To ease Penn Station woes, a new plan calls for a transit hub in Sunnyside, Queens

Was Chris Christie ever charged with the diversion of funds earmarked for the ARC (Access to the Region’s Core and using it for some NJ Highway so that he could temporarily avoid a gas tax increase prior to his reelection. The buffoon joked about running trains into Macy*s basement and was against the project for that made up reason. He should be behind bars. Also, build the new bus terminal in New Jersey and build a rail rapid transit line terminating on the sight of the hideous bus terminal and an office building on the land that it now occupies. The NJ buses idle outside of my building in the pm waiting for space in the bus terminal. It is hideous and they should be gone.

One regional system is a must; the first step to breakdown the antiquated, parochial political lines that compete for funds. But this also requires a reformed Port Authority that can credibly represent the region and rationally prioritize projects and funding.

To understand what happened to Penn Station first requires acknowledgement that all parties involved share the blame. Historically, Amtrak was established to offload the passenger operational costs from the freight railroads, which in 1970, were looking over the precipice at possible nationalization due to the fiasco of the Penn Central merger, and within two years, bankruptcy. Congress never viewed Amtrak as a transportation mode equal to access its own taxes in a dedicated trust fund as provided air and highway. Congress failed to structure an annual funding mechanism to allow Amtrak to properly plan, acquire equipment on lease, instead of purchasing; importantly, to designate routes according to market need; not congressional pressure.

With such a political vacuum, Congress and succeeding administrations acquiesced to the political power grab of Amtrak by the Northeastern congressional delegation. This ensured a Board of Directors for Amtrak predominantly from the Northeast who required Amtrak to serve as a convenient safety net for depositing political, non-railroad experienced CEOs, who lacked the credibility to develop a vision of credible leadership and fiscal prowess. The Northeastern congressional delegation also secured the Northeast Corridor for Amtrak from the USDOT in 1976, but without providing for the vast sums of funding required to repair and maintain the Corridor after decades of deferred neglect.

Before Amtrak, the New Haven Railroad operated hourly Boston-New York trains to Grand Central (and some thru runs from Hartford); its four thru trains between Boston-Washington ran over Hell Gate Bridge to Penn Station. When Penn Station was demolished in 1963 to appease connected developers, intercity trains were on their death throes in the East; commuter lines had not been yet re-organized into viable regional services. Nobody at that time had the vision to project the immense increase over the decades in commuter traffic, as well as more Amtrak services into NYC from Boston, Albany, Harrisburg, Washington, and Virginia.

Amtrak has been devoid of competent, experienced leadership since 2005, when the politicized Amtrak Board undercut a very strong railroad professional, Mr. David Gunn. Prior to Mr. Gunn’s arrival, Amtrak was horribly misled into an expensive decision to build new Acela train sets, rather than purchasing proven off the shelf equipment for far less, and better performance metrics. Mr. Wick Moorman, who was highly regarded as the former CEO of Norfolk Southern, assumed the Amtrak CEO slot only last October (2016), inheriting the obvious mis-management and financial issues parlayed over the past eleven years and ignored by a Board focused exclusively on the Northeast Corridor; but without the requisite hands-on knowledge to appreciate the dire situation to timely communicate to Congress, FRA, and USDOT.

At this point, Mr. Moorman did not create the long, drawn-out issues of neglecting Penn Station. But with his proven background in projects and track infrastructure, he will certainly fix the problem. What we cannot allow to happen is the typical political dodge game. We need to understand the details of how the governors of NJ and NY, along with their Port Authority, did not view Penn Station as their issue; no different than the tunnels and bridges leading into and out of NYC. Also, what is the history of Amtrak management responsible for Penn Station to have timely and properly identified the gravity of the issues–to their Executive C-Suite level and the Board of Directors? If their was a dereliction of their duty, where are they now; what is their future at Amtrak?