Riding out a transit tempest: they may fuss about fares, but New Yorkers are getting an increasingly safe, swift, and steady run for their money on an urban railway of staggering dimensions - and growing

Railway Age,  June, 2003  by Luther S. Miller

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Proposals to build a north-south subway line along Second Avenue have been floating around since 1929. East Side commercial and residential development mandated the dismantling of the Second Avenue El in 1942 and the Third Avenue El in 1956, leaving the Lexington Avenue Subway (now lines 4,5, and 8) to serve fast-growing population centers. In the 1960s, during the heady days of the Wholly Ronan Empire (presided over by the visionary Dr. William J. Ronan, an economics professor at New York University and Gov. Nelson Rockefeller's transportation guru), plans were revived and put on a fast track for a subway line extending from the Bronx to lower Manhattan. Several tunnel segments were constructed before a financial crisis, which threatened to push the city into bankruptcy, put the digs on hold and very soon into mothballs. But the need persisted, and in 1995 NYC Transit launched the Manhattan East Side Alternatives (MESA) Study with the objective of relieving congestion on the Lexington Avenue Line and providi ng easier mass transit accessibility for residents on the Far East Side of Manhattan. MTA's current capital program allocated $1.05 billion for the Second Avenue Subway. It will extend from 125th Street to the Financial District in Lower Manhattan.

It takes a heap of consultants to make a hole in the ground a home for the transient masses. The number of environmental consultants alone working on the Second Avenue Subway underscores the complexity of such an undertaking and the opportunities opened up for the supply side of the transit business. The list begins with Vollmer Associates LLP (prime consultant/conceptual engineering studies) and ends with SYSTRA Consulting (heavy rail engineering and planning services).

COPYRIGHT 2003 Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation
COPYRIGHT 2003 Gale Group