The report loves finding excuses why it’s not possible: they are squeamish about tunneling under the runways, they are worried an above-ground option would take lanes from the Grand Central Parkway (which a rail link would substitute for at higher capacity), they are worried about federal waivers. But to a significant extent, New York doesn’t even want to build. But in practice, the tunneling environment in question is massively easier than both phases of Second Avenue Subway – there’s plenty of space for cut-and-cover boxes in front of the terminal, a more controllable utilities environment, and not much development in the way of the elevated sections, which are mostly in an industrial zone to be redeveloped. Overall, this is in theory pretty close to $7 billion for a one-third underground extension from Astoria to the airport. There are standard subway : elevated cost ratios out there the ones that emerge from our database tend to be toward the higher end perhaps, but still consistent with a ratio of about 2.5. We know this, because Second Avenue Subway phase 1 was, in today’s money, around $2.2 billion per km, and phase 2 is perhaps a little more. This does not cost $7 billion, not even in New York. Such an extension would be about 4.7 km long and around one third underground, or potentially around 5 km and entirely above-ground if for some reason tunneling under airport grounds were cost-prohibitive. The panel realized that the best option is an extension of the subway. The panel agreed that extending the subway to provide a “one-seat ride” from Midtown was “the optimal way to achieve the best mass transportation connection.” But they added that the engineers that reviewed the options could not find a viable way to build a subway extension to the cramped airport, which is hemmed in by the Grand Central Parkway and the East River.Įven if a way could be found to extend the subway that would not interfere with flight operations at La Guardia, the analysis concluded, it would take at least 12 years and cost as much as $7 billion to build. Washington - said in a statement that they were unanimous in recommending that instead of building an AirTrain or extending a subway line to the airport, the Port Authority and the transportation authority should enhance existing Q70 bus service to the airport and add a dedicated shuttle between La Guardia and the last stop on the N/W subway line in Astoria. The panel’s three members - Janette Sadik-Khan, Mike Brown and Phillip A. Here’s what the above-linked New York Times article says about the rail alignments. The air train option going east of airport grounds was Cuomo’s personal project and, since it went the wrong way, away from Manhattan, it was widely unpopular among anyone who did not work for Cuomo and was for all intents and purposes dead shortly after Hochul took office. All alternatives are depicted as dashed lines the subway extension is depicted in yellow in the same color as the Astoria Line, and would be elevated until it hit airport grounds, while the other two options, depicted as thinner black lines, are people movers or air trains. On my usual base map of a subway system with some lines swapped around to make the system more coherent but no new construction, here are the various rail alignments to the airport:Ī full-size image can be found here. What’s not fine is slapping a $7 billion pricetag on such an endeavor. At New York costs, it’s fine to skip this. I think an elevated extension of the subway to LaGuardia is a neat project, but only at a normal cost, which is on the order of maybe $700 million for a 4.7 km extension, or let’s say $1 billion if it’s mostly underground. It’s an interesting case in which the decision, while bad, is still less bad than the justification for it. A year later, Governor Hochul has proven herself to be not much more competent than Cuomo, differing mainly in that she is not a violent sex criminal.Ĭase in point: the recent reporting that plans for rail to LaGuardia Airport are canceled, and the option selected for future development is just buses, makes it clear that New York can’t build. The effusive language I was using at the time, in 2021 and early 2022, was shared by local advocates for public transportation and other aspects of governance. When Andrew Cuomo was compelled to resign, there was a lot of hope that the state would reset and finally govern itself well.
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