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Chris Christie kills ARC Train project. Again.

By: Moe Lane (Diary)  |  October 27th, 2010 at 03:00 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Hey, remember the ARC Train project?

For those who don’t keep track of arcane New Jersey political footballs, the project was a long-proposed, long-delayed plan to build an underground light rail tunnel between Newark and NYC.  This project got rushed ahead by former Governor Jon Corzine -

Excuse me for a moment: former Governor Jon Corzine.  That’s still a pleasure to type out.

..who needed something flashy to try to salvage his re-election bid.  Didn’t work; and so Governor Chris Christie (R) came into office facing a program that was going to cost the state of NJ at least 2.7 billion, and probably a good deal more (the state was to be responsible for cost overruns, which were already projecting to be substantial).  So Christie killed the program. 

This freaked out a bunch of people – mostly Democratic politicians, who have difficulty understanding how a person could possibly refuse to spend money – so they got Christie to delay implementation of said program-killing for a couple of weeks.  Senator Frank Lautenberg’s office – which is easily the most prominent Democratic entity involved with this situation – treated that delay as a great and grand victory over the hated Christie: clearly Senator Lautenberg’s office* had made Christie blink.

Ehh.  Not so much. A press release came out today confirming the shutdown of the ARC project, based primarily on the sticking point that “no agreement was reached on terms that would assure New Jersey’s taxpayers would not pay more than $2.7 billion for a completed Trans Hudson Express ARC project.”  The governor didn’t want to be on the hook for anything from 1.1 to 3 billion dollars, particularly in this economic climate, and doubly particularly when it came to New Jersey.  The two weeks turned out to be largely an opportunity for the federal government to come up with some way to salvage the project, and failing.  Which should have surprised nobody – and probably didn’t, professional outrage from the Democratic party to the contrary.

See?  You can refuse to spend money that you don’t have.  Even if you’re a state government.  Who would’ve thought it?

Moe Lane (crosspost)

*I really hope that I’m not giving anything away to anyone by my implicit suggestion here that Senator Lautenberg himself is… not quite himself, these days.

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COMMENTS

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  • zipbags

    Like he ever had it. LOL

    Seriously, I live in NJ and I am glad he stopped this. The state is in so much debt….And we really cannot be in the hole for another 2.7+ billion.

  • mark1957

    Why would anyone want to go to Newark?

  • acat
  • blooch

    plant one of his ARRA signs in front of the next Big Dig?

    I bet you didn’t see that one coming, Barry. See, elections do have consequences.

  • johnt

    the Hudson. If only they had a couple of auto tunnels,, a few bridges, some Path lines for rapid rail transit. If only.
    Oh, there goes another rowboat under the waves. What is wrong with these fat cat Republicans?

  • fpete13527
  • ademintconservative

    are really exciting!

  • Next93

    We’re coming for your governor, Moe. We needed his brains (in the White House). It’s the only way to stave off the coming zombie apocalypse (that’s the one where the Voting Dead put the Wicked Witch back in charge of the house and re-elect Brainiac and Zippy the Pinhead for a second term).

    You have been warned. BWA-ha-ha-ha

  • The_Rebel

    or are not aware of the Big Dig fiasco, it was originally proposed at $2.6 billion and ended up at about $15 billion. If you add in over $7 billion in interest costs, that brings the final tab to $22 billion. One of the tunnels still leaks, and one death has been attributed to a collapsing tunnel ceiling. By the way, this was a union-only project thanks to Massachusetts mandates. The unions are killing us in more ways than one.

  • victrola

    We built a light rail for around $1.5 billion. They did a study, and found out they could buy EACH passenger that actually rides it THREE Priuses and still have money left over.

    We also happen to have the second largest budget problem in the country. Of course a Democrat mayor and Governor were responsible.

    These projects are nothing but gravy trains for unions.

  • kowalski

    The rail transit systems have always and will always be a huge waste of taxpayer money.

    Democrats like railroads, though, for exactly that reason: tremendous sums of taxpayer money wasted on choo-choo trains.

  • kowalski

    Each one of them has to sit there in a cramped environment with whatever freaky government employee is at the helm, in a car that takes them where they were going to go more expensively than if they did so themselves.

    Railroads are nice for things like bauxite and cattle carcasses. They suck for people, but the Donks keep trying to push everyone into them.

  • kowalski

    Each one of them has to sit there in a cramped environment with whatever freaky government employee is at the helm, in a car that takes them where they were going to go more expensively than if they did so themselves.

    Railroads are nice for things like bauxite and cattle carcasses. They suck for people, but the Donks keep trying to push everyone into them.

  • Mark D

    The NJ tunnel project would have added capacity to an existing rail system. The Valley Metro Light Rail was all all new system to alleviate road traffic, something new Priuses would not have done. In addition, the system serves as an economic catalyst for the areas it serves. Downtown Tempe, even in the current economic slump, is seeing a revival due in large part to the light rail line.
    Frankly, the biggest mistake was on Mesa’s part when they wouldn’t fund the line into their downtown. In 30 years Scottsdale will rue their decision to refuse extension to their downtown.

  • victrola

    As far as traffic congestion, it actually takes up a lane of traffic, it goes down surface streets.

    It was a complete boondoggle, and states that have massive deficits have no business building toys like this.

    If it was such a great idea, why are so many cities NOT wanting anything to do with it?

  • outbackjon

    All I could think about when I first heard this story was The Simpsons Monorail episode.

    Monorail Monorail Monorail…

  • http://impudent.edublogs.org/ kyle8

    Big time pork and cost overruns, IN EVERY CASE. And I never saw one system that met projected use or projected revenues.

  • Read Chesterton

    Mostly it’s built between horribly depressed democrat enclaves and bustling commercial centers. The idea is to provide transportation to good jobs for the poor and minority populations. Good, in theory… just like socialism. In practice, employment stays depressed on the democrat enclave side and crime goes way up on the business center side.

  • izoneguy

    http://www.dallasobserver.com/2010-07-22/news/despite-draconian-budget-cuts-dart-continues-to-put-on-a-happy-face/

    So I thought of him again a week ago when DART started doing the pockets-inside-out pantomime?shocked and dismayed to find that it must slash 300 jobs, cut service on all of its rail and bus lines and bring to a squealing halt almost all of its capital program to build new rail lines in the region?the lines that are on the drawing board but not under construction yet.

    And that’s what will happen if the agency’s more optimistic projections prove true. DART staff has informed the DART board of directors that if certain less optimistic projections prove right, the damage and the cuts will be twice as bad.

    Most of the money DART operates on is from sales tax revenues. The fares paid by passengers amount to barely six percent of the budget. More than 75 percent comes from a one-percent sales tax that you pay on every single item you buy within the DART service area. The rest of it pretty much comes from your income taxes.

    Sales tax money is DART’s life-blood. Buy a new car for 18 grand, you just paid DART $180.

    Remember that only two years ago DART had to reveal it had been over-optimistic about the cost of its current building campaign. By how much? In that case DART was over-optimistic by 100 percent.

    They had told the public the cost of completing new rail lines already under construction would be only $1 billion. As it turned out, it was two. Billion.

  • mnlerch

    Chris Christie rocks…and hasn’t forgotten that the original tunnels (still in use) were built entirely with PRIVATE money. Oh, and that private money also paid for the original Penn Station at the same time.

  • mnlerch

    in the early 1900s, they were out to kill the Pennsylvania Railroad, which was the largest private company in the world at the time!

    They love the railroads now since it’s government owned!

  • acat

    Which is why they’re propping up the Chicago El (Elevated / Electric) system and the Chicago Metra suburban system.

    The El has always been city-owned, but Metra’s trains run on private or formerly-private tracks.

    Mew

  • geemen73

    Great job today by our governor, finally someone looking out for the tax payer. Why should New jersey be on the hook for the billions in overrun cost, we could forget any help from NY because they are in worst shape then we are. Christie is doing a great job here, the unions hate him but theres more of us regular people out here then them so whos next, Go get them GOV……Just a ballot note for those in NJ, Constitutional amendment basically saying that the unemployment insurance fund and disabilty fund can no longer be raided for other crap and pet projects the money can soley be used for unemployment and disabilty only.. make sure it gets a yes vote

  • kowalski

    You can’t throw enough money at trains to make them economically viable.

    Therefore the only thing you can do if you want to make them economically viable is make the rest of the transportation options much less economically viable. Then all of a sudden Amtrak will be a bargain.

  • kowalski

    He likes Pabst Blue Ribbon but honestly in his heart of hearts, Joe Biden is a European who likes choo-choo trains He gets a big kick out of riding around on the trains.

    For proof of that the only thing you need to do is drive through Delaware off the Memorial Bridge: for more than 20 years now the State has been taking people’s money going over the bridge and the concrete and bridges have never been replaced. It’s a shambles on a level of the Cross Bronx Expressway in New York.

  • LisaDe

    to have such a terrific gov. He really does stand out dramatically from all the rest of them. He is proving himself to be the real deal.

  • LisaDe

    to have such a terrific gov. He really does stand out dramatically from all the rest of them. He is proving himself to be the real deal.

  • kowalski

    Most people who travel through Delaware from the North or South call it the “Hump State.”

    It’s not the First State, it’s the Hump State. That’s because when you drive through Delaware on I-95 on a per-mile basis you’re subjected to possibly the highest tolls per mile in the whole country.

    And nothing ever gets better there. It’s like an anti-miracle. :)

  • kowalski

    Most people who travel through Delaware from the North or South call it the “Hump State.”

    It’s not the First State, it’s the Hump State. That’s because when you drive through Delaware on I-95 on a per-mile basis you’re subjected to possibly the highest tolls per mile in the whole country.

    And nothing ever gets better there. It’s like an anti-miracle. :)

  • streiff

    and more patronage available in building/repairing roads than there is in rail.

    Light rail is a good idea in a metro area or metro corridor. I don’t know about the economics of rail in AZ but if you took the rail out of NJ/NY you couldn’t build enough roads to handle the cars.

  • streiff

    than building highways. The only reason rail gets slammed is because of how the money is accounted for.

  • geemen73

    When he ran in the primary for gov, the social conservatives were a little unsure about him…but he wasnt the typical republican in the state of NJ running, he wasnt a product of the New Jersey GOP. The state wide Gop had a bad stratagy for years, a social conservative will never win state wide election. Christie is a social conservative, but it wasnt his campaign point, his campaign point was for what hes exactly doing now. I dont know where you live LISADE, but our governor has that Northern NY NJ attitude the blue collar attitude that I have a job to do and it must get dont no matter what and plus he knew he would be in a battle with the unions especially the teachers union but he has the guts to take them head on, and the message with most common sense people in the state excluding the Northeast Liberal is felt by the regular non union people, and there is alot more of us then union members… Hey he threw the president of the njea out of his office because he said we have nothing to discuss, after one of her coherts gave a speech hoping hed die…. So in closing , the social conservative is behind them because they dont see him as the typical northern republican, and the independent which makes up most of the voting block here is behind him because they are pissed at the unions and the property tax and hes doing something about it, but most of all hes putting an end to the cronyism on all fronts with all agencys, and that really makes the majority happy here, so I hope he keeps up the good work…For me personally its his straight no bs english you can understand approach none of this Harvard stuff dancing around like the people on Dancing with the Stars..starightforward.

  • http://realchangeandsense.blogspot.com jamesrileyjr

    … I had wanted it but not for the price. I congratulate our wonderful Governor for his stalwart actions on behalf of fiscal discipline.

    As I indicated in a comment on the Newark Examiner’s site, no one involved in this project made any attempt to give the public a line-by-line cost estimate – it’s always been expected that this will just be another empty tax revenue hole we can shovel money into, while our union friends rake in the dough for the next ten to fifteen years (who knows, maybe it’ll last longer than that!).

    We do need more capacity going into New York Penn Station, but we need to do it economically. Might I point out that the existing rail tubes, all of them, were bought and paid for with private investment? And that, due to overregulation, overtaxation and union strangulation of the railroad industry as a whole, private investment, until those problems are remidied, is likely to run far away from any future railroad projects, no matter how many tax breaks get tossed their way?

    You want a tunnel? Break up, de-fund and privatize Amtrak, de-regulate the railroad industry, remove any kind of taxes on rail lines, railroad equipment, railroad companies and so forth, and MAYBE things will start to pick up again!

  • LisaDe

    but our gov, Mr. Ed Rendell, is miles apart from Christie. There’s not a whole lot to say about him!

  • http://www.2010blog.net jsanzone

    If it were allowed to manifest as a reaction to market forces demanding it. Rail is a great American legacy–and it tends to be rather efficient (see: every other developed nation in the world).

  • Mark D

    They widened the streets to maintain the previous number of lanes, including Apache Blvd/Main St. It addressed traffic density shortcomings along corridors that could not accommodate expanded highway or surface street capacity.
    It has exceeded ridership predictions. You can argue that money could have been spent elsewhere, such as the West or Southeast Valleys, but to call it a “boondoggle” is a stretch.
    Lastly, the ONLY city not interested in expanding the light rail is Scottsdale. Glendale, Phoenix, Mesa and Tempe all want to expand it. Chandler is interested in linking to the system at some point in the future. The reason Scottsdale doesn’t want to expand is twofold:
    1) The disruption caused by construction. Admittedly, this is big. I agree Apache Blvd. was no fun for 2-3 years during construction. Additionally, that disruption winds up driving merchants out of business along the route because customers don’t want to deal with the hassle. That, in my opinion, is a fair argument.
    2) The other reason Scottsdale doesn’t want it is due to a perception of who rides mass transit. They don’t want “those” people moving to the fair city. It’s the same logic why Ahwatukee has no bus service.

  • taxpayer1234

    a long time ago. The U.S. highway system was not intended to be primarily trucking routes. But that changed with the rise of the…Teamsters Union, who grabbed lots of clout for its truckers. And of course helped Washington to finish off the already-hurting railroad industry.

    Light transit will probably never be feasible for any but the largest cities. It would be great to see freight railroads grow again, which would help alleviate a lot the congestion and wear and tear on our roads–and pollution–from truckers. Less truck congestion would make gazillion-dollar light rail projects go away overnight.

  • heir2freedom

    Miracles never cease. Even libs are starting to see the light.

    NEW POST:

    AMERICA THE LAWLESS: WHY OBAMA ORDERED A “HIT” ON ARIZONA
    http://heir2freedom.blogspot.com/2010/10/america-lawless-why-obama-ordered-hit.html