Opinion

The transit threat to new TZ bridge

We’re on schedule to start building a new Tappan Zee Bridge this year — despite unaffordable and impractical demands from mass-transit advocates.

It was just last fall that Gov. Cuomo persuaded President Obama to put the Tappan Zee project on the federal fast-track list, speeding the environmental-approval process and expediting required permits. The Legislature then passed an innovative law that allows design and construction to occur simultaneously, on parallel tracks, rather than sequentially.

Required steps that usually take years have been done in months, including issuance this week of a final Request for Proposals that maps out detailed criteria for bidders competing to design and build the new bridge.

Building the new bridge will create tens of thousands of jobs, increase safety and decrease congestion for millions of drivers — and allow for future mass transit over the new span. But this isn’t enough for some critics.

A handful of elected officials in Westchester and Rockland counties have joined with advocates in calling on the state to also build a separate mass-transit system to stretch for 64 miles across those counties.

But that would cost more than the price tag for the bridge, and neither the state nor the local governments can afford to double the cost of this project. Also, no existing mass-transit system connects to the bridge, so it would be the “transit system to nowhere.”

We’re not ignoring anyone here. Instead, we are ending 10 years of delay and building a new, better bridge that can accommodate future mass transit.

Since the fall of last year, the Thruway Authority has carefully solicited expert input from the MTA, Metro North Railroad, transit advocates and others. Many specific suggestions from these groups have been incorporated into the requirements for the new bridge design, including the space and structural reinforcement needed to accommodate bus rapid transit and future commuter rail.

One day, when a full transit system is designed and built in each county, the bridge’s extra space (including four full lanes in each direction and an extra emergency-access lane) can be used to support future BRT.

But not now; the taxpayers simply can’t afford it. The state faces a $2 billion deficit, and the governor’s budget for this year reduces overall state spending without raising taxes. The sensible thing is just to build now, with a design that will fully accommodate transit in the future, when it’s financially viable.

As it is, demands for Westchester/Rockland mass transit threaten to stall the project. Yet it’s already been mired for more than a decade in a seemingly endless bureaucratic process, with more than 430 public meetings and some $88 million spent on studies. New Yorkers got no real movement on actually building a new bridge, because the taxpayers can’t afford the bridge and 64 miles of new transit corridor.

The Tappan Zee Bridge was built to last just 50 years. Fifty-six years later, it’s still one of the most heavily traveled bridges in our state, crossed by 138,000 vehicles a day. Its accident rate is double the state average; it’s constantly congested, and it’s costing $50 million a year in maintenance. It needs replacing now.

Tom Madison is executive director of the New York State Thruway Authority and the New York State Canal Corp.