Maloney Says Feds To Give More $$ For 2nd Ave. Subway
BY JOHN TOSCANO

“It’s full steam ahead for the Second Avenue Subway and East Side Access. This is truly an exciting time for New York transportation advocates and for the millions of New Yorkers who take mass transit every day...”—Maloney

Congressmember Carolyn Maloney hailed a new federal report released last week which will send “hundreds of millions” in federal funding to two major transportation projects in her Congressional district, East Side Access and the Second Avenue Subway.

Following the release of the report by the Federal Transit Administration the Queens/Manhattan lawmaker declared: “It’s full steam ahead for the Second Avenue Subway and East Side Access. This is truly an exciting time for New York transportation advocates and for the millions of New Yorkers who take mass transit every day.We are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel for these two long-awaited and desperately needed projects.”

The Fiscal Year 2007 New Starts report, released by the FTA last Thursday, recommends $300 million in federal funding for the East Side Access project, which would, for the first time, bring Long Island Rail Road train service into Grand Central Station on Manhattan’s East Side. Until now, the only LIRR terminal in Manhattan has been at Penn Station on the West Side.

The report also announced that the FTA expects to deliver $102 million for the Second Avenue Subway, which will operate from 125th Street to Lower Manhattan along Second Avenue. The $102 million will be divided among four other projects, Maloney said.

According to the report, Maloney said, the FTA expects to execute a full funding grant agreement for East Side Access this year, which would bring a projected $2.6 billion more to the project, and to approve a final design request for the Second Avenue Subway in the next few months.

Once the final design for the Second Avenue Subway is approved, Maloney said, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) can negotiate a full funding grant agreement for the project with the FTA, which would bring an estimated $1.3 billion more to the subway project.

The East Side Access project has been in progress for several years in Long Island City, where full scale preliminary work has taken place, including necessary track realignment installing and system controls that will bring LIRR trains to the West Side of Manhattan.

The project also calls for a new LIRR station stop in Sunnyside on Queens Boulevard near the Sunnyside train yards. This will serve thousands of commuters who travel into Manhattan every day.

Maloney recently helped secure $340 million in federal funds for the project, which will also receive $450 million from a bond act passed by voters last Election Day.

The New York City delegation in Congress has secured more than $600 million in federal aid since the project was announced in 1998. New York state has contributed $1.5 billion to the project.

Construction of the Second Avenue Subway is planned in four phases. Besides the funding announced in the FTA report, Maloney’s efforts netted the project $36.5 million in federal funding in the past six years. At the same time, the state has contributed $1.5 million. These funds have placed the MTA in a strong position to negotiate a full funding agreement with the FTA for the first phase of construction for the new subway line.

The full funding agreement, Maloney explained, will ensure that there is a federal match for state dollars spent on the project, which will add billions of dollars more.

According to Maloney, in the latest FTA report on the new underground line, the agency stated, it believes that the project should receive special funding consideration because it has earned a “Highly Recommended” rating, and the state and local financial investment in the project is unusually large.