The #7 could be extended to NJ but it should serve the urban areas of the waterfront (weehawkin, etc.) not a transfer station in the middle of the Meadowlands.

Suburban officials said that people in the suburbs demand something better than a subway ride, and only a one seat ride at a premium price to discourage the riff-raff would get them out of their cars.

Is that what they actually said or is that just your interpretation of the outcome.

Is it even possible for subways to run at grade, like trains or light rail? Or do they have to be either underground or elevated?

They can and do run at grade although they shouldn't have grade crossings (they used to though).

In any case, I think the biggest issue with it is that its a waste of resources. Rapid transit (subways) is much better for urban areas with frequent stops. I doubt many people would switch from a Northeast Corridor/NJCL/M&E/Montclair-Boonton train at Secaucus and there is not enough passenger on the Main/Bergen County/Pascack valley line trains to come even close to justifying the headway of the number 7.

And another question: why are we embarking on the current extension of the 7 rather than accelerating completion of the Second Ave. line? Doesn't it raise the cost of both projects, by competing for the same contractors and labor capable of tunneling and massive hole-digging (and for that matter, probably competing with the Croton Filtration plant)? There wouldn't seem to any economies of scale in doing them simultaneously.

Lastly -- what are the plans for the fill?

It is a TREMENDOUS opportunity for Obama.

Both McMcain and Clinton have gone against their principles to pander to those who want the easy way out in the short term. Obama just needs to keep saying:

"Gas was $1.50 per gallon in 2000, when the politicians said vote for me and I'll keep gas cheap so we can buy bigger cars and get bigger houses and burn more fuel. Now it's $4.00, and everyone with bigger cars and bigger houses is trapped, stuck."

"And what is their solution? Give you back 18.4 cents, which will be borrowed from your children! Gas is up $2.50 a gallon, you're stuck burning more of it than ever before, and that's their solution. We fell for it in 2000. I even fell for it once. Not anymore."

In other words, it isn't about liberals and conservatives, one part of the country vs. another, or one demographic against another. It is the politicians who have been scamming us all against everyone else. What an opportunity!

The Department of City Planning proposed extending the Flushing Line to what is now the Secaucus Transfer in the 1990s.

Suburban officials said that people in the suburbs demand something better than a subway ride, and only a one seat ride at a premium price to discourage the riff-raff would get them out of their cars.

At or near $4.00 a gallon, however, signs of panic are emerging everywhere and consumer demand may prove to be flexible at this price so that alternatives replace driving and/or consuming oil/gasoline.

A "laissez faire" policy on the price of oil/gasoline may prove the most effective however painful, way to decrease demand and consumption of oil and help the climate. Many drivers won't be able to afford the cost of their gasoline addiction and prove to be an alternative means of congestion pricing for every city by reducing the number of vehicles.

I'd like to see the figures and microeconomics grafts of the supply and demand curves for oil that show the price of oil at which consumer consumer demand for oil drops so much due to increased price that the oil companies begin to suffer loss of revenue.

Reigning in the profiteers in the oil industry is called for, as well.

The creation of national and state departments with appointed Secretary of sane energy policies with emphasis on climate change is also required.

I

In all seriousness, as of right now, the whole 7 to Secaucus idea is a complete joke. There is no real research just assertions. If its proponents want to convince me, they are going to have to show some real evidence of its efficacy and its cost benefits (not just a short table with assertions about costs without any details or data to back it up).

The problem is that the cheapest alternative for many people is to drive into the city. No tolls on the bridges, free parking galore throughout the city and most likely a waiting list to park at suburban rail stations.

Build more parking at suburban rail stations; extend the 7-line to Secaucus with a huge parking lot, toll the bridges and take away the free parking on the city.

There are so many ways to tackle congestion in the city but so often is gets down to Manhattan-envy and a defense of the phantom poor driving public.

It is inconsistant if not a lie

||Well, let me take that clue stick and whap you back with it. Don't want to pay the toll? Take the subway like everyone else. You know what you'll see on the subway? LOTS of families with children.||

Actually, no they don't, although my kids ride the subway more than anyone you know. You have no idea how many families there are and if they flooded the subways, then the subways would be well beyond capacity and the families themselves would be unable to function.

Ruben

Make up your mind. When trying to shove this thing down my throat it was claimed almost nobody in Brooklyn would be affected because we don't drive in. Now you admit that it's designed to keep Brooklynites out of Manhattan with our cars.

It's not inconsistent. It's a tiny minority of Brooklynites who act like jerks by bringing their cars into Manhattan.

If your meaning of "The whole point of congestion pricing was to get people like you to act more like Brooklynites and less like Lynbrook-ites" means that we shouldn't raise children and should agree to be land locked from Manhattan and the rest of the nation by tolling the Brooklyn Bridge, let me hit you with a clue stick, over my dead body will I ever pay a toll to drive in my city.

Well, let me take that clue stick and whap you back with it. Don't want to pay the toll? Take the subway like everyone else. You know what you'll see on the subway? LOTS of families with children.

It's nonsense.

If your meaning of "The whole point of congestion pricing was to get people like you to act more like Brooklynites and less like Lynbrook-ites" means that we shouldn't raise children and should agree to be land locked from Manhattan and the rest of the nation by tolling the Brooklyn Bridge, let me hit you with a clue stick, over my dead body will I ever pay a toll to drive in my city. Lock out Lynbrook and remember that Brooklyn and Queens are integrated parts of the city and not "Bridge and Tunnel People".

Ruben

Regardless of the official definition of "suburb," if you spend most of your time driving, you're living a suburban lifestyle, Mr. Brooklyn. The whole point of congestion pricing was to get people like you to act more like Brooklynites and less like Lynbrook-ites. Silly us, what were we thinking?

By the way, I think those are the shoals that pierce the hull of the good ship Obama. Obama, allegedly, appeals to the smart voter, pushing the line that politics "as usual" is based on little negative, gotcha moments. Supposedly, his appeal to the voters better instincts will draw "new voters" to the polls who will become agents of "change".

I don't buy it, as much as I wish it was true. I think the new voters are basically not a lot different from the old voters, except that they were too stupid to have voted in the past.

The gas tax will be a good opportunity for O'Bama to distinguish himself. First McCain, then Clinton pandered to cutting the gas tax. Will O'Bama do the right thing, step up to the plate and speak truth to power? I'm not holding my breath.

I think he was a big Ethanol booster in Iowa (what a progressive group those Iowa people are to vote for a black man). And coal gasification was popular for him in his home state of Illinois. On energy policy so far he has been equally as progressive as Pataki.

http://demographia.blogspot.com/2008/04/more-than-90-of-metropolitan-growth-in.html

In fact, they make up over 90% of growth in the region. Until that changes, a tax on Brooklyn and Queens just makes no sense except to rip Brooklyn and Queens from the fabric of their own city.

Regardless of the price of gas, or the suggested ill-conceived tax on Brooklyn and Queens, people will continue to try to drive in because their coming from further and further away at great cost to the environment.

Until you change this trend, they can shove the Brooklyn and Queens tax where the sun don't shine.

Toll the LIE and the Garden State.

If there is a crisis, it's the looming food crisis brought on by farmers switching to biofuel crops , coupled with massively increased costs of production for energy intensive agriculture practiced in developing countries. The crisis is people starving because they can't afford food. The crisis is NOT people having to pay more to drive their Hummer 2 miles to the grocery store.