving, gun toting, Fox News watching, Trump loving, constituents.

There's nothing more grotesque than free-riders who think they're free-living.

To wit: Rural folks who don't realize that all infrastructure in their district is the fruit of rural electrification, rural telecom, rural roadbuilding, rural interstates, rural airports, and rural LD-train subsidies paid for by urbanites in general, and NEC urbanites, historically (via gas taxes exported from populous places to build interstates in the then-empty South)

Just as Amtrak has threatened to cut service in no-PTC areas (Vermont), I'd like to see Amtrak commit to cutting LDs out of NYP in the event that an emergency closure of the current tunnels is needed.

First, it has the advantage of being true and budgetarily beneficial: The LDs that serve NC & SC & GA & FL are money-losers. They should be the first to get cut.

Second, it points out to NC & SC & GA & FL that they are heavy users of the national system, including the inhabitants of the NC-13 congressional district (roughly the republican gerrymander that wraps around the democratic Research Triangle)

So make real clear that the Cardinal, Crescent, Silver Star, Silver Meteor & Palmetto* would all be impossible to run during a tunnel closure--just like the whole Sunset Limited got cut when the Gulf Coast became impassible.

And also let everyone know that even VA & NC state trains (eg Carolinian) can only get a "maybe" and that in order to run, VA and NC would have to suck up extra losses on their south-of-WAS services that they'd suffer if PHL and NYC had to be cut off.

Here's what Amtrak would save by cutting the freeloader's trains:
$17.6m Cardinal
$31.5m Silver Star**
$31.5m Silver Meteor**
$38.4m Crescent
$01.6m Palmetto*,**
=============
$120m annual losses

*Ok, maybe keep the Palmetto, if not cut in "solidarity" with other trains.
**3 of them serving NC-13 district

Gilbert B Norman wrote:Rep. Ted Budd (R-NC13) has authored an Opinion piece appearing in Today's Journal:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-northe ... nts_sector" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Fair Use:

..For federal taxpayers, the shifty details of Gateway’s history add insult to the program’s injurious costs. In 2012 New Jersey’s then- Gov. Chris Christie canceled a primarily state-funded version of the rail upgrade because it would have cost residents too much money. Mr. Christie took the estimated $3 billion in fees collected to finance the project and diverted them into the state highway trust fund—a bit of budgetary sleight-of-hand that helped him avoid raising New Jersey’s gasoline tax before his 2013 re-election bid.

Some of the reader comments I find interesting, but the piece just seems same old same old pitched to the Congressman's Pickup driving, gun toting, Fox News watching, Trump loving, constituents.

It just shows you how stupid decisions by one short-sighted politician will come to haunt the state of NJ for decades to come. This is same old same old politics, but it works really well for Budd as his constituents are buying it. Christie returned the $3 billion in federal money and used the other $3 billion from the Port Authority for the Pulasky Skyway and other projects around NJ rather than redirect them to Gateway or any other reasonable alternative (subway to Secaucus?). The state will be paying triple or quadruple those amounts just to get something built because of Christie's presidential ambitions which crashed on the George Washington Bridge approach ramps in Fort Lee ...

While East Side Access for LIRR is over budget and has been delayed multiple times, once it opens Long Island will become much more attractive place for commuters compared with New Jersey. Twenty years after East Side Access opens the difference between New Jersey commuter suburbs and Long Island commuter suburbs will be very stark. Hopefully I live long enough to see it, even though I will not be enjoying telling anyone "I told you so".

Arlington wrote:There's nothing more grotesque than free-riders who think they're free-living.

To wit: Rural folks who don't realize that all infrastructure in their district is the fruit of rural electrification, rural telecom, rural roadbuilding, rural interstates, rural airports, and rural LD-train subsidies paid for by urbanites in general, and NEC urbanites, historically (via gas taxes exported from populous places to build interstates in the then-empty South)

Just as Amtrak has threatened to cut service in no-PTC areas (Vermont), I'd like to see Amtrak commit to cutting LDs out of NYP in the event that an emergency closure of the current tunnels is needed.

First, it has the advantage of being true and budgetarily beneficial: The LDs that serve NC & SC & GA & FL are money-losers. They should be the first to get cut.

Second, it points out to NC & SC & GA & FL that they are heavy users of the national system, including the inhabitants of the NC-13 congressional district (roughly the republican gerrymander that wraps around the democratic Research Triangle)

So make real clear that the Cardinal, Crescent, Silver Star, Silver Meteor & Palmetto* would all be impossible to run during a tunnel closure--just like the whole Sunset Limited got cut when the Gulf Coast became impassible.

And also let everyone know that even VA & NC state trains (eg Carolinian) can only get a "maybe" and that in order to run, VA and NC would have to suck up extra losses on their south-of-WAS services that they'd suffer if PHL and NYC had to be cut off.

Here's what Amtrak would save by cutting the freeloader's trains:
$17.6m Cardinal
$31.5m Silver Star**
$31.5m Silver Meteor**
$38.4m Crescent
$01.6m Palmetto*,**
=============
$120m annual losses

*Ok, maybe keep the Palmetto, if not cut in "solidarity" with other trains.
**3 of them serving NC-13 district

There you are spreading the false rumor that rural infrastructure was built exclusively for rural customers. The truth is rural infrastructure was built for urban customers more so than rural customers.
Check out the interstate highways in the middle of nowhere and ask where the drivers are going and where they were coming from ? I bet the majority anywhere in the country will answer they heading for or coming from what you would describe as an urban location.
Ask the same question of everyone on an Amtrak long distance train in the middle of nowhere at 2 am, you'll get the same answers. Farmers needed electrification so they could produce more food for mostly urban customers.

Almost all infrastructure needed in the middle of nowhere is to service people in the middle of somewhere.

electricron wrote:Almost all infrastructure needed in the middle of nowhere is to service people in the middle of somewhere.

The people in somewhere had mostly built toll roads (OH, IN, IL, NJ, PA, NY, MA, MD, ME) for the places they needed limited access roads, and were happy that things moved by US Routes (66, 29) or by, ahem, freight rail.

Interstates 88, 77, 40, 26, 16, 89, 20, 81 are far more lane-miles than the somewhere people needed (and benefitted those free to be Amtrak-doubters now)

This would all be so much more cut-and-dry if there wasn't a American-general and Northeast-particular and New York-specific cost problem that seems to get bigger every month. Alon Levy's calculation is that if the bare-tunnel cost estimates for Gateway could be brought down to the per-mile levels of the notoriously expensive Second Avenue Subway then the tunnels would be easily fund-able within the existing commitments of New York and New Jersey

https://pedestrianobservations.com/2018 ... led-again/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Arlington wrote:Here's what Amtrak would save by cutting the freeloader's trains:
$17.6m Cardinal
$31.5m Silver Star**
$31.5m Silver Meteor**
$38.4m Crescent
$01.6m Palmetto*,**
=============
$120m annual losses

*Ok, maybe keep the Palmetto, if not cut in "solidarity" with other trains.
**3 of them serving NC-13 district

https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/NC/13" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Mr. Arlington, the only Amtrak train to cross the NC/13th CD is the Crescent with stops at Greensboro, High Point, and Salisbury.

Of interest is how the District is carved so as to avoid any of the "libbies" within the Education/Research Triangle. Of further interest is that the 13th District was established during 2002 owing to population gains. Somehow, betcha those gains were where the "libbies" hang their hats, and not in the backwoods.