Why was Nadler and Weiner so hot a heavy pushing a tunnel and rail lines in NY….2005, when they werent needed. The neighborhood associations fought him and Weiner. There’s a lot of monkey business going on with him; $9 Billion to duplicate a tunnel, structures and rail!

PUBLISHED IN THE JUNE 2005 JUNIPER BERRY. “Nadler's Great Fall”. ROBERT F. HOLDEN

“Under fierce opposition from residents of Queens and Brooklyn that included protests, rally's, letters, editorials, and even an attack billboard, it appears that the Cross Harbor Project is all but dead and soon to be buried. As most Juniper Park Civic Association members know, Manhattan Congressman Jerrold Nadler has been promoting a plan for a Cross Harbor Rail Freight Tunnel connecting Brooklyn to New Jersey. The tunnel project also calls for the construction 143-acre intermodal (truck to train) facility in Maspeth. This proposed facility would include a massive 20-story building, with a 46 acre footprint, that would be used to load and unload trains. The facility could potentially bring up to 16,000 additional trucks a day into our area…

Congressman Jerrold Nadler did not take no for an answer. He immediately started visiting several daily and local newspapers……They just spouted the Nadler mantra that the tunnel would reduce truck traffic significantly in NYC. A claim that is not even supported in the Draft Environmental Impact Study (DEIS), which was funded with $21 million of taxpayer money secured by Nadler.

WHY WE CAN'T COUNT ON CONGRESSMAN WEINER: As if the neighborhood wasn't facing a more daunting challenge of fighting the rhetoric, lies and misinformation spread by tunnel advocates and a misguided press, we didn't even have the support of our own Congressman. Rep. Anthony Weiner, who just happens to be running for Mayor, is supporting the Cross Harbor project… We have to wonder who does Congressman Weiner represent?

WHY THE CROSS HARBOR TUNNEL IS UNNECESSARY: A continuous argument of Congressmen Nadler and Weiner and lobbyist namely Marnie MacGregor (Move NY/NJ) is that the New York region is uncommonly dependent on trucking. The fact it is not radically out of line with the national average – trucking transports 81% of the tons of freight in the New York metro area versus 78% nationwide. Trucking is the main freight mode in NYC, as it is all over. Rail does play a minor role – less than 2% in New York versus 16% nationwide, but that's because water transport looms so large in NYC.

The big difference between the NYC area and the rest of the country is not rail versus trucking, but rail versus water. The New York Metro region, with islands, peninsulas and inlets, is wonderfully suited for water transport and very poorly suited for rail. Water transportation has thrived like practically nowhere else in the United States. Waterways are natural obstacles to rail thus making rail connections very expensive to build……

With that said, today there are still adequate rail routes into NYC without building a $9 billion Cross Harbor tunnel between New Jersey and Brooklyn. That money would be better spent on improving existing railroad infrastructure to increase capacity and productivity. The 143-acre (truck/train depot) facility in Maspeth would displace hundreds of existing businesses and cause massive traffic jams and pollution in an already heavily congested area (where the LIE meets the BQE). Nadler says that this problem could be mitigated by adding entrance and exit ramps to the Long Island Expressway. Even if this were possible, can the the LIE absorb thousands of trucks additional trucks a day? And what about when the LIE is congested,

what will prevent trucks from finding alternate routes through our neighborhood?

What Nadler fails to realize in his quest for the tunnel is that these types of intermodal facilities already exist in New Jersey and Pennsylvania away from densely populated urban areas. Nadler and cronies also overlook 50 years of investment in warehousing and logistics centers in central and northern New Jersey out of which trucks daily distribute goods throughout the NY/NJ/CT region….Why should they build expensive new duplicative facilities on very pricey New York City land? They simply won't do it.

NYC IS ALREADY LINKED TO NATIONAL RAIL NETWORK: The entire premise that is put forth by Nadler that this tunnel would "connect NYC to the national rail network" is utterly absurd. NYC is already connected to the national rail network and quite well I might add. Lines run into the city for the north from New England and down both the west and east sides of the Hudson and these Hudson lines connect to the natural flow of the national rail traffic from the west into the northeast including NYC……more article below

http://www.junipercivic.com/juniperberryarticle.asp?nid=281#.XH2E3aROmEd