NEWARK, N.J. — Rail passengers traveling between New Jersey and New York regularly experience delays of 5 hours, and have lost almost 2,000 hours of time and productivity over the course of a five-year study period.
The Associated Press reports those findings from a study released Monday by the Gateway Program Development Corp., which wants to build a new tunnel under the Hudson River and other infrastructure improvements on the Northeast Corridor tracks shared by Amtrak and NJ Transit.
The study found 85 cases over the five-year period when there were delays of 5 hours or more, or about 1.4 such incidents per month.
Bloomberg reports that the data showed 65 days with major tunnel delays, with 35 percent attributable to power failures, and the rest involving track, signals, and other systems. The 108-year-old Portal Bridge, which often fails to close properly after being opened for boat traffic, accounted for another 18 days of delays. On those days, NJ Transit reported that 27 percent of its trains were late, while more than one-third of Amtrak trains were late. Even Long Island Rail Road trains, which do not use the bridge or tunnel but share Penn Station, experienced delays of 16 percent of its trains.
Bloomberg and AP are just reporting the study, not judging it or researching it. They at least were honest and reported that the Gateway Program Development Corp. has an interest that alerts the reader to understand where the study is coming from. That’s a little better than a lot of what passes for objective reporting these days.
The problem the NYC & northern NJ face is that, while they have some power in DC, the rest of the country isn’t that willing to finance their projects. Big city infrastructure projects financed by the Feds haven’t been that popular elsewhere since the “Big Dig”.
Just read this sentence “…those findings from a study released Monday by the Gateway Program Development Corp., which wants to build a new tunnel under the Hudson River and other infrastructure improvements on the Northeast Corridor tracks shared by Amtrak and NJ Transit.”
Now how unbiased do you think those findings are when the organization that wants to build the tunnels and do the infrastructure improvements is the one doing the reporting. Come on, telemarketing scams are not as easy to detect as this,
Fake exaggerated news.. There’s almost zero river traffic on the Hackensack this bridge hardly opens, and these delays over a 5 year period? Ok whats the actual numbers compared to total commuter miles? Pretty insignificant if you ask me. How about rebuilding the bridge and rebuilding the current tunnels and increasing capacity at penn station and giving commuters a one seat ride to gct instead of this mutltibillion dollar fiasco that has no chance of receiving all the funding needed…
What about highway delays as well? How does this compare to rail delays?
Someone hand me a box of Kleenex please, I’m overcome with the plight of these people.
I understand that it’s a different train, different operator, etc, but what’s going on with Amtrak 5/6? Time keeping has been abysmal, and it looks like both UP and BNSF are dinging it hard…
@Gerald McFarlane
So let me ask you this? If this project never gets accomplished will the US dry up and disappear? Will it be the end of the world? You make it seem as if this project is the end all of the US if it doesn’t get funding..As stated where are there numbers supporting this? How many trains were trains delayed to trains ontime? 1.4 incidents per month is insignificant. Per passenger is per train… These numbers are lumped together so too bad if I didn’t comprehend. I’m sticking with my numbers. This is nothing more than a sensationalist piece to drum up support for a manufactured crisis…Go to railway age’s website and read David Peter Alans piece titled The Gateway? it’s a 6 series read.. https://www.railwayage.com/passenger/part-1-of-6-an-arc-with-no-covenant/
Braden Kayaganich, what you fail to comprehend is that 2000 hours is PER PERSON over a 5 year period, that is a significant drain on the overall economy of the USA, of which 30 – 40% is attributable to the New York/New Jersey area(mostly Wall Street, but still). If everyone thinks this project and the Portal Bridge project I want you all to look at the studies of what would happen should either the twin Hudson tunnels or Portal Bridge go out for any significant length of time. The Depression would seem like a cake walk compared to what would happen to the U.S. economy would look like should that happen…and that has been confirmed even by the CBO, GAO and a few other independent budget hawks in D.C.
@ John Winter. The so called bridge issue is only attribute to .09 percent of delays over a 5 year span. The tunnel delays only attribute to a little over 3.5 percent of delays. Power delays account for 2% over a 5 year period. For a grand total of 6.5% total delays occurred in a 5 year span due to said instances above. 2,000 hrs of delays out of a 5 years span comes to a total of 4.5% delay time.. Yes fake news and grossly exaggerated.. Too bad real journalism is rare these days. Where journalists actually took time and researched first hand these accounts they write on.. Just like Trump says fake news, or like Denzel Washington said..”The media creates news when there is none”..
So Braden, you’re saying the Gateway Program Development Corp. study & Bloomberg & the AP are making this up (fake news)??? Just looking to clarify what part is lying.
Don’t look for NY to do much about it. Too busy creating laws outlawing declawing cats.