Huge revers-L: Cuomo scraps L-shutdown plan
BY SYDNEY PEREIRA
So long, “L-pocalypse”!
In shocking news that reverberated
from Manhattan to Brooklyn,
Governor Andrew Cuomo announced
last Thursday that the Metropolitan
Transportation Authority is scrapping
its L train shutdown plan.
Instead, the M.T.A. will close a single
East River tube at a time over nights and
weekends. The work is still expected to
begin around the end of April.
The new scheme could only take up
to 20 months — fi ve months more than
the previous plan, according to M.T.A.
Acting Chairperson Fernando Ferrer.
Planned improved subway service on
the G, M and 7 lines will remain, Ferrer
said.
The M.T.A. is “thrilled” with the new
plan, Ferrer said. The one-tube-at-a-time
closure will allow for trains to run in
both directions in the second, open tube.
Peak ridership hours will not change,
and the existing 15-to-20-minute wait
for trains during nights and weekends
will remain, according to Ferrer.
“It’s innovative, creative and we deem
it a sound plan,” Ferrer said.
The planned additional ferry service
between Williamsburg and Stuyvesant
Cove at Stuyvesant Town will likely
be scuttled, according to Andy Byford,
president of the New York City Transit
Authority. While Byford said he will
continue to work with the city’s Department
of Transportation on additional
details, he anticipates high-occupancy
vehicle (HOV-3) lanes on the Williamsburg
Bridge will now no longer be necessary.
Other details under the previous full
L-shutdown plan regarding added bike
lanes, bus routes, M14 Select Bus Service
and the 14th St. “busway” remain
unclear.
Cuomo’s announcement came just
two weeks after he toured the tunnels
with engineering experts from Cornell
and Columbia universities. The new
plan for repairing the L train’s East
River tunnels, according to offi cials, is a
better, more innovative design that drastically
reduces labor-intensive demolition
work.
“This is really a unique design, a
unique system,” Cuomo said of the revised
plan. “It is a totally different way
to reconstruct the tunnel. It’s faster. It’s
cheaper. It’s better than the way we have
been doing it.”
The key change of the alternative design
is how it deals with cables that have
been corroded by saltwater from Hurricane
Sandy that are currently embedded
in “bench walls” — essentially, cement
walkways used by workers to access the
tunnel.
Under the previous plan, all the two
tubes’ bench walls and power and communications
cables would have been
replaced.
Under a revised plan announced by Governor Andrew Cuomo last week,
weekday service on the L train will continue, with repairs to the line’s
two East River tubes only done at night and on weekends, and only on
one tube at a time, with one tube always remaining in service.
‘It’s better
than the way
we have been
doing it.’
Andrew
Cuomo
Inspired by other cities — including
Hong Kong, London and Riyadh, Saudi
Arabia — engineering experts recommended
to Cuomo and the M.T.A. to
adopt a new design that would instead
suspend the cables on the sides of the
tunnel within a fi reproof material. Under
this method, the only cement bench
walls that would be removed would be
severely weakened ones. Other portions
would be bolstered with “fi berreinforced
polymer” or, for structurally
stable bench walls, left alone.
“If we do not need to remove the
bench wall and reconstruct the bench
wall, we’re not going to do it,” said
Mary Boyce, the dean of Columbia
University’s engineering school, who
was one of the experts that issued the
new recommendations to Cuomo and
PHOTO BY SYDNEY PEREIRA
the M.T.A. “That’s an incredibly timeintensive,
labor-intensive element that
we removed.”
While City Council Speaker Corey
Johnson said, on the one hand, he was
hopeful about the change of plan, he
was also “having a tough time” with
the “last-minute” announcement lacking
a lot of specifi cs.
“If this new plan is as good as advertised,”
Johnson said, “then obviously it
is fantastic news for the hundreds of
thousands of L-train riders who were
dreading the shutdown, as well as for
those who were worrying about the
shutdown’s spillover effects.
“That said, I’m having a tough time
with this,” the Council speaker said.
“For years, the M.T.A. told New Yorkers
that a shutdown was unavoidable.
Now, at the last minute, we’re presented
with a new proposal with no details
on cost or a solid time frame. All New
Yorkers, including those who uprooted
their lives and businesses in anticipation
of the shutdown and the workers
who rely on the L train during nights
and weekends, deserve better.”
Councilmember Keith Powers, who
represents parts of Stuyvesant Town
and Kips Bay, said the city should keep
its plans for the M14 Select Bus Service
and the Williamsburg-Stuyvesant Cove
ferry service.
Any plan to reduce inconvenience is
welcome, Powers said, but added that
the “new recommendations are a swift
and sudden change to the L train plan,
which now need to be fully evaluated.”
“As an everyday L-train rider,” Powers
said, “I am hopeful that this will
be an improvement in the lives of New
Yorkers and look forward to receiving
more information in the coming days.”
Councilmember Carlina Rivera said
M.T.A. offi cials told her the new plan
could possibly reduce noise and construction
along E. 14th St. between
First Ave. and Avenue B. She said she
was “disappointed,” though, that the
news came without details or warning.
Rivera called on the City Council to
hold public hearings this month, and
said D.O.T. should continue with its
previous plans for additional bike lanes,
bus routes and dedicated bus corridors
until the public and advocates can fully
comment.
“But regardless of how the L-train
tunnel repair goes,” Rivera added, “our
state and city agencies must deeply
evaluate how the mishandling of these
announcements continues to erode
public trust in our most important institutions,
and work to redouble their
efforts with our communities.”
State Senator Brad Hoylman, whose
district includes all of Manhattan’s Ltrain
stretch, welcomed an alternative
without, as he put it, “hundreds of additional
dirty diesel buses” that would
have resulted from four additional bus
routes between Brooklyn and Manhattan
under the previous mitigation plan.
“It’ll be the job of the new Senate
Democratic majority along with our
Assembly colleagues to provide suffi -
cient oversight of the M.T.A. and this
plan,” Hoylman added. “In addition,
we must continue to push for more reliable
train and bus service, planned
upgrades to our subway station and
bike infrastructure, and work toward
the ultimate goal of reducing car traffi c
through congestion pricing.”
Meanwhile, some transportation advocates
kept the focus on reducing congestion,
regardless of how the L train
is repaired.
“However this L train work plays out,
we expect Mayor de Blasio and D.O.T.
to preserve the new bus and bike infrastructure
that has been put forth,” said
Joe Cutrufo, a spokesperson for Transportation
Alternatives. “Even without
a full 15-month L-train shutdown, it’s
pretty clear that New York City has a
serious congestion problem.”
Cutrufo hopes the HOV-3 plan for
the Williamsburg Bridge, the new 12th
and 13th Sts. protected crosstown bike
lanes, a better bus system across the
14th St. corridor, and especially congestion
pricing are still prioritized —
full L shutdown or not.
“Congestion isn’t going away without
both congestion pricing and new innovative
ways to get people around New
York City,” Cutrufo said.
Mayor Bill de Blasio would not comment
on the details since he had only
gotten initial briefi ngs from Cuomo last
week.
“Anything that avoids disruption, I
favor, obviously,” de Blasio said. “And
a lot of people in Brooklyn, a lot of
people in Manhattan have been really
worried about the L-train shutdown.”
Schneps Media TVG January 10, 2019 3