NEW YORK — Critical funding for the $16 billion Gateway tunnel project, the largest infrastructure project in U.S. history, was made official Monday.
The plan to build two new tunnels under the Hudson River and improve the existing tunnels received a $6.8 billion grant from the federal government.
Work on infrastructure updates was already underway, but the grant allows the hiring of crews to start digging the new tunnels.
Gateway Development Commission CEO Kris Kolluri said work to dig the new tunnels could start before the end of 2024. The goal is to complete the project by 2035.
“The light at the end of the Gateway Tunnel”
New York and New Jersey leaders, including Gov. Kathy Hochul, Gov. Phil Murphy, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Sen. Cory Booker and Rep. Jerry Nadler, attended the announcement. They called it a win for both states.
“Today, I’m proud to say the massive $6.8 billion infusion of federal funds, the light at the end of the Gateway Tunnel, is signed, sealed and delivered,” Schumer said. “The federal share of Gateway is now more than 70%. It’s unheard of. But I’m majority leader. This is New York and we go big.”
“The is a great American project. This region of New York and New Jersey is the most economically productive region in all of America and one of the most economically productive regions in all of the world. Investments here pay dividends,” Booker said.
Nadler said the project will create 95,000 jobs and bring in $20 billion in economic activity.
Hochul criticized for supporting Gateway but pausing congestion pricing
Danny Pearlstein, policy and communications director for the Riders Alliance, criticized the New York governor for supporting the Gateway Project while abandoning congestion pricing.
“Gov. Hochul’s congestion pricing betrayal is wasting time and money. Gateway will cost double the prior tunnel plan that former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie blocked. As the governor cheers one project, her flip flop lost New York the biggest ever federal capital investment grant, which would have built the Second Avenue subway to East Harlem. While wooing suburbanites, who hate her, the governor has abandoned millions of city bus and subway riders, who elected her and are stuck waiting for reliable and accessible public transit,” Pearlstein wrote in a statement.
Just across the street from the signing celebration, protesters said the project will cost them their homes to make way for an expansion train station on the Manhattan side of the Gateway Tunnel.
“We’re here trying to say there’s another way. You don’t have to destroy our block and two other entire blocks and throw out businesses and residents,” 30th Street resident Eugene Sinigalliano said.
