His tunnel vision
Gov tours L line, hopes to ease repair pain
Gov. Cuomo says he’s looking for a way to ease or even avert the 15-month L train shutdown anticipated with dread by thousands of commuters in Brooklyn and Queens.
After touring the L train’s East River tunnel early Friday, Cuomo said he’s consulting with top engineers to make sure the 15-month shutdown to start in April is the best way to fix salt water damage caused by Hurricane Sandy in 2012.
Cuomo said he wants to be able to “look New Yorkers in the eye” and say, “We have gone through the project with the best minds on the globe, and this is the best way to do it and the fastest way to do it.”
“I need personally to feel confident in that decision,” Cuomo said. “And frankly, I don’t want to hear it secondhand. I want to see it for myself.”
Cuomo toured the tunnel in an NYC Transit rail inspection car, and was joined by engineers from Columbia and Cornell universities as well as private consultants. The inspection car pulled out of the First Ave. station in Manhattan soon after 12:30 a.m., and returned an hour later.
The governor said he’ll give his experts about three weeks to figure out if there’s a better way to fix the tunnel than the MTA’s current plans.
The MTA says the work is necessary to fix electrical and safety equipment damaged by salt water Sandy pushed into the tunnel. MTA officials originally planned to shut the tunnel for 19 months; they later shortened the plan to 15 months.
“I know there’s a lot of concern about the project,” Cuomo said. “I want to be able to say, once again, everyone who knows how to do this has looked at it, and this is the best way and the fastest way.”
Cuomo was joined on his tour of what’s formally known as the Canarsie Tunnel by Mary Boyce, dean of Columbia University’s Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science; Lance Collins, dean of engineering at Cornell; Sarah Feinberg, an engineering consultant and former administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration; and Charlie Hall of WSP, a longtime MTA consultant and contractor.
MTA executives Pat Foye and Veronique Hakim were also on the tour.
The MTA closed down one side of the tunnel for the track inspection car and ran Manhattan and Brooklyn-bound trains on a single set of tracks. Late-night riders accommodated Cuomo’s visit by waiting 20 minutes between L trains — twice as long as they’d wait under normal service.
Some people delayed by Cuomo’s tour late Thursday and early Friday said they didn’t mind accommodating the governor if it meant a better repair plan.
Williamsburg resident James Macfarlan, 40, said he hoped for a better timeline for the L line. “It might save three months, who knows?” said Macfarlan, who’s planning to escape the shutdown by moving his family to New Jersey.
Late-night traveler Rachelle Rahme, 29, was uncertain that any good would come of Cuomo’s visit so close to the shutdown.
“One visit, just four months shy — it’s not going to really change much,” said Rahme, who lives in East Williamsburg. “I hope it gives him a better idea of what’s going on.”