Thinking Bigger: New York and
Transportation in the Northeast Megaregion
Webcasts |
Articles
Over 300 attendees crowded the room on November 13 for NYMTC and the Rudin Center's major conference: "Thinking Bigger: New York and Transportation in the Northeast Megaregion." The goals of the conference were to:
1. foster a better understanding of the relationship between the Northeast Corridor and the broader megaregion, and
2. begin the discussion of how to address transportation Informative panel sessions were led by Barry Seymour, Executive Director, Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission and Mark Schweiker, President and CEO, Greater Philadelphia Area Chamber of Commerce.
Webcasts of the entire event are available online.
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link to webcast section]
Webcasts
Link to the webcast of conference "Thinking Bigger: NY and
Transportation in the Northeast Megaregion" held on Nov. 13, 2007.
Articles
Improve Cooperation
by Cliff Sobel, Deputy Executive Director, NJTPA
The Thinking Bigger conference was thought provoking. For those of us who wrestle on a day-to-day basis with issues at the local and regional level, we were reminded that there are larger forces and trends in the multi-state megaregion affecting what we do and the options we have available. The conference brought together experts from a range of organizations and disciplines which created an interesting mix of perspectives.
As part of the Northeast megaregion, we surely are in an advantageous position. We heard that the dynamic economies of the Northeast states -- drawing upon our highly skilled labor pool, great universities, world class urban centers and other resources -- generate one-fifth of the nation's GDP. But our continued success depends on addressing often monumental infrastructure challenges. The costs can be staggering -- in New Jersey alone: $13 billion for bridges; $20 billion for new transit initiatives; and the list goes on.
There was talk of the need for new and/or improved mechanisms to help jurisdictions within the Northeast join forces to address our common needs. There was less recognition or discussion at the conference of the tensions within our mega-region that stand in the way of cooperation -- for instance, the competition among the east coast port facilities. But the point was well taken that action on numerous cross-jurisdictional issues could help address difficult problems at the local and regional level. For instance, strategic upgrades to the freight rail networks promise to remove trucks from our congested roads. Similarly, improving Amtrak -- possibly someday through high speed rail -- could help unburden our overcrowded airports.
Rather than creating new mechanisms for cooperation, it appears that the organizational structures are already in place: the MPOs in the tri-state region already have begun improving their cooperation and this could be expanded; the I-95 Corridor Coalition has proven an effective body for key mega-region transportation issues; and the Coalition of Northeast Governors is effective in representing our interests in Washington. Now that we have begun "Thinking Bigger", our challenge is finding effective ways for "Acting Bigger."
Contact
Cliff Sobel
973.639.8402
Traveling the Corridor
by Allison L. C. de Cerreño, Director, Rudin Center, NYU
On November 13, the NYU Wagner Rudin Center for Transportation Policy & Management, co-hosted Thinking Bigger: New York and Transportation in the Northeast Megaregion, with NYMTC, MTA, the Port Authority, the University Transportation Research Center, the American
Institute of Architects New York Chapter, Regional Plan Association, and University of Delaware’s Institute of Public Administration.
The need to address the Northeast Corridor (NEC) really struck home for me this past October as I traveled up and down the Corridor in a three-week-period, from New York to Washington (twice), to Trenton and Piscataway in New Jersey, and to Newark, DE – never on the same day. Not one trip went off without a hitch. Trains were delayed, connections were missed, traffic on the turnpike was a bear. The more than five hour trip home from Delaware should have taken three hours. I was struck by the fact that there is just no good way to move along this Corridor.
To address this challenge, we need a new way of thinking. Europe and Asia are ahead of us in terms of planning regionally, especially for transportation. They are on their second and third generations of high-speed ground transportation technologies, with the more modest of them easily cruising at 186 mph while others exceed that by far. Meanwhile, the NEC’s Acela, the flagship of intercity passenger rail in the United States, brings up the rear with maximum authorized speeds of only 150 mph, which it rarely actually reaches, and then for only 33.9 miles along a 456-miles corridor.
I would suggest that if we continue to view the corridor as we have, piece by piece and mode by mode, in another four decades, we’ll likely be about where we are today – with a system plagued
by congestion on the roadways, on the rail, and in the air, with various inefficiencies, and lowered air quality and quality of life of our cities and surrounding areas.
Instead, I believe our challenge is to truly begin thinking about this Corridor as a system. I suggest that we begin thinking beyond intermodalism and multimodalism, to thinking of our transportation network as an entire organic system, applying a “megamodal” approach, in which decisions taken in one area are likely to have an impact in others; in which investments in one area (such as high speed rail), necessitate investments in others (like transit for complementary links); and in which we can begin to think about the most efficient use of our capacity for both passengers and freight across all modes, rather than continuing to try to have every mode share every travel need.
Contact
Allison L. C. de Cerreño
212.998.7547
Contact
Carol Wilkinson
212.383.7241