Transportation in New York City

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The transportation system of New York City is one of the most complex of any city in the United States. It includes the largest subway network in the world by track mileage, the longest suspension bridge in North America, the world's first mechanically ventilated vehicular tunnel and an aerial tramway that transports commuters between Roosevelt Island and Manhattan. Along with its size and variety, the city's transport infrastructure is also beset with ongoing congestion, reliability, and funding challenges.

New York is distinguished from other American cities by its significant use of public transportation. While nearly 90% of Americans drive to their jobs, public transit is the overwhelmingly dominant form of travel for New Yorkers.^[1] About one in every three users of mass transit in the United States and two-thirds of the nation's rail riders live in New York and its suburbs.^[2] New York City is the only locality in the United States where more than half of all households do not own a car (the figure is even higher in Manhattan, over 75%; nationally, the number is 8%).^[1]

Contents 1 Environment and social issues 1.1 Commuting 1.2 Pedestrians and bicycles 2 Rapid transit 2.1 New York City Subway 2.2 PATH 2.3 Airport services 3 Railways 3.1 Commuter rail 3.2 Intercity rail 4 Buses 5 Ferries 6 Aerial tramway 7 Roads 7.1 Street grid 7.2 Bridges and tunnels 7.3 Expressways 7.4 Taxis 7.5 Semi-formal 8 Airports 9 Seaports 10 Other infrastructure 11 Future and proposed projects 12 See also 13 Further reading 14 References 15 External links

[edit] Environment and social issues

New York City's uniquely high rate of public transit use makes it one of the most energy-efficient cities in the United States. Gasoline consumption in the city is at the rate of the national average in the 1920s.^[3] Researchers have found that of the 50 largest cities in the United States, New York is best positioned to endure an oil crisis with an extended gasoline price shock in the $3 to $8 dollar per gallon range.^[4]

The city's transportation system, and the population density it makes possible, also have other effects. Scientists at Columbia University examined data from 13,102 adults in the city's five boroughs and identified correlations between New York's built environment and public health. New Yorkers residing in densely populated, pedestrian-friendly areas have significantly lower body mass index (BMI) levels compared to other New Yorkers. Three characteristics of the city environment -- living in areas with mixed residential and commercial uses, living near bus and subway stops and living in population-dense areas -- were found to be inversely associated with BMI levels.^[5]

See also: Environmental issues in New York City

[edit] Commuting

Of all people who commute to work in New York City, 32% use the subway, 25% drive alone, 14% take the bus, 8% travel by commuter rail, 8% walk to work, 6% carpool, 1% use a taxi, 0.4% ride their bicycle to work, and 0.4% travel by ferry.^[6] 54% of households in New York City do not own a car, and rely on public transportation.^[7] While car culture dominates in most American cities, mass transit has a defining influence on New York life. The subway is a popular location for politicians to meet voters during elections and is also a major venue for musicians. Each week, more than 100 musicians and ensembles -- ranging in genre from classical to Cajun, bluegrass, African, South American and jazz -- give over 150 performances sanctioned by New York City Transit at 25 locations throughout the subway system.^[8]

New York City compared
Texas Transportation Institute Data	New York	Los Angeles	chicago
Surveyed metro population	17.7 million	12.5 million	9.8 million
Annual congestion delay per person	23 hrs	50 hrs	37 hrs
Annual congestion cost per person	$383	$855	$631
Rush hours per day	6 hrs	8 hrs	8 hrs
Annual passenger miles of travel on public transit	18.5 billion	2.8 billion	2.2 billion
Annual congestion cost saved by public transit	$4.9 billion	$2.2 billion	$1.3 billion
Excess fuel consumed per person due to congestion	11 gal	33 gal	23 gal
Data from 2003 TTI Urban Mobility Report

As of 2000, 3.7 million people were employed in New York City; Manhattan is the main employment center with 56% of all jobs.^[9] Of those working in Manhattan, 30% commute from within Manhattan, while 17% come from Queens, 16% from Brooklyn, 8% from the Bronx, and 2.5% from Staten Island. Another 4.5% commute to Manhattan from Nassau County and 2% from Suffolk County on Long Island, while 4% commute from Westchester County. 5% commute from Bergen and Hudson counties in New Jersey.^[9] Some New Yorkers reverse commute to the suburbs: 3% travel to Nassau County, 1.5% to Westchester County, 0.7% to Hudson County, 0.6% to Bergen County, 0.5% to Suffolk County, and smaller percentages to other places in the metropolitan area.^[9]

[edit] Pedestrians and bicycles

Utility cycling is a growing mode of transport in New York City. An estimated 120,000 city residents travel to work by bicycle and make 400,000 trips each day, equivalent to the number of the ten most popular bus routes in the city.^[10] The City Department of Transportation estimates there are an additional two in-line skaters for every cyclist in New York. The city has 119 miles of bike lanes including the Manhattan Waterfront Greenway and has in recent years expanded protected bike lanes on major thoroughfares and on bridges across the East River. More than 500 people annually work as bicycle rickshaw drivers, who in 2005 handled one million passengers.^[11] The city also annually presents the largest recreational cycling event in the United States, the Five Boro Bike Tour, in which 30,000 cyclists ride 42 miles through the city's boroughs.

Walk and bicycle modes of travel account for 21% of all modes for trips in the city; nationally the rate for metro regions is about 8%.^[12] In 2000 New York had the largest number of walking commuters among large American cities in both total number and as a proportion of all commuters: 517,290, or 5.6%.^[13] By way of comparison, the next city with the largest proportion of walking commuters, Boston, had 119,294 commuter pedestrians, amounting to 4.1% of that city's commuters.^[13]

[edit] Rapid transit

By far the dominant mode of transportation in New York City is mass transit. Only 6% of shopping trips in Manhattan's Central Business District involve the use of a car.^[14] The city's public transportation network is the most extensive and among the oldest in North America. Responsibility for managing the various components of the system falls to several government agencies and private corporations. The largest and most important is the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), a New York state government agency, which runs all of the city's subways and buses and two of its three commuter rail networks. Ridership in the city increased 36% to 2.2 billion annual riders from 1995 to 2005, far outpacing population growth.^[15] Average weekday subway ridership was 5.076 million in September 2006, while combined subway and bus ridership on an average weekday that month was 7.61 million.^[16]

[edit] New York City Subway

Main article: New York City Subway

The New York City Subway is the largest rapid transit system in the world when measured by track mileage (656 miles, or 1,056 km of mainline track), and the fourth-largest when measured by annual ridership (1.4 billion passenger trips in 2005).^[2] It is the second-oldest subway in the United States after the system in Boston. In 2002, an average 4.8 million passengers used the metro each weekday. During one day in September 2005, 7.5 million daily riders set a record for ridership. Life in New York City is so dependent on the subway that the city is home to two of only three 24-hour subway systems in the world.^[17] The city's 26 subway lines run through all boroughs except Staten Island, which is served by the Staten Island Railway.

Subway riders pay with the MetroCard, which is also valid on all other rapid transit systems and buses in the city, as well as the Roosevelt Island tramway. Fares are loaded electronically on the card. In the future all New York-area transit systems will use a new, standardized "contactless" payment system similar to the Octopus Card in Hong Kong, which is a RFID-Type smart card with a computer chip that can be read by turnstiles without requiring passengers to swipe.

[edit] PATH

Main article: Port Authority Trans-Hudson

The Port Authority Trans-Hudson (PATH) is a rapid transit system linking Manhattan and Jersey City, Hoboken, Harrison, and Newark in New Jersey. The primary transit link between Manhattan and New Jersey, PATH carries 240,000 passengers each weekday on four lines.^[18]

While some PATH stations are adjacent to subway stations in New York City and Newark as well as Hudson-Bergen Light Rail stations in New Jersey, there are no free transfers. The PATH system spans 13.8 miles (22.2 km) of route mileage, not including track overlap.^[19] Like the New York City Subway, PATH operates 24 hours a day. Opened in 1908 as the Hudson and Manhattan Railroad, a privately owned corporation, PATH since 1962 has been operated by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

[edit] Airport services

Main articles: AirTrain JFK and AirTrain Newark

Kennedy and Newark airports are served by intermodal rail systems. AirTrain JFK is an 8.1 mile (13 km) rapid transit system that connects Kennedy to New York's subway and commuter rail network in Queens. It also provides free transit between airport terminals. For trips beyond the airport the train costs $5. Roughly 4 million people rode the AirTrain to and from Kennedy in 2006, an increase of about 15% over 2005.^[20] AirTrain Newark is a 1.9 mile (3 km) monorail system connecting Newark's three terminals to commuter and intercity trains running on the Northeast Corridor rail line.

[edit] Railways

[edit] Commuter rail

Main articles: Long Island Rail Road, Metro-North Railroad, and New Jersey Transit

New York City's commuter rail system is the most extensive in the United States, with about 250 stations and 20 rail lines serving more than 150 million commuters annually in the tri-state region.^[21] Commuter rail service from the suburbs is operated by two agencies. The MTA operates the Long Island Rail Road on Long Island and the Metro-North Railroad in the Hudson Valley and Connecticut. New Jersey Transit operates the rail network on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River. These rail systems converge at the two busiest train stations in the United States, Penn Station and Grand Central Terminal, both in Manhattan.

[edit] Intercity rail

Main article: Northeast Corridor

Intercity train service from New York City is provided by Amtrak. 54 trains run each day on the busiest route, New York to Philadelphia. For trips of less than 500 miles to other Northeastern cities Amtrak is often cheaper and faster than air travel. Amtrak accounts for 47% of all non-automobile intercity trips between New York and Washington, D.C. and about 14% of all intercity trips (including those by automobile) between those cities.^[22] Amtrak's high-speed Acela trains run from New York to Boston and Washington, D.C. using titling technology and fast electric locomotives. This route, known as the Northeast Corridor, accounts for about half of Amtrak's total national ridership.^[23]

New York City's Penn Station is the busiest Amtrak station in the United States by annual boardings. In 2004 it saw 4.4 million passenger boardings, more than double the next busiest station, Union Station in Washington, D.C.^[24]

Major destinations with frequent service include Albany, New York, Baltimore, Boston, Montreal, Canada, New Haven, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. There are also trains to Upstate New York, New England and destinations in the South and Midwest.

[edit] Buses

Main article: Buses in New York City

New York City's bus network is extensive, with approximately 5,800 buses carrying about 2.01 million passengers every day on more than 200 local routes and 30 express routes.^[25] Buses owned by MTA account for 80% of the city's surface mass transit.^[2] New York City has the largest clean air diesel-hybrid and compressed natural gas bus fleet in the United States.^[25]

Buses are labeled with a number and a prefix identifying the primary borough (B for Brooklyn, Bx for the Bronx, M for Manhattan, Q for Queens, and S for Staten Island). Express buses use the letter "x" rather than a borough label.

The Port Authority Bus Terminal, near Times Square, is the busiest bus station in the United States and the main gateway for interstate buses into New York City. The terminal serves both commuter routes, mainly operated by New Jersey Transit, and national routes operated by companies such as Greyhound and Peter Pan. The terminal, with direct intermodal links to 12 subway lines, is used by 200,000 people on an average weekday. About 7,200 buses arrive and depart the terminal each day.^[26]

[edit] Ferries

The busiest ferry in the United States is the Staten Island Ferry, which annually carries over 19 million passengers on the 5.2 mile (8.4 km) run between Staten Island and Manhattan. Service is provided 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and takes approximately 25 minutes each way. Each day approximately five boats transport almost 65,000 passengers during 104 boat trips. Over 33,000 trips are made annually.^[27] The fare was eliminated in 1997 and the Ferry has remained free since then. The charge for vehicles is $3, though vehicles have not been allowed on the Ferry since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Bicycles are allowed on the lower level for free. The ferry ride is a favorite of tourists as it provides excellent views of the Lower Manhattan skyline and the Statue of Liberty.

New York has several privately run ferry services. Among the major companies are NY Waterway, which operates several routes from New Jersey across the Hudson River to Manhattan; SeaStreak, which provides service from Monmouth County, New Jersey to Manhattan; and New York Water Taxi, which runs lines connecting Brooklyn and Queens to Manhattan.

See also: Staten Island Ferry

[edit] Aerial tramway

Main article: Roosevelt Island Tramway

Built in 1976 to shuttle island residents to Midtown, the Roosevelt Island Tramway was originally intended to be temporary until the Roosevelt Island subway station opened. When the subway finally connected to Roosevelt Island in 1989, the tram was too popular to discontinue.

The Tramway was built by the Swiss company Vonroll and is operated by the Roosevelt Island Operating Corp (RIOC). Each cable car has a capacity of 125 passengers. The tramway's maximum height as it crosses the East River is 250 feet. Travel time from Roosevelt Island to Manhattan is just under five minutes and the fare is the same as a subway ride.

In 2006, service was suspended on the tramway for six months after a service malfunction that required all passengers to be evacuated. On April 18, 2006, two trams were stuck over the East River for seven hours, trapping 69 passengers. The tramway was back in operation in September 2006.

[edit] Roads

Despite New York's reliance on public transit, roads are a defining feature of the city. Manhattan's street grid plan greatly influenced the city's physical development. Several of the city's streets and avenues, like Broadway, Wall Street and Madison Avenue are also used as shorthand in the American vernacular for national industries located there (in the case of theater, finance, and advertising respectively).

[edit] Street grid

Main article: Commissioners' Plan of 1811

Formulated in the Commissioners' Plan of 1811, New York adopted a visionary proposal to develop Manhattan north of 14th Street with a regular street grid. The economic logic underlying the plan, which called for twelve numbered avenues running north and south, and 155 orthogonal cross streets, was that the grid's regularity would provide an efficient means to develop new real estate property. Governor DeWitt Clinton, one of the proposal's designers, also advocated use of surveying principles and Cartesian linear perspective as a means to discipline the mind and encourage the masses to think rationally. Among the grid's greatest critics was Frederick Law Olmstead, the designer of Central Park, who argued that the grid valued economic utility above aesthetics. Manhattan's avenues run north and south, and its streets east and west.

See also: Geography and environment of New York City

[edit] Bridges and tunnels

Main article: Bridges and tunnels in New York City

The bridges of New York City, necessitated by its archipelago geography, are notable for their scale and historical significance. With its Gothic-revival double-arched towers and diagonal suspension wires, the Brooklyn Bridge is one of the city's most recognized architectural structures, depicted by artists including Hart Crane and Georgia O'Keefe. Designed by John Roebling, the Bridge was the first link between Manhattan and the land mass of Long Island. Its main span of 1,596'6" was the longest in the world when it was completed in 1883. The Williamsburg Bridge and Manhattan Bridge are the two others in the triumvirate of architecturally-notable East River crossings. The Queensboro Bridge, which links Manhattan and Queens, is an important piece of cantilever bridge design. The borough of Staten Island was connected to Brooklyn in 1964 with the completion of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, the longest suspension bridge in North America. Its towers, which rise 650 feet above the water, are 4,260 feet apart. The bridge is large enough that the towers are 1 5/8 inches farther apart at their tops than their bases, due to the curvature of the earth.

New York has historically been a pioneer in tunnel construction. The Lincoln Tunnel, which carries 120,000 vehicles per day under the Hudson River between New Jersey and Manhattan, is the world's busiest vehicular tunnel. The Holland Tunnel, also under the Hudson River, was the first mechanically ventilated vehicular tunnel in the world and is considered a National Civil Engineering Landmark by the American Society of Civil Engineers. The Lincoln and Holland tunnels were built instead of bridges to allow for the free passage of large passenger and cargo ships. Soon after the Holland Tunnel was opened in 1927, support grew for a tunnel under the East River to relieve congestion on the bridges connecting Manhattan with Queens and Brooklyn. When it was completed in 1940, the Queens Midtown Tunnel was the largest non-Federal project of its time. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the first person to drive through it. In 1950, the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel was opened to traffic. At 9,117 feet (2,779 meters), it is the longest underwater tunnel in North America.

[edit] Expressways

Main article: Expressways in New York City

A less favored alternative to commuting by rail and boat is the New York region's outdated and congested expressway network, designed by Robert Moses. The city's extensive network of expressways includes four primary Interstate Highways: I-78, I-80, I-87 and I-95. I-278 serves as a partial beltway around the city. The Long Island Expressway begins at the Queens Midtown Tunnel and runs through the heart of Queens east into the Long Island suburbs.

Also designed by Robert Moses are a series of limited-access parkways. Originally designed to connect New York City to its more rural suburbs, they have become heavily-used thoroughfares in their own right, despite the fact that they were designed from the outset to only carry cars. The FDR Drive and Harlem River Drive are two such routes through Manhattan. The Bronx River Parkway and Hutchinson River Parkway link the Bronx to nearby Westchester County and its parkways, and the Grand Central Parkway and Belt Parkway provide similar functions for Long Island's parkway system.

[edit] Taxis

Main article: Taxicabs of New York City

There are 13,087 taxis operating in New York City, not including over 40,000 other for-hire vehicles.^[28] Their distinctive yellow paint has made them New York icons. John D. Hertz started the Yellow Cab Company in 1915, which operated in a number of cities including New York. Hertz painted his cabs yellow after he read a study identifying yellow as the most visible color from long distances. In 1967, New York City ordered all "medallion taxis" be painted yellow.^[29]

Taxicabs are operated by private companies and licensed by the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission. "Medallion taxis," the familiar yellow cabs, are the only vehicles in the city permitted to pick up passengers in response to a street hail. A cab’s availability is indicated by the lights on the top of the car. When just the center light showing the medallion number is lit, the cab is empty and available. When no lights are lit, the cab is occupied by passengers.

Fares begin at $2.50 ($3.00 after 8pm, and $3.50 during the peak weekday hours of 4-8pm) and increase based on the distance traveled and time spent in slow traffic. The passenger also must pay the fare whenever a cab is driven through a toll.^[30] The average cab fare in 2000 was $6; over $1 billion in fares were paid that year in total.^[29]

241 million passengers rode in New York taxis in 1999. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, of the 42,000 cabbies in New York 82% are foreign born: 23% from the Caribbean (the Dominican Republic and Haiti), and 20% from South Asia (India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh).

In 2005, New York introduced incentives to replace its current yellow cabs with electric hybrid vehicles such as the Toyota Prius and Ford Escape Hybrid.^[31]

[edit] Semi-formal

New York has many forms of semi-formal public transportation, including "dollar vans" and "Chinese vans." Dollar vans serve major corridors in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx that lack adequate subway service. In 2006, the New York City Council began debate on greater industry regulation, including requiring all dollar vans to be painted in a specific color to make them easier to recognize, similar to the public light buses in Hong Kong.^[32] The vans pick up and drop off anywhere along a route, and payment is made at the end of a trip.

Similar to dollar vans, Chinese vans serve predominantly Chinese and other East Asian communities in Brooklyn's Chinatown, Manhattan's Chinatown, Elmhurst and Flushing.

There are also highly competitive Chinatown bus lines operating routes from New York City's Chinatowns to other Chinatowns in the Northeast, with frequent service to major cities like Boston and Philadelphia. These bus companies use full-size coaches and offer fares much lower than traditional carriers like Greyhound.

There are numerous other transportation services in the city, including RightRides, a free car service operated by a nonprofit that shuttles women home from bars and parties on Saturday nights from midnight to 3 a.m. in Manhattan, Queens, and Brooklyn. RightRides uses vehicles donated by Zipcar, a membership-based carsharing company providing hourly or daily car rentals in New York City to its members, who often do not own cars.

[edit] Airports

Main article: Aviation in New York City

New York City is the top international air passenger gateway to the United States.^[33] 100 million travelers used the city's airports in 2005; New York is the busiest air gateway in the nation.^[34]

The city is served by three major airports, Kennedy (also known as JFK), Newark and LaGuardia. Teterboro serves as a primary general aviation airport. JFK and Newark both connect to regional rail systems by a light rail service.^[35]

JFK and Newark serve long-haul domestic and international flights. The two airports' outbound international travel accounted for about a quarter of all U.S. travelers who went overseas in 2004.^[36] LaGuardia caters to short-haul and domestic destinations.

JFK is the major entry point for international arrivals in the United States and is the largest international air freight gateway in the nation by value of shipments.^[37] About 100 airlines from more than 50 countries operate direct flights to JFK. The JFK-London Heathrow route is the leading U.S. international airport pair.^[38] The airport is located along Jamaica Bay near Howard Beach, Queens, about 12 miles east of downtown Manhattan.

Newark was the first major airport serving New York City and is the fifth busiest international air gateway to the United States.^[33] Amelia Earhart dedicated the Newark Airport Administration Building in 1935, which was North America's first commercial airline terminal. In 2003, Newark became the terminus of the world's longest non-stop scheduled airline route, Continental's service to Hong Kong. In 2004, Singapore Airlines broke Continental's record by starting direct 18-hour flights to Singapore. The airport is located in Newark, New Jersey, about 12 miles west of downtown Manhattan.

LaGuardia, the smallest of New York's primary airports, handles domestic flights. It is named for Fiorello H. LaGuardia, the city's great Depression-era mayor known as a reformist and strong supporter of the New Deal. A perimeter rule prohibits incoming and outgoing flights that exceed 1,500 miles (2,400 km) except on Saturdays, when the ban is lifted, and to Denver, which has a grandfathered exemption. As a result, most transcontinental and international flights use JFK and Newark.^[39] The airport is located in northern Queens about 6 miles from downtown Manhattan.

Manhattan has three public heliports, used mostly by business travelers. A regularly-scheduled helicopter service operates flights to JFK Airport from the Downtown Manhattan Heliport, located at the eastern end of Wall Street.

See also: Transportation to New York City area airports

[edit] Seaports

The New York Harbor, with its natural advantages of deep water channels and protection from the Atlantic Ocean, has historically been one of the most important ports in the United States. Built in 1648 by Governor Peter Stuyvesant, the port grew rapidly with the introduction of steamships and especially with the completion in 1825 of the Erie Canal, which made New York the most important connection between Europe and the American heartland. By the mid 19th century, more passengers and products came through the Port of New York than all other harbors in the country combined. In 1944, at the height of World War II, the New York port was the busiest in world history.

The Port of New Jersey and New York is now the third busiest in the United States, behind Los Angeles and Long Beach, California. Each year, more than 25 million tons of oceanborne general cargo moves through New York, including 4.5 million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent units) of containerized cargo. In 2005 more than 5,300 ships delivered goods to the port that went to 35% of the U.S. population.^[40] The port is experiencing rapid growth. Shipments increased nearly 12% in 2005. There are three cargo terminals and a passenger terminal on the New York City side of the harbor, including the Howland Hook Marine Terminal, Red Hook Container Terminal, Brooklyn Marine Terminal, and New York Cruise Terminal; three additional cargo terminals are on the New Jersey side.

The Port of New York is also a major hub for passenger ships. More than half a million people depart annually from Manhattan's cruise ship terminal on the Hudson River, accounting for five percent of the worldwide cruise industry and employing 21,000 residents in the city. The Queen Mary 2, the world's second largest passenger ship and one of the few traditional ocean liners still in service, was designed specifically to fit under the Verrazano Bridge, itself the longest suspension bridge in the United States. The Queen Mary 2 makes regular ports of call on her transatlantic runs from Southampton, England. The city is building a new cruise ship terminal in Red Hook, Brooklyn.

Originally focused on Brooklyn's waterfront, especially at the Brooklyn Army Terminal in Sunset Park, most container ship cargo operations have shifted to the Port Newark-Elizabeth Marine Terminal on the other side of the bay. The terminal, operated by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, is the largest port complex on the East Coast. $114.54 billion of cargo passed through the Port of New York and New Jersey in 2004. The top five trading partners at the port are China, Italy, Germany, Brazil and India.

Water quality in the New York Harbor has improved dramatically since passage of the Clean Water Act and extensive harbor cleanup projects. A common misconception is that the Upper Bay is devoid of marine life. It actually supports a diverse population of marine species, including striped bass. New Yorkers regularly kayak and sail in the harbor, which has become a major recreational site for the city. Water quality problems persist in Long Island Sound, however.

[edit] Other infrastructure

There are several other major infrastructure systems that are critical to New York. One is the network of water tunnels that transfer drinking water from the vast protected watershed in the Catskill Mountains to the city. Currently two water tunnels supply water. A third, officially named City Tunnel No. 3, has been under construction for several decades. The largest capital construction project in the United States, it will eventually span more than 60 miles and is expected to be complete in 2020. Operation of the new tunnel will allow repair and inspection of Tunnels No. 1 and 2 for the first time since their completion. The activated portion of Tunnel No. 3, constructed in bedrock 250 to 800 feet below the surface, runs 13 miles and begins at Hillview Reservoir in Yonkers, New York. It extends across Central Park and eastward under the East River and Roosevelt Island into Astoria, Queens.

[edit] Future and proposed projects

Several proposals for expanding the New York City transit system are in various stages of discussion, planning, or initial funding. Some of them would compete with others for available funding.

• In January 2007, the Port Authority approved plans for the $78.5 million purchase of a lease of Stewart Airport in Newburgh, New York as a 4th major airport for the area.^[41]
• PATH World Trade Center station, whose construction began in late 2005, will replace the PATH terminal destroyed in the September 11, 2001 attacks with a new central terminal designed by Santiago Calatrava that will allow easy transfer between the PATH system, several subway lines and proposed new projects. It is expected to serve 250,000 travelers daily.

• Fulton Street Transit Center, a $750 million project in Lower Manhattan that will improve access to and connections between 12 subway lines, PATH service and the World Trade Center site. Construction began in 2005 and will be finished in 2008.
• Moynihan Station would expand Penn Station into the James Farley Post Office building across the street.
• Second Avenue Subway, a new north-south line, first proposed in 1929, would run from 125th Street in Harlem to Hanover Square in lower Manhattan.
• IRT Flushing Line Extension would extend the 7 service (Flushing line) west from its current terminus at Times Square, then south to the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.
• East Side Access project would route some Long Island Rail Road Trains to Grand Central Terminal instead of Penn Station. Since many, if not most, LIRR commuters work on the east side of Manhattan, many in walking distance of Grand Central, this proposal would save travel time and reduce congestion at Penn Station and on subway lines connecting it with the east side. It would also greatly expand the hourly capacity of the LIRR system.
• The Lower Manhattan-Jamaica/JFK Transportation Project would extend an existing Long Island Rail Road line from Jamaica Station, with a new 3-mile tunnel under the East River from downtown Brooklyn to Manhattan. AirTrain JFK-compatible cars would run along the new route, connecting John F. Kennedy International Airport and Jamaica with Lower Manhattan.
• Trans-Hudson Express Tunnel would add a second pair of railroad tracks under the Hudson River, connecting an expanded Penn Station to NJ Transit lines.
• Although New York City does not have light rail as of 2005, a few proposals exist:
  • There are plans to convert 42nd Street into a light rail transit mall which would be closed to all vehicles except emergency vehicles [4]. The idea was previously planned in the early 1990s, and was approved by the City Council in 1994, but stalled due to lack of funds.
  • Staten Island light rail proposals have found political support from Senator Charles Schumer and local political and business leaders.
• JFK Airport is undergoing a US$10.3 billion redevelopment, one of the largest airport reconstruction projects in the world. In recent years, Terminal One, Terminal Four and Terminal Nine have been reconstructed, and work has begun on a new Terminal Five. The remaining five terminals are slated for demolition or reconstruction.^{[citation needed]}
• Santiago Calatrava has also proposed an aerial gondola system linking Manhattan, Governors Island and Brooklyn as part of the city's plans to develop the island.
• In August 2006 the MTA revealed that all future subway stations, including ones built for the Second Avenue subway, the No. 7 line extension, and the new South Ferry station will be outfitted with special air-cooling systems to reduce the temperature along platforms.^[42]

[edit] See also

• Mass transit in New York City
• History of the New York City Subway
• New York City Department of Transportation
• List of streetcar lines in Queens

[edit] Further reading

• Taxi!: Cabs and Capitalism in New York City, Biju Mathew 2005
• New York Underground, Julia Solis 2004
• The Works: Anatomy of a City, Kate Ascher 2005
• Underground Harmonies: Music and Politics in the Subways of New York , Susie J. Tanenbaum 1995

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Regional Plan Association

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