One day, New York metro area transit riders will have a new Penn Station. For now, they have brighter lighting, raised ceilings, and fresh stores\u2014all vast improvements over the commuter rail dungeon with walking-dead atmospherics that replaced the glorious Beaux Arts original. Across the street at the Moynihan Train Hall for Amtrak passengers is a vibrant 21st-century train station: The luminous atrium with a soaring steel and glass roof and a real food court almost make you forget about finding something to sit on.<\/p>\n
But turning Penn Station\u2019s former twilight zone into somewhere fit for waiting won\u2019t mean much if it\u2019s linked to a leaky, 115-year-old rail tunnel. The Gateway Program aims to bring this section of the nation\u2019s rail infrastructure into the 21st century. The Hudson Yards Concrete Casing\u2013Section 3 project<\/a> is a major component of the $16 billion, 2.4-mile Gateway undertaking that will connect Penn Station to the new Hudson River tunnel. It\u2019s scheduled to be completed next year.<\/p>\n More from Gabrielle Gurley<\/a><\/p>\n New tunnels could have been built by now \u2026 but politics. Gateway\u2019s momentum is currently surviving President Trump\u2019s declaration about \u201cterminating\u201d the project along with the Second Avenue Subway Extension in New York City, an unrelated Metropolitan Transportation Authority project. The interruption has been theoretically laid on the doorstep of DEI, namely Gateway\u2019s awarding a certain percentage of public construction contracts to women- and minority-owned companies. But the president also signaled that this move was another set piece in his ongoing vendetta against Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and his failure to capitulate to Republican demands in order to avoid a government shutdown.<\/p>\n To ratchet down the attacks, Gateway project managers will have to start figuring out how to deal with this latest federal directive. How contractors and subcontractors who have executed contracts under the old terms respond adds another layer of complexity.<\/p>\n The first Trump administration didn\u2019t like Gateway either, so for New York and New Jersey, it\u2019s d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu all over again. The signals are still mixed. There have been supportive statements from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, furious backpedaling<\/a> from Department of Transportation spokespeople, topped off by indignant messages from the White House.<\/p>\n Related: Trump keeps overreaching: Will it backfire?<\/a><\/p>\n Yet the fate of Penn Station may hold the key to dealing with the current roadblock.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not unduly fazed by the current standoff,\u201d Andy Byford, the former Metropolitan Transportation Authority president, told<\/a> reporters in New York last week after an address to the New York Building Congress, a construction sector group. \u201cI think there\u2019s a lot of politics there. Let\u2019s see how it plays out.\u201d<\/p>\n Enter \u201cTrain Daddy.\u201d That\u2019s the nickname city transit riders bestowed on Byford during his two-year MTA stint. He now serves as special adviser to the Amtrak board of directors charged with the redevelopment of Penn Station. Since the Department of Transportation and Amtrak took over<\/a> that job from the MTA, Byford has a direct line to the White House.<\/p>\n The Penn Station project aims to select a master developer by next spring and break ground by 2027. Byford told his audience that he reports to the White House. \u201cIf we have someone that\u2019s unduly obstructive or something that\u2019s causing me a problem, even within Amtrak, well, my trump card is the Trump card,\u201d Byford said<\/a>. \u201cIf necessary, I won\u2019t hesitate to say, \u2018Well, we need to get this done. And you\u2019re saying we can\u2019t do it? Do you want to tell him, or shall I? Because I\u2019m not telling him.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n THERE\u2019S A TENDENCY IN CERTAIN CIRCLES to label the Gateway Program a boondoggle\u2014which makes as much sense as arguing that since an old car is still drivable after being flooded with saltwater, you don\u2019t have to replace it. What Gateway\u2019s disparagers usually miss is what makes train travel between the Northeast and the South possible today. Right now, Amtrak and New Jersey Transit can still slowly shunt their trains through an ancient, disintegrating tunnel that the Federal Railroad Administration says<\/a> demands \u201cregular and, occasionally, emergency maintenance.\u201d That\u2019s a testament to the regular feats of engineering and maintenance that keep the tunnel open after Hurricane Sandy floodwaters accelerated corrosion in the passageways 13 years ago. Who knows how long this miracle under the Hudson will hold up.<\/p>\n The two states on the front lines are desperately working across party lines to get and keep the money to overhaul this vital linchpin of the country\u2019s passenger rail system. Both New Jersey gubernatorial candidates, Democrat Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli, support Gateway. They\u2019d each face potential difficulties with Washington that could complicate their lives in Trenton. Sherrill would have to decide how she wants to handle the inevitable provocations; Ciattarelli couldn\u2019t be too much of a sycophant.<\/p>\n Zohran Mamdani, the presumptive 111th mayor of New York, the man who Trump expects to win<\/a>, has no dollars on the table. But like Sherrill, he has to decide what a defensive posture looks like in general and on transportation (and a host of other issues) in particular.<\/p>\n There\u2019s another state leader who\u2019s less of a wild card. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) has emerged as the state\u2019s ultimate Trump-whisperer. She has had a fair amount of success reining in the president\u2019s excesses and reinstating<\/a> funding cuts. Hochul has been blunt<\/a> about Gateway: \u201cWe need to replace them because if this system of transportation collapses, the Northeastern economy and the economy of the country collapses.\u201d<\/p>\n The administration has stopped<\/a> other transit funding grants from moving forward before<\/a> and since<\/a> the shutdown. Most of the Gateway Program\u2019s funding, about 70 percent<\/a>, originates with the federal government. New York, New Jersey, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey must raise the remaining 30 percent.<\/p>\n The federal government has also committed<\/a> nearly $7 billion to Gateway through the New Starts Capital Investment Grants program and about $4 billion through the Federal-State Partnership for Intercity Passenger Rail (FSP) program. These grants are reimbursable, so the question is whether the entities involved can get their money back once they submit requests to the Department of Transportation.<\/p>\n It would be difficult for New York and New Jersey to replace the grant funding. When California\u2019s high-speed rail project lost $4 billion in unspent federal funding in July, state officials turned around and decided to use $1 billion annually in cap-and-trade program revenues<\/a> on the rail project. It\u2019s also beyond the current capacity of New York and New Jersey to maintain their state\u2019s transportation portfolio and fund Gateway as well. There are no obvious funding sources that can generate billion-dollar revenue levels, as cap-and-trade does for California or congestion pricing does for the MTA, also about $1 billion annually.<\/p>\n