Comments on: Delays, overruns again plaguing Second Ave. Subway

By: MTA Propoganda | Stuff Nobody Cares About

MTA Propoganda | Stuff Nobody Cares About — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 11:18:54 +0000

[...] Street to 72nd Street of the Second Avenue subway would be completed in 2016. It is of course delayed and over budget. If they don’t run out of funds it might be completed by June [...]

By: US Rail Construction Costs | Pedestrian Observations

US Rail Construction Costs | Pedestrian Observations — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 01:29:12 +0000

[...] Avenue Subway Phase 1: $4.9-5.7 billion in 2007-17 for about 3 km of new tunnel. This is $1.7 billion per [...]

By: Nathanael

Nathanael — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 21:53:09 +0000

I still think “phase 2″ will get built; it will just go really slowly.

106th St. Station can be constructed as a single project (since the tunnels are already there).

When it’s done, 116th St. Station can be constructed as a single project (since the southern tunnels are already there).

When it’s done, the pressure for a 125th St. Station will be huge. It’ll be a big project, but the sort which is really attractive to planners… so it will get built too.

Phase 3? I doubt it.

By: Inside the subway station of the future :: Second Ave. Sagas

Inside the subway station of the future :: Second Ave. Sagas — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 04:53:51 +0000

[...] As the MTA’s operations budget sloughs through one of its worst crisis of in New York history, the capital budget is, if not alive and well, still ticking. With a large federal contribution behind it, the Second Ave. Subway work is chugging along, and despite a drill mishap last week that I’ll cover later today, work will be completed by some time in the future. [...]

By: Peter

Peter — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 02:26:07 +0000

For those interested, I write more about the MTA's ability to stick to timelines here on my blog. Peter

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 21:26:59 +0000

Touché.

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:56:54 +0000

Not doing any planning doesn’t actually give you better results.

If you want a workable but maximally spiteful solution, go for zero local content next time. Contract a company with an established track record – i.e. one that isn’t American – and let fly its own contractors in.

By: Larry Littlefield

Larry Littlefield — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:02:13 +0000

“According to Eliot Brown, the FTA has blamed rising construction costs and poor oversight as sources for both the delays and cost increases along Second Ave.”

Construction costs have been falling, in some cases signficantly, since 2007 in the private sector. Why not for the MTA?

As for the delays, I have heard from the inside that they were caused in large part due to unexpected difficulties with utilities in unexpected locations — after spending years and $hundreds of millions on consultants to avoid exactly that.

Next time (if there is a next time), they should just go ahead and start digging, deal with the utilities and design as they go, and not give the consultants a dime.

By: bob

bob — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 14:52:45 +0000

LA has had plenty of controversy and construction problems also. They gave up on building heavy rail for a while. But once a system is actually up and running all that fades into history.

By: bob

bob — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 14:50:42 +0000

We should be grateful to those who built the existing subway system. But they worked under different conditions. They didn’t have restrictions to keep from bothering the local community. The workday was much longer, so you could build a lot more in a month or a year. Labor costs were lower (after inflation). And there were few if any safety regulations – deaths were considered acceptable.

There was a book published a few years back of construction photos from the IND. Take a look at those – what do you think the reaction from the locals would be today? Entire streets were dug up – today SAS construction is required to maintain 3 or 4 lanes of traffic at all times. That alone could easily have added at least 25% to the launch box construction.