MTA panel plans to trim building costs

MTA officials vowed Wednesday to slash red tape and revamp the bidding process on projects in an effort to rein in out-of-whack construction costs and delays.

Scott Rechler, a Metropolitan Transportation Authority board member and real estate developer, led a working group that offered a blueprint for overhauling the agency’s contracting system to avoid blown budgets and construction timelines that plagued megaprojects like the Second Ave. subway and East Side Access at Grand Central Terminal.

“We can’t ask the public to give us money if we can’t prove we’re gonna spend that money wisely,” Rechler said at MTA headquarters in lower Manhattan.

The Regional Plan Association issued a report in February that detailed how complicated bureaucracy and out-of-date work rules that overstaff sites have led to construction costs much higher than other major cities outside the U.S. The Second Ave. subway cost $807 million for each mile of track, making it the world’s most expensive subway extension.