The Death of the LaGuardia AirTrain is an Opportunity to Showcase Bus Rapid Transit
“I accept the recommendations of this report, and I look forward to its immediate implementation by the Port Authority in close coordination with our partners in the M.T.A., city and federal government.” - Governor Kathy Hochul commenting on an expert report that recommends putting the kibosh on the LaGuardia AirTrain.
Metrobús Insurgentes, Ciudad de México. A model bus rapid transit (BRT) line.
Rule number one: When you plan to spend a lot of money on transportation infrastructure make sure it is likely to deliver as promised.
So here’s the good news in a week with little of it; we won’t be building a pricey, redundant AirTrain to LaGuardia Airport (LGA). Instead, the State of New York, the MTA and the Port Authority will focus on speeding up existing Q70 Select Bus Service to LaGuardia from the E, F and 7 trains at Roosevelt Avenue in Jackson Heights and adding a dedicated shuttle between LaGuardia and the N and W subway line in Astoria.
While transportation engineering firms and workers may like the sound of multi-billion dollar cost-plus construction projects, taxpaying transit riders deserve more for their taxes and subway and bus fare.
It’s no longer enough that the City spends a country’s GDP on subway or light rail construction and closes off the streets and sidewalks for decades. Nowadays, transit infrastructure spending has to pencil out as well and the AirTrain doesn’t.
The death of disgraced former governor Andrew Cuomo’s vanity AirTrain project couldn’t come at a more opportune time. With the MTA reeling from its botched and belated delivery of gold-plated Grand Central Madison, New Yorkers deserve to hear some good transportation news that isn’t going to cost them obscene gobs of money.
Speeding up the Q70 by creating a genuine dedicated bus lane between Jackson Heights and LGA is an opportunity to showcase low-cost bus rapid transit (BRT) in America’s most important city. In recent years the MTA has made some strides with Select Bus Service, a modified BRT model, along 14th Street, 34th Street, 125th Street, First and Second Avenues, Nostrand Ave, Fordham Road, Webster Avenue and elsewhere.
Select Bus Service, Edward L Grant Highway, The Bronx.
While the agency’s 16 Select Bus Service routes are a good start, they generally fall short of the dedicated BRT workhorses that efficiently move legions of people in Bogotá, Mexico City and elsewhere in Latin America. If done right, like TransMilenio in Bogotá, the proposed Q70 improvements can be a model for cities hopelessly addicted to heavy and light rail construction projects. BRTs can do the trick at a fraction of the cost.
Metrobús Insurgentes, Ciudad de México.
It helps that the AirTrain report’s authors included heavy hitters former NYCDOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, former Transport for London Commissioner Mike Brown and Denver International Airport CEO Phil Washington. Washington is also LA Metro’s former CEO. It was on his watch that Measure M, the nation’s largest transportation infrastructure construction initiative, was adopted by LA County voters.
To make the panel’s proposed transit solutions true BRT, air traveler friendly and green, electric buses sporting luggage racks on dedicated bus only lanes are the way to go. There will of course be dickering over which of the report’s recommendations actually get adopted but whatever the outcome, the cost to the transit agency and the public will be a fraction of the cost of the AirTrain.
Public scrutiny of the AirTrain which drove the creation of an expert panel to consider the plan, suggests why sunlight is always the best disinfectant.
Informed skepticism about the State’s Midtown West supertalls real estate giveaway in exchange for a new Penn Station has sent that similarly costly and misguided plan back to the drawing board.
According to the AirTrain report, even if a way could be found to extend the subway to LaGuardia without disrupting flight operations, it would take at least 12 years and cost $7 billion to build.
A true BRT to LaGuardia can help show New Yorkers and others that bus rapid transit is a desirable low-cost alternative to bloated, costly subway and light rail construction that doesn’t do a better job.
BTW, about those pesky NYC subway construction costs, the highest in the world, here’s my strategy for getting new lines built: Just inform the contractors that the MTA will never be building another rail line. That will get their attention and help them find a way to contract for less.
The death of the Cuomo AirTrain is a victory for transit riders as well as air travelers. But if you don’t agree that transit infrastructure can and should be built cost effectively and you prefer the MTA continuing to sign a blank check to the contractors, there’s always the Second Avenue Subway extension to crow about.
Yours in transit,
Joel
Joel Epstein is a New Yorker and an advocate for public transit, livable cities and public space.
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