MTA's next megaproject, $2.8 billion Penn Station Access, delayed

The same lack of cooperation by Amtrak that delayed the finally delivered East Side Access megaproject is threatening to hold up the MTA's next major infrastructure effort by as much as nine months, transit officials said Monday.

Known as Penn Station Access, the $2.8 billion project, which aims to bring Metro-North Railroad to the Long Island Rail Road’s original Manhattan home of Penn Station, fell victim to one of the main culprits behind the East Side Access delays — a lack of cooperation from Amtrak, in the form of access to its track and its workers, Metropolitan Transportation Authority officials said.

Project launched last year

The MTA formally launched the Penn Station Access project in January of 2022, and started major construction just last month. Still, MTA Capital Construction president Jamie Torres-Springer, at an MTA Board meeting Monday, said the effort is already “potentially behind schedule” by six-to-nine months, in large part "due to difficulties getting support from Amtrak.”

Much of the construction work for the project is set to take place along Amtrak’s Hell Gate rail line, which stretches from Queens to Westchester County. Because of that, Torres-Springer said, the MTA and its contractors require assistance from Amtrak, both by getting access to its tracks as well as the use of its workers.

Because the MTA’s East Side Access also had delays attributed by project officials to a lack of Amtrak’s cooperation,  MTA officials said they entered into an agreement with Amtrak that detailed the track outages and workers needed. But, Torres-Springer said, Amtrak officials “have been unable to live up to this agreement to date.”

Torres-Springer said Amtrak “acknowledges these problems” and is working with the MTA on putting together a “recovery schedule” to make up the lost time. That schedule could include taking one Amtrak track on the Hell Gate line out of service for up to eight months, starting in March.

Amtrak, in a statement, wrote: "Amtrak and MTA are working closely on this project, and pursuing options to improve the construction schedule."

Vital to finishing project

Joseph DeVito, an independent engineer hired by the MTA to review the project, said the planned track outage is vital “if this construction is to overcome delays while maintaining both passenger and freight service on this line.”

MTA officials said the project also requires more cooperation from freight railroad CSX, which operates in the region. CSX spokeswomen Cindy Schild said Monday that the freight railroad is "fulfilling the terms of the agreements with project stakeholders" and, this past weekend, "went above and beyond these obligations to accommodate an MTA request for additional resources in effort to help advance this project."

The announcement of the setback came just five days after the opening of the Long Island Rail Road’s new Grand Central Madison station — the product of the $11.1 billion East Side Access project, the largest in the MTA’s history, which was once expected to be completed in 2009.

That project, too, required a helping hand from Amtrak, because much of the work took place at the Harold Interlocking junction in Queens, through which Amtrak operates. MTA chairman Janno Lieber said Monday that Amtrak’s lack of cooperation added “probably a billion dollars, maybe more” to the budget of East Side Access.

“This is the dynamic that got East Side Access into the hole,” said Lieber.

MTA and Amtrak eventually reached an agreement and Grand Central Madison, the LIRR's new station on Manhattan's East Side, opened last Wednesday.

Legal recourse

Different from East Side Access, Lieber said the MTA has legal recourse with Penn Station Access, because of the agreement reached with Amtrak for its cooperation before construction began.

“We have legal rights. And none of us wants to exercise them. Amtrak is our partner. And, in fairness, they have been trying to improve,” Lieber said.

Torres-Springer said the agreement with Amtrak called for the "sharing of risk, which does mean the sharing of cost in the end, if cost is incurred."

Although smaller in scale than other transportation megaprojects in the region, Lieber called Penn Station Access the “linchpin” in a broader effort to create a regional rail system, that includes direct connections between LIRR and the MTA's Metro-North trains. The MTA is also planning a $7 billion reconstruction of Penn Station that it wants to complete before Metro-North trains begin arriving at Penn.

Penn Station Access, which is scheduled for completion by 2027, also calls for the construction of four new Metro-North stations in the Bronx. In a statement last month, Gov. Kathy Hochul said the effort "will not only drastically reduce commute times, but it will also help connect hundreds of thousands of residents and boost local economies."

By Alfonso A. Castillo

alfonso.castillo@newsday.com@alfonsoreports

Alfonso Castillo has been reporting for Newsday since 1999 and covering the transportation beat since 2008. He grew up in the Bronx and Queens and now lives in Valley Stream with his wife and two sons.