Mysore Nagaraja, the head of MTA Capital Construction, has called it quits after two years, and the Daily News speculates that rising capital costs and frequent delays may be a motivating factor in his departure.
Pete Donohue has more:
The MTA official in charge of mega-construction projects, including the LIRR extension to Grand Central Terminal, is leaving – amid concerns about rising costs and delays.
Mysore Nagaraja, 65, president of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Capital Construction Co., is departing at the end of the month to be a private-sector consultant, ending more than two decades with the authority. His knowledge is unsurpassed when it comes to the MTA’s most ambitious construction and system expansion plans, MTA board member Barry Feinstein said. “Losing Mysore is a significant loss.”
I have no intimate knowledge of the situation, and the MTA has yet to issue a release about Nagaraja’s departure. But it’s certainly true that capital projects across the board seem to take longer than expected to complete. Rising costs are as much related to the shaky economy than they are to the man in charge, but if Nagaraja or some institutional issues are causing project delays, a change at the top can sometimes kick start a sagging department.
2 comments
I agree . . . too early to tell if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Also, impossible to tell without a little inside gossip. This has been the year for Bloomberg and Spitzer each to shake up staffs (almost exclusively for the better so far) . . . maybe this is another step in that process . . . or if not, then maybe it will serve as a wakeup call to our leaders to stop nickel and diming the transit system.
Time will tell.
[…] five months ago — an eternity in the world of construction — Mysore Nagaraja left his post as head of MTA Capital Construction. Since then, the MTA has soldiered on with an interim head in place; Veronique Hakim is still just […]