MTA throwing away $600M
2nd Ave. waste amid congest fury
The MTA could potentially find another $600 million in savings in its bloated plans to extend the Second Avenue subway, a Post investigation found — as the agency faces pressure to prove it’ll spend its upcoming congestion toll windfall wisely.
New York is potentially just about three months away from launching a controversial $15 daily charge on cars that drive below 60th Street in Manhattan, raising $1 billion a year for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to spend on projects, such as its expansion of the Q line to East Harlem.
“MTA management is ineffective, and handing more money to unelected bureaucrats will not fix the MTA’s problems,” testified real-estate agent Lucas Callejas, 38, of Inwood, during a public hearing about the congestion-fee plan Monday.
MTA officials announced last month they shaved $300 million off the $6.9 billion total estimate to extend the Q line from its terminus at 96th Street another 1.5 miles up Second Avenue and then westward along 125th Street to Lexington Avenue.
But The Post’s analysis found another $600 million in savings in the MTA’s station designs, when compared to what it would cost to build a similar project overseas.
While the tunneling costs are in line with those of other major cities, such as London and Rome, the station costs and designs remain in an entirely different league, The Post’s analysis revealed.
Before the recently announced trims, the MTA’s budget for tunneling, track work, stations and power, computer and radio systems was estimated to be $4.1 billion. The new, “more efficient” station designs have helped lower the figure to $3.8 billion — still more than the $3.2 billion it cost to build a similar project in London, the most expensive of the European cities examined by The Post, in a worst-case scenario.