Comments on: In New York, ARC tunnel could face eminent domain delay

By: Al

Al — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 21:49:43 +0000

Yes it does preclude Alternative G. The new station will have New York Water Tunnel #1 directly in its path, and nothing is going to go through that.

By: Al

Al — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 21:48:19 +0000

In that case, then how come Amtrak has plans to tunnel directly into NY Penn? The preconceptions seem to have been shattered.

By: Al

Al — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 21:46:45 +0000

I think he meant connect via railroad tracks, not passageways. It’s granted that there will be outside access to the deep-level station. This is totally useless to Amtrak.

By: Ray O'Moonshine

Ray O'Moonshine — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 06:47:45 +0000

There is also a passenger tunnel underground paralleling the sixth ave line, running from 40th street to the 34th street station. I think it closed down in the mid 80s.It was not within the area where you needed a token, so I’m betting it was closed because the NYCTA cops wouldn’t protect it and NYC was under budget cuts

By: road n rail man

road n rail man — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:19:44 +0000

That is not accurate. The deep cavern station will connect to Penn Station, the PATH and surrounding subway lines through an underground concourse.

see page six under customer convienience:

http://www.arctunnel.com/pdf/n.....layout.pdf

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 00:25:44 +0000

Well, under Alt P, there’s no connection from the new tunnels to the existing Penn Station. There were plans for one, but they got dropped in a budget cut (the cost has still swollen by a factor of 2).

But there are some ideas to connect the new station with GCT or with East Side Access-GCT, after Water Tunnel 3 is complete. The problem with all those ideas is that they have little operational flexibility. Trains into deep-level Penn would only connect to GCT, and trains into subsurface Penn would only connect to the East River Tunnels.

By: AK

AK — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 21:03:11 +0000

As always, it depends on your perspective. I disagree with you

By: AlexB

AlexB — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 18:41:46 +0000

One thing I find interesting about all this is that choosing the option currently under construction does not preclude also doing option G at any point there is money and political will. They don’t have to extend the ARC and wait until Water Tunnel 3 is finished. They could start planning to connect Penn and Grand Central tomorrow, no? I’d think a wye connection from the tunnels under 33rd St going up to GC would be great, allowing for Metro-North to connect directly to NJ Transit and the LIRR.

By: rhywun

rhywun — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 05:23:32 +0000

It’s hard to see how “public benefit” has any relevance whatsoever after Kelo v. City of New London. Hence, my earlier snark about pretending the land is to be given to developers. That decision has made a mockery of what eminent domain used to stand for.

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 23:24:03 +0000

I’ve read that DEP vetoed Alternative G because it didn’t want construction anywhere near Water Tunnel 1. But I may be wrong there.

The bulkhead is more of an excuse than a real reason. It may be historic, but it’s invisible below ground level; there’s no reason to avoid tunneling through it. And it should be possible to go around it by sticking to paralleling the old pair of tunnels, instead of building a new curvy tunnel. Is it expensive? Yes. Is it more expensive than a new cavern station? Probably not.

I should mention at this point that Alternative S was pretty rotten, too. It called for service to Penn, and for a new tunnel pair connecting Penn and Sunnyside, such that trains from the old Hudson River pair could only use the old East River Tunnels and trains from the new Hudson pair could only use the new East River pair. Beyond the obvious flexibility problems, which were there for G as well, there’s the question of who needs more tunnels from Manhattan to Sunnyside. The East River Tunnels aren’t at capacity, ridership growth isn’t going to put them at capacity, and if anything East Side Access is going to relieve them.