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 Posted: Sat, Apr 30 2011, 8:35 pm EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| And the Feds are right. It pains me to say it as a NJ taxpayer but in the end it's our money either way as it comes from Federal taxes if not state and there's no reason the citizens of any other state should have to pay for our mess of spending a third of a billion dollars before saying "never mind." |
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| Posted: Sun, May 1 2011, 1:53 am EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| To me the amazing thing is New Jersey was supposed th foot bill for an interstate transportation project. Why is it that the feds can pay for an "inter-state" highway in Hawaii but they can't pay for a rail tunnel on the eastern seaboard? Frankly, the $271 million is a pitance compared to the boondaggle we would have endured had this project moved forward. |
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| Posted: Sun, May 1 2011, 10:50 am EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | To me the amazing thing is New Jersey was supposed th foot bill for an interstate transportation project. Why is it that the feds can pay for an "inter-state" highway in Hawaii but they can't pay for a rail tunnel on the eastern seaboard? Frankly, the $271 million is a pitance compared to the boondaggle we would have endured had this project moved forward. |
What are you smoking? NJ was sharing the cost. The Feds were putting in billions and NY State was putting in about $1.5-2B as well. NJ had the largest share because it benefits NJ the most. That's not unusual at all. Honestly, we were lucky that we were getting $4.5B from the feds and NY for a project that almost exclusively impacts NJ residents. |
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| Posted: Sun, May 1 2011, 11:06 am EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | Frankly, the $271 million is a pitance compared to the boondaggle we would have endured had this project moved forward. |
Then let's save a whole lot of money and shut down all state expenses because as a taxpayer I am being screwed by the State spending billions on dollars on other agencies and projects while they don't spend on something far more important like the tunnel. As I sit for hours a day on trains that should take 50 minutes, I have yet to encounter any of the other millions to depend on the outdated system that is the most over saturated to capacity in the country who thinks it wasn't a priority to expand tunnel capacity. I guarantee if Christie had to commute over an hour each day on NJ transit and be subject to the hell that is the Hudson tunnel daily game of roulette he wouldn’t think it wasn’t a priority.
How is it this state thinks it enough of a priority to build 7 stations along Montclair so everyone there can walk to their nearest station or find easy parking on a line that has so many fewer travelers that it only makes back 20% of its cost from ticket sales and has to have the rest of us subsidize it? Or building a "transfer" station that is usually mostly deserted and just puts more capacity on the same single tunnel? Or build an express line along the river for what? How are any of these things more important? Why are they doing needless work on Old Trenton that no one asked for, and I suspect hundreds of similar projects all over the state if they don’t have any money? I don’t care if it is county or state money, it’s all the same taxpayer pool of cash. As it is we subsidize other townships and schools with our taxes so it is one big bumble.
So stop taking my taxes or all the other crap or if you are at least use a little of it to do something legitimately useful like the tunnel. |
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| Posted: Sun, May 1 2011, 4:45 pm EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| As long as you aren't bothering to differentiate between levels of government, why not blame the TC for the tunnel? You could go to the next meeting and rant and rave about everything that is wrong with all levels of government. Et me know when you're going so I can be there to laugh at you.l |
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| Posted: Mon, May 2 2011, 12:35 pm EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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Thanks for another good example, though personally I don't demonize this stuff as being "typical" of any party. This is about Christie as an individual. With the tunnel project he demonstrated that he has no problem cancelling already started projects well in to spending on them. And no one could rationally argue that the Xanadu project is more important to the state than the tunnel. If Christie was true to the reasoning he used for the tunnel, where he basically subjected millions of tax paying New Jersey citizens to decades of indentured servitude quality of life conditions, then he shouldn't have given a dime to this project. He shouldn't be spend a dime period. We should shut-down all spending except critical safely-related functions if we really have no money. |
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| Posted: Mon, May 2 2011, 9:14 pm EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: |
Thanks for another good example, though personally I don't demonize this stuff as being "typical" of any party. This is about Christie as an individual. With the tunnel project he demonstrated that he has no problem cancelling already started projects well in to spending on them. And no one could rationally argue that the Xanadu project is more important to the state than the tunnel. If Christie was true to the reasoning he used for the tunnel, where he basically subjected millions of tax paying New Jersey citizens to decades of indentured servitude quality of life conditions, then he shouldn't have given a dime to this project. He shouldn't be spend a dime period. We should shut-down all spending except critical safely-related functions if we really have no money. |
The fact is Christie agreed to spend billions of dollars on the tunnel, he just refused to write a blank check drawn from New Jersey's bank account. The best the feds offered was to split the cost of the undetermined billions of dollars of cost overruns.
If you want to blame someone for the lack of a tunnel, why not try Frank Lautenberg. You would have thought a "shovel-ready" mass transit project creating thousands of union jobs and benefitting Americans from Boston to DC would have been an easy sell to a democratic congress by New Jersey's Senior Senator and "Godfather of Public Transportation". Why did Lautenberg sit on the sidelines? Politics. |
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| Posted: Mon, May 2 2011, 10:36 pm EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: |
Thanks for another good example, though personally I don't demonize this stuff as being "typical" of any party. This is about Christie as an individual. With the tunnel project he demonstrated that he has no problem cancelling already started projects well in to spending on them. And no one could rationally argue that the Xanadu project is more important to the state than the tunnel. If Christie was true to the reasoning he used for the tunnel, where he basically subjected millions of tax paying New Jersey citizens to decades of indentured servitude quality of life conditions, then he shouldn't have given a dime to this project. He shouldn't be spend a dime period. We should shut-down all spending except critical safely-related functions if we really have no money. |
The fact is Christie agreed to spend billions of dollars on the tunnel, he just refused to write a blank check drawn from New Jersey's bank account. The best the feds offered was to split the cost of the undetermined billions of dollars of cost overruns.
If you want to blame someone for the lack of a tunnel, why not try Frank Lautenberg. You would have thought a "shovel-ready" mass transit project creating thousands of union jobs and benefitting Americans from Boston to DC would have been an easy sell to a democratic congress by New Jersey's Senior Senator and "Godfather of Public Transportation". Why did Lautenberg sit on the sidelines? Politics. |
It was a New Jersey based project. NJ should have been responsible for the overruns just as Cranbury was responsible for the overruns on the ballfield. The Feds were providing substantial cost offset not promising to to be 50/50 partners. As a NJ and Federal taxpayer, I think it would have been inappropriate if the Feds guaranteed the cost overruns. |
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| Posted: Mon, May 2 2011, 11:38 pm EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: |
Thanks for another good example, though personally I don't demonize this stuff as being "typical" of any party. This is about Christie as an individual. With the tunnel project he demonstrated that he has no problem cancelling already started projects well in to spending on them. And no one could rationally argue that the Xanadu project is more important to the state than the tunnel. If Christie was true to the reasoning he used for the tunnel, where he basically subjected millions of tax paying New Jersey citizens to decades of indentured servitude quality of life conditions, then he shouldn't have given a dime to this project. He shouldn't be spend a dime period. We should shut-down all spending except critical safely-related functions if we really have no money. |
The fact is Christie agreed to spend billions of dollars on the tunnel, he just refused to write a blank check drawn from New Jersey's bank account. The best the feds offered was to split the cost of the undetermined billions of dollars of cost overruns.
If you want to blame someone for the lack of a tunnel, why not try Frank Lautenberg. You would have thought a "shovel-ready" mass transit project creating thousands of union jobs and benefitting Americans from Boston to DC would have been an easy sell to a democratic congress by New Jersey's Senior Senator and "Godfather of Public Transportation". Why did Lautenberg sit on the sidelines? Politics. |
It was a New Jersey based project. NJ should have been responsible for the overruns just as Cranbury was responsible for the overruns on the ballfield. The Feds were providing substantial cost offset not promising to to be 50/50 partners. As a NJ and Federal taxpayer, I think it would have been inappropriate if the Feds guaranteed the cost overruns. |
Actually your facts are not accurate. The feds offered to pay for half the obverruns, but a minority share up front. Also, more than half of the project was in New York. There is no reason New jersey should have been on the hook for the majority of the costs of this inter-state regional transportation project. Blaming Christie for forfeiting a 2 percent deposit on a 12 billion dollar excrement sandwich is ridiculous. |
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| Posted: Tue, May 3 2011, 6:28 am EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| This was a short sited partisan political decision by Christie. It will come back to haunt him and NJ republicans for years |
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| Posted: Tue, May 3 2011, 7:00 am EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | This was a short sited partisan political decision by Christie. It will come back to haunt him and NJ republicans for years |
Sadly, I agree that politically this decision will "come back to haunt him" because, like you, most people choose to ignore the complexities and base their opinion on knee jerk reactions. Simple arguments are easier to make, and they tend to stick. I think this is endemic of a much greater and more serious problem in America- the willful ignorance of the intelligencia. i |
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| Posted: Tue, May 3 2011, 9:55 am EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: |
Thanks for another good example, though personally I don't demonize this stuff as being "typical" of any party. This is about Christie as an individual. With the tunnel project he demonstrated that he has no problem cancelling already started projects well in to spending on them. And no one could rationally argue that the Xanadu project is more important to the state than the tunnel. If Christie was true to the reasoning he used for the tunnel, where he basically subjected millions of tax paying New Jersey citizens to decades of indentured servitude quality of life conditions, then he shouldn't have given a dime to this project. He shouldn't be spend a dime period. We should shut-down all spending except critical safely-related functions if we really have no money. |
The fact is Christie agreed to spend billions of dollars on the tunnel, he just refused to write a blank check drawn from New Jersey's bank account. The best the feds offered was to split the cost of the undetermined billions of dollars of cost overruns.
If you want to blame someone for the lack of a tunnel, why not try Frank Lautenberg. You would have thought a "shovel-ready" mass transit project creating thousands of union jobs and benefitting Americans from Boston to DC would have been an easy sell to a democratic congress by New Jersey's Senior Senator and "Godfather of Public Transportation". Why did Lautenberg sit on the sidelines? Politics. |
It was a New Jersey based project. NJ should have been responsible for the overruns just as Cranbury was responsible for the overruns on the ballfield. The Feds were providing substantial cost offset not promising to to be 50/50 partners. As a NJ and Federal taxpayer, I think it would have been inappropriate if the Feds guaranteed the cost overruns. |
Actually your facts are not accurate. The feds offered to pay for half the obverruns, but a minority share up front. Also, more than half of the project was in New York. There is no reason New jersey should have been on the hook for the majority of the costs of this inter-state regional transportation project. Blaming Christie for forfeiting a 2 percent deposit on a 12 billion dollar excrement sandwich is ridiculous. |
I don't agree with your statement of supposed "facts." The suggestion that more than half of this project should have been fronted by NY is ridiculous. NJ is the primary beneficiary of this project so of course we should have the lead responsibility. This tunnel would have exclusively served NJ Transit trains, not even Amtrak. |
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| Posted: Tue, May 3 2011, 10:12 am EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: | | This was a short sited partisan political decision by Christie. It will come back to haunt him and NJ republicans for years |
Sadly, I agree that politically this decision will "come back to haunt him" because, like you, most people choose to ignore the complexities and base their opinion on knee jerk reactions. Simple arguments are easier to make, and they tend to stick. I think this is endemic of a much greater and more serious problem in America- the willful ignorance of the intelligencia. i |
LOL at the suggestion that Christie is about complex solutions rather than knee-jerk, simple arguments. Wow, talk about the pot calling the kettle black.
Christie is the King of knee-jerk, simplistic black-or-white positions and sound bites. He's all war and no diplomacy. Diplomacy and compromise is complex. Negotiations are complex; ultimatums and unilateral declarations are simple. Simply making headlines by outright killing a project that will dramatically impact NJ for decades to look fiscally conservative is simple. Complex would have been to recognize the importance of the critical need for a tunnel to NJ’s future and the livelihoods of millions of NJ taxpayers and to recognize that solving that problem one way or another was more important than a political stunt and more important than proving he’s consistent to his goal of reducing costs.
A real leader would have had the courage to go against the grain of his campaign slogans if the issue was important enough and the facts supported the issue, just as two members of the local TC did recently on the budget. They risked the wrath of their own party to do what they thought was right based on the facts. Or look at George Bush who went against everything he had stood for for 8 years in pushing a $1.5 trillion dollar bail out near the end of his second term because he placed the importance of the economic recovery, as he saw it based on the best facts available at the time, ahead of his general principles or reputation within the party. Whether you agree with him or not, that was leadership and courage, not what Christie did. The facts on the economic impact of the tunnel and the impact to the quality of life for millions of citizens are clear. A real leader would have rolled-up his sleeves and found the savings a different way, killed or scaled back other projects that weren’t as critical to the state, or become more conciliatory with his political peers and won more compromises. There were dozens of approaches to the problem of the tunnel costs available short of the dramatic step of merely killing it. But none of them were as simplistic or as favorable to his bulldog, no-compromise image. Christie never even tried. Instead he took the immediate entrenched position of arrogantly demanding that the Feds and NY pay or else, which was a silly bluff since NJ had way more to lose than the feds or NY state. That is not complex, that is not leadership, and it was not right for the state or its citizens. |
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| Posted: Tue, May 3 2011, 4:29 pm EDT Post subject: Re: NJ Must Return $271 Million Spent on Hudson Tunnel, U.S. Insists |
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| Guest wrote: | | ...look at George Bush who went against everything he had stood for for 8 years in pushing a $1.5 trillion dollar bail out near the end of his second term because he placed the importance of the economic recovery, as he saw it based on the best facts available at the time, ahead of his general principles or reputation within the party. Whether you agree with him or not, that was leadership and courage... |
What? You really think "W" had some sort of principled objection to the government covering the ass-etts of big business' greedy house of cards? I take it you never heard of Enron? |
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