Metro-North

This will one day be a Metro-North stop filled with Yankee fans. (Photo by Mark Vergari of The Journal News)

It’s amazing what this city will do for the Yankees.

While a new stadium goes up across the street from venerable Yankee Stadium, the city and its taxpayers are footing the bill for a larger portion of that construction project that anyone likes to admit. Meanwhile, a few hundred yards away, various city agencies are paying $91 million to build the most expensive and largest station ever built by Metro-North.

With a new baseball season upon us and construction at the Yankee Stadium site continuing at a rapid pace, Ken Valenti of The Journal News toured the construction. LoHud.com has some poorly resampled pictures posted of the station under progress. While this concrete platform will soon be a Metro-North crown jewel, for now, things are progressing:

The project has outsized dimensions compared with most Metro-North work. The platforms are 20 to 25 feet wide and 420 feet long, compared with typical platforms 12 feet by 70 feet, Miceli said. Staircases and elevators will connect the platforms with a 10,000-square-foot covered mezzanine, making the walkway accessible to people in wheelchairs. The new walkway will be 25 feet wide, more than twice the width of the one with the curved plastic top, of which only part remains, and connected to the one under construction by the wooden steps. The new walk will make room for 15,000 fans arriving for the start of a game by train and from the parking area…

New York City pitched in $39 million for the project. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority is paying $52 million, but $4 million of that comes from legislative earmarks from Rep. Jose Serrano, D-Bronx, and state Assembly members Carmen Arroyo and Jose Rivera. None of the money came from the Yankees.

Of course, the project is delayed with an anticipated completion date of shortly after Opening day 2009, but would you really expect an on-time delivery here?

My biggest concern with the project is, of course, fiduciary. While the Metro-North stop will benefit the South Bronx neighborhoods surrounding Yankee Stadium, I’m a little dismayed that the Yanks couldn’t toss in a few million dollars to off-set the MTA’s expenditures here. The MTA could use the financial relief, and the Yankees are veritably rolling in dough these days.

But either way, this will certainly be a useful station when it opens next year.

It’s hard to believe that this whole new Yankee Stadium thing is actually happening. I’ve been going to Yankee games for my whole life at Yankee Stadium; my dad has been going to games at Yankee Stadium for his entire life. But come January 2009, the Yanks will be playing in some other stadium called Yankee Stadium with the so-called modern amenities that the House that Ruth Built is supposedly lacking.

While this is a discussion for another blog, one positive part of the new Yankee Stadium plan got off the ground — or should I say underground? — today as Yankee, MTA, city and state officials journeyed up to the Bronx for the Metro-North groundbreaking. The new stop, which I discussed in depth in May, will link the south Bronx area around Yankee Stadium to the popular Metro-North commuter rail network. During non-game hours, the Hudson line will head through this station. During game days, the Hudson, Harlem and New Haven lines will deliver thousands of fans to Yankee Stadium.

NY1 had more about the groundbreaking:

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Governor Eliot Spitzer were among those at a ground breaking Friday for a new commuter train station in the Bronx where Metro-North trains will one day pull up to the new Yankee Stadium. The station is located on the north side of 161st Street in the Bronx.

Officials say the station will be able to accommodate up to 12,000 fans, reducing traffic on the subway and streets. “There’s an awful lot of traffic and there will be even more traffic as time goes on, because more and more people will be coming to these games,” said Bloomberg. “So finding a way that we can get there by mass transit is just as integral of having the stadium as the actual field and the stands.”

The station is set to open in June of 2009, two months after the new stadium. And New York officials are hopeful that it will reduce congestion and traffic around the stadium during game days.

Meanwhile, the social impact of the new station can already be felt in the Bronx. As with any new transportation hub, real estate value is on the rise in the area, and Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion noted that many young families are opting to buy apartments in what hasn’t been a very desirable neighborhood. While some think long-term residents will stick with their trusty automobiles, the congestion fee could very well change those plans.

Yankee fans will enjoy the benefits of this station too, and with fans coming from all over the area, this stop will be a boon for the Yanks and a boon for the area.

The Yankee Stadium Metro-North hub should alleviate some traffic concerns in the Bronx. (Courtesy of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Click the image for a bigger view.)

When last we visited with the Metro-North plans for the new Yankee Stadium, things were not going so well. In fact, the plans, a centerpiece to the new Stadium, were in jeopardy.

But not anymore. This afternoon, the MTA and the City of New York announced that a deal is in place to bring the Metro-North Hub to the new Yankee Stadium site after all. This agreement – complicated in that it details who will pay for the station’s construction, maintenance and operation – calls for the MTA to throw in $52 million and for the City to add $39 million to the project’s $91 million price tag.

According to the MTA, the Authority will pay for the station, ticketing facilities, customer information system and half of the mezzanine. The City will fund the overpass connecting passengers with the stadium concourse areas and the other half of the mezzanine. Metro-North will keep up station operations and maintenance.

Peter Cannito, the head of Metro-North, praised the project. “This new station will be a dream come true for Yankee fans throughout our territory in New York and Connecticut. Moreover, once this station is built, it will also make Metro-North service available to people who live and work in this area of the Bronx,” he said.

And Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff, often the Bad Guy in the Bloomberg Administration’s dealings with the MTA, noted the impact the station will have on the area. “Making the new stadium, as well as the resurgent surrounding South Bronx, accessible to people from around the region via Metro North will be essential to reducing traffic and pollution in the area,” he said.

While operating schedules will be worked out prior to the station’s 2009 opening, the MTA has already developed extensive plans for the hub. The ADA-compliant station will feature two ten-car-length island platforms as well as four staircases and two elevators for the estimated 6000-10,000 fans who will pass through it on the way to Yankee games. From the mezzanine, an overpass will connect to the new stadium concourses and waterfront parks.

On game days, service from all three Metro-North lines – Hudson, Harlem, New Haven – will run through the hub. Otherwise, the Hudson Line will service the stop. Additionally, game day shuttles from Grand Central Terminal and 125th Street will run to the new Stadium stop.

So this news is great for Yankee fans coming out of the city and for residents of the Bronx who will enjoy a tangible benefit from a construction project that otherwise leaves the area in the dust. No longer will Westchester Yankee fans have to go into Manhattan and back up to the Bronx for access to the Stadium.

On the other hand, the $39 million thrown in by the city is just another example of money spent by the city for the new Yankee Stadium. As Neil de Mause has tirelessly documented, the city is actually kicking in a lot more money than was originally reported for the new stadium.

All in all, though, this deal is good news for commuters and great news for Yankee fans.