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(erielack) Specter to host Scranton-to-Hoboken Rail forum

Specter to host Scranton-to-Hoboken Rail forum

BY BORYS KRAWCZENIUK     05/01/2006

U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter will host a forum today on the future of the
Scranton-to-Hoboken, N.J., passenger train in an effort to understand the
curves in the tracks ahead of the estimated $350 million project.
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 ³I donıt think itıs stalled,² said Andy Wallace, the director of Mr.
Specterıs Northeastern Pennsylvania office. ³I donıt think itıs moving along
as quickly as we would like it to.²
However, officials of the Federal Transit Administrationıs regional office
and from Monroe and Lackawanna counties are expected to get a first-hand
look at part of the proposed route. They plan to take a train trip from the
restored historic Tobyhanna train station to the Steamtown National Historic
Site.
Officials of New Jersey Transit, which would operate the train, are expected
to send a representative, but most of the agencyıs key officials are
expected to be tied up in Trenton at state transportation budget hearings.
The project is 88 miles long from Scranton to Port Morris, N.J., where
existing N.J. Transit tracks end. Itıs another 45 miles into Hoboken for a
total trip of 133 miles.
Mr. Specter will meet the train at 9:10 a.m. at the Radisson at Lackawanna
Station hotel and ride the train the short remaining distance to Steamtown
for the forum.
Officials from the two counties will talk about their progress in forming a
joint railroad authority that will oversee the Pennsylvania end of the
train.
Lackawanna County Commissioner Robert C. Cordaro said the jointure is near
completion and should be finalized by June.
³Itıs doable,² Mr. Cordaro said.
New Jersey Transit is expected to have an environmental assessment of the
train ready for submission to the FTA by the middle of this year, but
planning is far behind what local officials expected years ago.
The earliest a train could be ready is 2010, a New Jersey Transit spokesman
said in 2004.
FTA approval is uncertain as is state funding for the project, at least half
of which New Jersey and Pennsylvania are expected to share. The federal
government is expected to come up with the other half.
Contact the writer: bkrawczeniuk_@_timesshamrock.com


İThe Times-Tribune 2006 


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