NEW YORK (WCBS 880) – Gov. Phil Murphy and members of New Jersey’s Congressional Delegation got a first hand look at the crumbling rail tunnels beneath the Hudson River on Monday.
Both tubes of the century-old Hudson River rail tunnel have significant corrosion and damage from Superstorm Sandy and a replacement is desperately needed.
Murphy peered out of a picture window of an obervation car at the conditions in the deteriorating tunnel.
"It's pretty alarming to say the least," he said. "The hundreds of thousands of people who come in and out between our two states every day, this is existential. The delays, the breakdowns, the old infrastructure, we gotta get out at this. It's long past due."
Murphy calls the Gateway Tunnel Project the "most critical infrastructure project in the country," and says that "future economic viability depends on building a new tunnel as soon as possible."
The Trump administration pulled the plug on a funding arrangement that would have split the cost of new tunnels between New York, New Jersey and Washington.
Sens. Bob Menendez and Cory Booker, who will be tasked with trying to secure federal funding for the project, also joined Murphy on the tour.
Menendez bemoaned former Gov. Chris Christie's killing of the ARC Project, WCBS 880's Rich Lamb reported.
"As I was going through the tunnel, I'm so upset that what the late Sen. Lottenberg and I did years ago that got the largest federal transportation committment in our nation's history was squandered that we're now in the midst of fighting this again. But, the governor, the Port Authority, the state of New York, have put up real money, so there's no more reason for the Federal Department of Transportation or for the administration to delay this project," Menendez said.
Last year, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo send video of the tunnel to President Donald Trump and later met with him to discuss federal funding for the Gateway Tunnel Project. Cuomo called it a "positive meeting" and said the president wants "to take the next steps to find a way forward."