The RPA’s Third Regional Plan featured a call for the Triboro RX line that the MTA presented in 2008.
In 1996, the RPA published its Third Regional Plan, and it became the report that launched a thousand fantasy maps. In that massive tome arguing for more transportation investment for the city and region, the RPA set forth the Triboro RX plan. Embraced by then-MTA Executive Director Lee Sander in his 2008 State of the MTA address, this circumferential subway line would utilize preexisting track and right-of-way to connect through outer portions of Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx. It hasn’t, obviously, come to pass.
The Triboro RX’s existence as a fantasy subway line rather than reality isn’t for lack of trying. The MTA knows the plans are out there, as do transit advocates, amateur cartographers and research institutions. But there’s no political champion, and without a political champion, nothing will happen. The 7 line extension will see the light of day because Mayor Bloomberg lined up financing, and the Second Ave. Subway is well on its way to some sort of completion due to a bond vote and guaranteed money from Chuck Schumer and the feds. No such effort materialized in the aftermath of the Third Regional Plan.
Stil, thinking big and thinking long term are two key elements of sustaining and encouraging growth in New York City. Although the next MTA five-year capital plan is likely to be short on expansion efforts and long on systems maintenance and modernization, New York must keep looking long. Sander hoped to see the Triboro RX realized within 40 years, and it could still happen.
Meanwhile, the RPA announced on Friday a fourth regional plan. With a focus on both the overall economy and climate change and the impact shifting weather patterns and ocean levels will have on the region, the RPA will study “growth and sustainability” in New York. Here’s how the Regional Plan Associate describes this effort:
The Fourth Regional Plan for the greater New York region will examine our most pressing challenges, including climate change, fiscal uncertainty and declining economic opportunity for too many residents of the region. The plan will propose policies and investments to ensure our prosperity and quality of life for the coming decades…
RPA believes that the metropolitan region has reached another critical juncture. On the one hand, we have made tremendous advances in the last 20 years. Instead of fleeing our urban areas, residents and businesses are flocking to city centers. Crime has dropped dramatically throughout the region, and we are making key investments in infrastructure after decades of neglect. Abandoned industrial waterfronts have been turned into thriving parks, and threatened open spaces have been preserved.
Yet there is much that threatens our progress. Despite our efforts to curb pollution, we haven’t done nearly enough to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and address the risk posed by climate change. A growing number of the region’s residents can’t find housing they can afford, and many are struggling under growing financial pressure. Much of our infrastructure is deteriorating, and increasingly we lag behind our global peers in implementing new ideas and technology. Our public institutions, plagued by high levels of debt and outdated structures, often fail to address our most pressing long-term needs.
In praising the effort, Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy hit the nail on the head. “A strong economic future requires us to make smart decisions now – to connect transportation, commerce, and housing with an eye on affordability, sustainability and livability,” he said. Those three factors needs to be more closely integrated in major planning efforts in New York City and in the surrounding region.
We don’t yet know plans and proposals will emerge from the Fourth Regional Plan, but it should be grand. The MTA, by virtue of its budgetary constraints, won’t be thinking grand, and politicians can’t see past their own reelection campaigns these days. Maybe something inspiring will come out of the RPA’s efforts. The challenge after that, though, is realizing this dream. After all, Triboro RX is no closer to reality today than it was 17 years ago.
(Franklin Avenue Shuttle)
It’s been six weeks since the MTA raised fares and instituted a $1 fee for all new MetroCard purchases made at a vending machine, and already, straphangers may be starting to change their purchasing patterns. The MTA won’t release official numbers on fare media liability for a few months, but if our eyes are to be believed, the fee is having its intended impact.