Planning amidst the chaos

For nearly 100 years, the Regional Plan Association has worked on long-term ideas to improve the way people live and work in the three-state, 31-county megalopolis of 23 million inhabitants spreading out from the five boroughs. These good, smart people have produced — after years of effort — their Fourth Regional Plan, comprised of 61 initiatives from transit to housing to job creation.

Unfortunately, at least when the plan was first being chewed over, most of those ideas were overshadowed by a silly idea to permanently end overnight subway service most weekdays. Thanks but no thanks. Yes, ridership is lower in the wee hours, and yes, it would be useful to have time for maintenance and repairs. But no, the New York City subway never sleeps, because people in the five boroughs work all shifts.

But don’t hold one dumb idea against the whole blueprint, which includes some bright thinking about how New York and its surroundings must adjust to the needs of changing times and a growing population.

The best ideas in the plan would attack the twin beasts of the Port Authority and the MTA.

To fix the PA, as wayward and hopelessly bureaucratic as big agencies come, the wonks propose transforming the agency into a regional infrastructure bank to fund big projects like the Gateway passenger rail tunnel under the Hudson.

Don’t expect that to happen anytime soon — even basic PA reforms agreed to by just about everyone are now held up by a recalcitrant Jersey legislature. But someone’s got to push for ideas even when they look like political nonstarters.

Ditto for the notgonnahappen-but-soundsnice notion of combining NJTransit and Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North to allow seamless commuter rail travel throughout the region.

The RPA also wants to create a new subway reconstruction authority. We’re wary of solving problems of existing bureaucracies by creating new ones — but if done right, that would make sense.

Best of all, the RPA is fully on board congestion pricing to curb traffic and raise cash for mass transit. Bravely supported by Gov. Cuomo and opposed by Mayor de Blasio, it has to become reality.

It’s one visionary idea that could actually happen in our lifetimes.