New Proposed Tunnel Doesn't Offer Much for Bergen and Passaic Commuters

When Governor Christie that would have connected Ridgewood and other stations with direct access to Manhattan, Democratic U.S. Senators Frank Lautenberg and Robert Menendez pounced.

The pair charged Christie with creating a monumental mistake and said the Hudson River Tunnel Project was an investment in New Jersey's future; a way to get jobs to strengthen the economy while retooling an antiquated, crowded transit infrastructure. Christie did not back down, saying he was right to kill a project that had ballooned huge cost overruns and said the state "was broke" and could not bear the over $10 billion cost.

Now the senators are proposing Amtrak put up a new tunnel project over that of the ARC–which last saw construction done in October of 2010–and the transit giant says it would do one big thing differently than the doomed ARC tunnel: it would send trains straight to Penn Station, not the 34rd Street station on Manhattan's West Side.

But that's small solace for those on the Bergen and Passaic Lines. tunnel, this project would not send Bergen and Passaic line trains directly into Manhattan. There would still be a transfer in Secaucus although the proposal "allows for a connection to be built in the future" and would likely relieve congestion on all lines.

Lautenberg, in a release, said New Jersey is "facing a transportation crisis" and said the project is necessary for its citizens.

"Our commuters are fed up with train delays that make them late to work and endless traffic that traps them on our highways when they want to be home with their families. When the ARC Tunnel was cancelled, it was clear to me that we couldn’t just throw up our hands and wait years to find another solution," he said.

Dubbed "The Gateway Tunnel," the plan would allow NJ Transit to add an additional 13 trains per peak hour into New York City and it would increase the number of Amtrak trains into New York City by eight per hour.

If all goes according to plan, the tunnel could cost $13.5 billion and would be completed within the decade.

Property values in areas two miles away from a station could have increased property values upwards of 30 percent, according to a study done on the effects of the ARC tunnel. Whether that leap holds in Bergen and Passaic County without direct access to New York City is in question now.

Riders in Ridgewood would have seen roundtrip commuting times drop by approximately 20 minutes under the ARC plan, and there would have been increased connectivity to subway lines.

There's also an uphill climb for funding the Gateway Tunnel with a project cost above that of the ARC tunnel, which still continues to be an acrimonious point between the state and federal government. The federal government the state borrowed to pay for the tunnel; Christie says it's not paying.

Christie's press secretary Michael Drewiniak was not available for comment, but an article in the Star Ledger notes that Amtrak officials believe this proposal would fit well under President Obama's new infrastructure improvement initiatives. Amtrak will be spending $50 million on an engineering study on the Gateway plan.