N.J. senators, Amtrak to announce new Hudson tunnel project

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/0 ... ew_co.html

Highlights;

new tunnel to an expanded NY Penn,
NJ Transit would get to operate and additional 13 trains per hour into NY Penn (ARC would have given NJ Transit 25 additional trains per hour), Amtrak gets eight additional trains per hour.

Cost $10 Billion, be built in ten years.

Interesting news. But I would not take the $10 billion figure at face value until the press conference and there are specifics to back it up. A very big chunk of the cost of the ARC project and probable cost overruns was for the Penn Station Extension. This plan appears to be to connect the new tunnels to the existing NYP, but with upgrades to NYP which are probably tied mostly to the Moynihan station project. The newspaper writer may have carried forward the projected ballpark costs for the ARC project. We will learn more tomorrow.

Of course, the hard part is going to be getting the funding.

Amtrak is proposing to spend $50 million to begin preliminary engineering and design on two new rail tunnels from New Jersey to New York City.

http://noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid ... ye9U&pos=9

Doing what the New Jersey Governor won't.

Yes i agree with the governor, why should NJ have to pay for it.

Maybe this time they can design it in a way that actually makes the new tunnels useful to the regional transportation network [instead of terminating in a non-sensical deep cavern station]...

Just in terms of trains alone, under the old ARC plan: 25 per hour; under the new ARC plan: 21 per hour. Change? Division in the house, as Amtrak would be getting slots that it previously wasn't going to get under the old ARC plan. If the same number of tracks are going to be built under the Hudson then the major handicap is expanding NYP, as I understand it from the preliminary reports. As much as NJT would like to "get out" of Sunnyside Yard, I think they will still be having a presence there. Hopefully additional "in station" storage tracks will be built, as NJT presently has (but limited).

As much as I wanted to see the ARC tunnel get built, I always agreed with the argument that not connecting it to Penn St. was a mistake. I've always felt (logistics aside for the moment) that expanding Penn Station and adding new tunnels made the most sense. This in turn could have been done with a complete gutting of the various subterranean levels, demolishing MSG, and opening up the whole station. Obviously the MSG idea is dead, as it's beginning renovation, but I still think it's an opportunity to fix the underground areas.

I remember reading somewhere that Amtrak's idea for additional trackage was to go underneath the existing terminal. I don't know how feasible it is to go south without taking over and demolishing buildings.

To connect the whole thing to the Post Office complex would be the icing on the cake - since that project seems to be more about vanity than functionality.

JamesRR wrote:To connect the whole thing to the Post Office complex would be the icing on the cake - since that project seems to be more about vanity than functionality.

I totally agree.

Frankly, I have never understood the usefulness of the post office project.
It seems to me like a lot of money to spend to:

• Fix a wrong which cannot be undone (1963 demolition of Penn Station)
• Move the station even farther from its customers
• Provide poorer connections to the local transportation network
• Put senator Moynihan's name on something

Spidey!!!

There are some details available about the proposed new tunnels posted in a 10 page viewgraph set on Lautenberg's website at http://lautenberg.senate.gov/assets/Gateway.pdf. Rather ambitious plan in my opinion.

Sounds like a much better plan than ARC if it is indeed going to NYP this time. I'm not surprised Amtrak is stepping in. That whole $300B 30-year vision for the Northeast cannot happen without a new tunnel. And the capacity crunch is already being felt, nevermind what it'll be if they lose time planning the extra capacity. Waiting to build a new one years down the line when this one was already started would've cost far far more than $10B on this proposal and been far harder to fund so the expediency stepping in here so soon after Christie's cancellation will save them money down the line. Funding of course is not a given and they've got to be really organized to hit fast on securing it, but coming so soon after the State of the Union this may be the only way to recover the fumble in this political atmosphere before inertia solidifies against building.

Never thought the 7 Subway extension substitute to NJ was a good replacement project, as Fed funding for an MTA-only venture would've been that much harder to swing even with cheaper price tag. This at least gets multi-state support and a max Amtrak push.


Now, if they can just get Christie to return the ARC money he's planning to pocket and pour more asphalt with that would at least buy time to keep planning progress moving while they make their case for Fed funding on the build-out. This puts Lautenberg in an interesting position of possibly having to go to war with his own state's gov't to recoup that. And Christie having to showdown with much more formidable parties about returning the money.

For some reason news of the the new Amtrak tunnel has made the front page of the BBC website. :-\

Re the Macy's station I believe that many of the Penn Station improvements were scaled back so that expansion of platform space will less ambitious. As has been pointed out before there is room within the Penn Station bathtub for more tracks if one were to reconfigure the space currently devoted to the A, D and E yards and blast out what is currently the E yard to 10th Ave. At street level most of that space is currently a parking lot so it would not mean any major demolition.

Look at the east end of the station and apply a similar configuration with the second set of tunnels heading in under W 31st St and fanning out in the area that is currently parking lot connecting with the two ladder tracks. To avoid building under Macy's (if necessary) you can then stuff the existing D and E yard area with new platforms that are separated from the existing platforms via the ladder. Anyway, the reason that I heard for the Macy's station problems was that interested parties were sharking down NJT for the "privilege" of doing all the shallow level utility relocation work. With Amtrak on board and Cuomo setting a new tone in Albany there may be more motivation to push the project through without extortion.

Penn Station South seems like an interesting alternative to the NJT Bat Cave. I'm no expert, though, but couldn't they increase the efficiency of Penn Station without adding more tracks by through-running commuter trains? I'd have to guess that "Penn Station South" with all trackwork, land acquisition, and construction it requires, probably accounts for a couple billion dollars of the total price tag. I bet you could free up an equivalent number of track slots at Penn Station by investing $2 billion in interoperability projects.

(1) NJT - MNR New Haven Line interoperability would require zero capital expense. They already do it - "The Train To The Game". Incorporating this into regular weekday schedules would require busting silos which is politically difficult, but NJT and MNR already cooperate on the lines west of the Hudson, so come on guys!
(2) NJT - LIRR would require "dual mode" locomotives that can run on both third rail and catenary. The technology to do this (and do it reliably!) already exists: see the Eurostar.
(3) LIRR - MNR Hudson/Harlem Line. Would require complete electrification of the West Side LIne, which is already proposed by MNR. MNR and LIRR Third rail are incompatible but is this really a show stopper? Worst case, retrofit all MNR territory and trains to work with LIRR style 3rd rail, or vice versa. Cost? Probably a lot less than building "Penn Station South".

Why cant they store rail cars in secaucus ?

Steampowered wrote:Why cant they store rail cars in secaucus ?

At what yard? There's no yard in Secaucus at all, and the Meadows Maintenance Complex is not really set up for constant in and out train movements (though a more knowledgable poster can correct me if I'm mistaken). The ARC plans did call for an additional yard near Secaucus, but there's no indication if that's part of this plan.

As for the plan, I think this is something Amtrak has been sitting on for a while, as there have been rumblings of a new Amtrak tunnel. I will say, from a passenger standpoint, the proposed "Tracks A-F" seem far more useful and friendly than ARC's planned ones ever could.