$2.9B Contract Awarded For Penn Station Access From Westchester

A contract for the Penn Station Access Project, which will provide direct Metro-North service on the Hell Gate Line from the Bronx, Westchester and Connecticut to Penn Station and Manhattan's west side, will be awarded to Halmar International, LLC/RailWorks, J.V.

"Access to Penn Station is completely transformative for Metro-North," Catherine Rinaldi, President of MTA Metro-North Railroad said in the announcement. "This will be the railroad's largest expansion in history — four new stations is no small thing."

This gives Metro-North's busiest line — the New Haven —a second route into Manhattan for the first time, "redundancy that's all the more important as the railroad looks to pursue major capital renewal projects on the route to Grand Central - namely the Park Avenue Viaduct and the Park Avenue Tunnel," Rinaldi said.

The project will repair and expand the Hell Gate Line with over 19 miles of new and rehabilitated track.

It will also improve reliability and on-time performance for intercity passengers, Rinaldi said.

It will also prepare part of the Amtrak corridor for high-speed rail in the future. Amtrak will contribute $500 million toward the project. Amtrak has also agreed to pay the costs of delay if they fail to meet commitments to provide outages or workforce, Gov. Kathy Hochul said.

In addition to the four new stations in the Bronx, the project also includes the reconfiguration of Metro-North's New Rochelle Yard, four bridge rehabilitations, four new and one reconfigured interlockings, five new and two upgraded substations, and the modernization of signal, power and communication infrastructure.

The current project construction schedule is estimated at 63 months and $2.87 billion. It is estimated the project will create or retain 4,500 direct jobs and another 10,000 indirect jobs.

"This is a watershed moment for transit-starved communities in the East and South Bronx — and the Sound Shore communities of Westchester — as it will connect these communities with quick, reliable, one-seat commuter rail service into Midtown Manhattan and job centers in Westchester and Connecticut," said U.S Senator Chuck Schumer, who brokered the deal between Amtrak and MTA to advance the Metro-North Penn Access and the East River Tunnel rehabilitation projects. "I applaud the MTA Board for awarding the contract and look forward to continuing to push both projects as priorities for USDOT grants."

Representative Jamaal Bowman said he was honored to join Hochul, Schumer, New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson and NYC Mayor de Blasio along with colleagues throughout New York to support the project which, he pointed out, promotes transit justice and equity by championing further infrastructure investments on the federal level. "This project has been an empty promise to our state and my district for too long."

The deal for rail development in NYC's northern suburbs will finally bring greater connectivity, reliability and convenience to commuters, said Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins. "New Yorkers deserve state-of-the-art transit, especially as we all begin returning to the office."