Gateway to sanity

They were all there: the President, secretary of transportation, White House chief of staff, budget director and director of the National Economic Council, to discuss Amtrak’s Gateway plan for two new rail tunnels under the Hudson. Joining the White House meeting were two governors, three senators and a dozen House members from New York and New Jersey. Hallelujah, the new tubes are truly needed. Why? Because the 1910 tunnels carrying about 200,000 people a day on NJ Transit and Amtrak were badly damaged by superstorm Sandy and must be closed to be repaired. Otherwise, commerce in the Northeast will grind to a halt should even one of the tubes fail.

But instead of a lean and focused fix, Amtrak has fallen victim to the worst kind of mission creep. It has a $30 billion fantasy that includes wasteful billions to tear down a giant tract of Midtown and nuttily build two new bridges each with two tracks over the Hackensack River when a single span with four tracks will do.

The White House correctly identifies Gateway as composed of nine separate projects, with the new tunnels as one component and the rehab of the old tubes as a second piece. Both are needed, as is a new bridge over the Hackensack.

But Amtrak is trying to sneak through two other elements: A new, unnecessary, stub-end terminal called Penn South for $6.5 billion — which would require demolishing a block and a half of Midtown Manhattan — and another bridge costing $2 billion. That’s more than $8 billion in waste that must be chopped from the plan.

Someone up here should tell the President and his team down in D.C.

Years ago, when the entire Gateway shebang was pegged at $20 billion, Sen. Chuck Schumer helped Govs. Cuomo and Christie cut a deal with the Obama administration that Washington would pay $10 billion and the states, through the Port Authority, would pay $10 billion. Fair enough.

But since then, the price has climbed and climbed. It needs to be cut back. Killing Penn South and having a single, wider Hackensack bridge can get it back to budget reality.