When news broke late yesterday of the city’s very preliminary plans to extend the 7 train to Secaucus, New Jersey, everyone was taken by surprise including, it seems, MTA Chair and CEO Jay Walder. In remarks to the press after this morning’s MTA Board meeting, Walder said that Bloomberg officials told him of the plan only “hours” before The Times broke the story. For its part, the city said it had not yet involved MTA officials in its talks because, as Michael Grynbaum put it, “the idea remained in its infancy and that the discussions had not progressed to a point where other agencies would be consulted.”
For his part, though, Walder, speaking as a transit technocrat, embraced the idea. He called it “very exciting” and expressed his belief that the transit system for the New York Metropolitan region must transcend state borders. “One of the things that it really says to us is that the region continues to look at the importance of public transportation to further the economic growth and the prosperity that we want to see,” he said.
Still, we shouldn’t start counting down the days until the MTA readies a tunnel across the Hudson. In addition to the planning challenges, the authority stressed how the dollars for such a project just aren’t there, and the MTA won’t begin the process until other capital plans are realized first. “There is no money,” Walder said, “in our capital program for any megaprojects except the three we have under way.” Until the dollars materialize, this extension will remain a tantalizing idea on paper only.