Cross Harbor

The idea of a cross harbor rail freight tunnel has a long history. An 1893 plan by the Pennsylvania Railroad included a new double-track line extending from Houtenville, near Rahway, NJ across the Arthur Kill by bridge or tunnel, through Staten Island, and then under "the Narrows" to Brooklyn via a tunnel terminating at a Long Island Railroad connection. Similarly, in 1903, the Pennsylvania Railroad unveiled a complex plan of terminal expansion and rail connections via a "cross harbor" tunnel between Jersey City and South Brooklyn to address waterway congestion in the Port district. Regional planners in the 1920s sought to implement the tunnel. The project foundered amidst disagreements among the dozen different freight railroads then controlling the waterfront rail yards.

A study in late 1941 re-explored a cross harbor tunnel as a defense initiative that would provide a direct connection to the Brooklyn facilities from locations west of the Hudson River. Planners and freight railroads on both sides of the Hudson have conducted numerous studies since that have explored improvements to the inefficient railcar float system and the construction and operation of a rail freight tunnel.

By the 1990s, considerable advances in tunneling technology, increasingly severe roadway congestion and freight industry conditions, led NYCEDC and the New York City Department of City Planning to examine the issue again. The resulting "Intermodal Goods Movement Study" concluded that rail freight improvements, including the development of a rail freight tunnel under New York Harbor, had potentially favorable public benefits. The Cross Harbor Freight Movement MIS, completed in May 2000, confirmed that conclusion.

The EIS has five primary goals that respond to the regional needs identified in the previous Major Investment Study (MIS). The goals are designed to improve the economic strength, environmental health and security of the New York/northern New Jersey metropolitan region. They include:

Improve the movement of goods into, out of and through the New York City/northern New Jersey/southern Connecticut region.
Create a more balanced transportation system to move goods in the region.
Improve environmental quality in the region by diverting freight movements to less polluting modes of transport.
Promote economic development in the New York City region through a more efficient goods movement system.
Provide an additional option to the region’s vital Hudson River crossings.

Each of the proposed alternatives will be analyzed to determine how successful it is in meeting the project goals. This will be the principal performance measure used to select a preferred alternative.

Four alternatives for the enhancement of cross harbor freight service will be evaluated in the EIS. The “No Action” alternative represents the likely state of the region’s transportation infrastructure in the future without the project. The "Transportation Systems Management" alternative provides a strategy to make the most of the current rail freight network with minimal capital investment. The two “Build” alternatives represent strategies with independent utility and an incremental approach to the development of a more effective rail freight network. The alternatives to be examined include:

No Action—An analysis of current infrastructure and projects for which funding is committed (or likely to be committed) by public agencies or through private investment.
Transportation Systems Management (TSM)—Manage the current transportation infrastructure more efficiently to accommodate demand. Emphasis is placed on operating improvements and strategic upgrades to critical bottlenecks along the existing freight system, such as increased clearances to allow Trailer-on-Flatcar (TOFC) intermodal service to existing and planned East-of-Hudson rail yards. See map

Expanded Float Operations—Improve and expand capacity and level-of-service for both the railcar float system and rail yards, and potentially increase clearances to allow doublestack intermodal service. This strategy would likely include additional system improvements. See map
Rail Freight Tunnel—This alternative would include construction of a rail freight tunnel under New York Harbor. Two tunnel routes were evaluated: (1) between the Staten Island Railroad in Staten Island, NY, and the Bay Ridge Branch in Brooklyn, NY, (the “Staten Island alignment”) and (2) between Greenville Yard in Jersey City, NJ, and the Bay Ridge Branch in Brooklyn, NY (the “New Jersey alignment”). In addition, two implementation scenarios are evaluated for each route: a single tunnel system (“Single Tunnel System”) and a double tunnel system (“Double Tunnel System”). The Single Tunnel System would be built so as not to preclude expansion to the Double Tunnel System. The Tunnel Alternative would also include improvements to rail infrastructure such as increasing clearance heights along the Bay Ridge Branch and Montauk Branch of the Long Island Rail Road and/or the Staten Island Railroad and the expansion of an existing rail yard in West Maspeth, Queens. See maps

With respect to all goals, the TSM Alternative would produce minimal or immeasurable benefits due to the small diversion from truck to rail that it achieves. The Tunnel Alternative would produce far greater benefits than the Expanded Float Operations Alternative due to the ability of the tunnel to attract a much larger diversion of freight from truck to rail. This results from the more efficient operation (in time, cost and reliability) of direct rail service in comparison to transfers between landside rail and float. As shown in the analyses in the DEIS, the Tunnel Alternative is preferable to both the TSM Alternative and the Expanded Float Operations Alternative with respect to the project goals and objectives.

The New Jersey alignment of the Tunnel Alternative would achieve greater benefits than the Staten Island alignment. The more direct routing to the western portal of the New Jersey alignment would result in more diversion of freight from truck to rail, which would subsequently yield greater user benefits and travel efficiencies than the Staten Island alignment. In addition, the New Jersey alignment has limited adverse environmental and neighborhood character impacts in comparison to the Staten Island alignment.

The New Jersey alignment could be constructed as a Single Tunnel System or Double Tunnel System. The Double Tunnel System would produce greater benefits than the Single Tunnel System due to operational constraints in the Single Tunnel System, which reduce the diversion of intermodal traffic. While the Double Tunnel System would generate the most benefits in many respects, it would also result in additional adverse environmental impacts, more business displacements and would require additional capital expenditures.

The New Jersey alignment of the Tunnel Alternative has been identified as the Preferred Alternative. The decision of whether a Single or Double Tunnel System should be recommended will be explored further during the period between the Draft EIS and the Final EIS. For the purposes of the DEIS, the benefits and impacts of all alternatives are analyzed and discussed.