Even with congestion pricing starting by June 30, there is no way the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority will be able to advertise, award and issue a Notice to Proceed to contractors representing $15 billion worth of projects within the following six months.
There are also billions in other ongoing capital projects plus billions more not yet underway whose work will be carried over into the next $51 billion or more 2025-2029 Five Year Capital Plan.
There may not be enough resources to integrate the implementation of $15 billion or more carryover congestion-pricing-funded projects from the $51 billion 2020-2024 Five Year Capital Plan, billions more in ongoing non-congestion-pricing-funded projects with those in the first and second year of the upcoming $51 billion plus 2025-2029 Five Year Capital Plan.
The MTA lacks sufficient procurement, project managers, engineers, legal, and force account employees, along with track outage availability to proceed with all these projects in the same time frame.
Billions of capital improvement projects will be delayed. Costs will increase due to inflation and other factors as time goes by.
The upcoming $51 billion plus 2025-2029 Five Year Capital Plan is due to be released in October and adopted on or before Jan. 1, 2025. This should include a master integrated resource loaded schedule for how the billions in carryover capital projects will proceed with billions more in the new five-year capital program.
MTA Board members, elected officials, city, state and federal funding agencies such as the Federal Transit Administration, commuters, taxpayers, transit advocacy groups and transit reporters need to see this critical information. It is the only way we can determine if the MTA is up to meeting the challenge..
New York State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli just released his “Annual Update:
Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Debt Profile Report” covering May 2024 to May 2025.
His report confirms what I’ve been saying all along about the MTA’s problems with both advancing previous and current ongoing Five Year Capital Programs, increases in long-term debt and growing annual debt service payments.
Larry Penner
Great Neck
Larry Penner is a transportation advocate, historian and writer who previously served as a former director for the Federal Transit Administration Region 2 New York Office of Operations and Program Management.
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