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AMTRAK

Increased traffic and congestion into midtown Manhattan threatens the economy of northern New Jersey and New York City.  The existing 100-year old rail tunnels into midtown Manhattan are already operating at capacity during rush hour, and ridership is expected to double in the next two decades.

To address these immediate concerns following the cancellation of the ARC Tunnel project and with the encouragement of Senator Lautenberg, Amtrak expedited its plans to build new rail tunnels.  They are now moving forward with the Gateway Project to increase the number of trains into and out of New York.  The project will also expand intercity and high-speed rail access, providing world-class, high-speed rail service on the Northeast Corridor.

The Gateway Project is expected to increase NJ Transit commuter rail capacity into New York by 65 percent (increase from 20 to 33 trains per hour during peak hours).  The new tunnels will connect to the new Moynihan station as well as to a new Penn Station South that is connected to the existing New York Penn station, which has reached its capacity.

Amtrak’s plan also includes a total replacement and expansion of the 100 year-old Portal Bridge over the Hackensack River between Kearny and Secaucus. There would also be significant infrastructure improvements in New Jersey including expanding track capacity from what is essentially a two-track railroad to an operationally superior four track configuration between Newark and New York Penn Stations.

Amtrak projects that the entire Gateway Tunnel project could be completed in 2020 at an estimated cost of $13.5 billion.  Amtrak will take a lead in finding ways to pay the cost and will look for contributions from local, regional and state governments including New Jersey, New York State, New York City, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, and New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), as well as private investors.

Download full version (PDF): Amtrak Gateway Tunnel Project

About Amtrak
www.amtrak.com
Amtrak is a government-owned corporation that was organized on May 1, 1971, to provide intercity passenger train service in the United States. It operates passenger service on 21,000 miles of track primarily owned by freight railroads connecting 500 destinations in 46 states and three Canadian provinces.

Tags: Amtrak, ARC Tunnel, Frank. R. Lautenberg, Gateway Project, Gateway Tunnel, New Jersey, New York, NJ, NY, Robert Menendez, Senator Lautenberg, Tunnel

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 8th, 2011 at 1:53 pm and is filed under Bipartisan, Competitiveness, Congestion, Democrat, Infra Views, Jobs, Local, Rail, Transit . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.