Cross Harbor Freight Tunnel to take 30 years to build? Or, to never be built? It's just another, in a long line of transportation projects, waiting to be funded.

Another 30-year wait for completion of the Cross-Harbor Freight Tunnel?

There is only $70 million for advancing an environmental study along with preliminary design and engineering for the Cross-Harbor Freight Tunnel within the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey 2017 - 2026 Capital Plan. This leaves a $9.930 billion shortfall to complete this project.

From article, (The proposed Cross-Harbor Freight Tunnel may be just another in the continuing series of feasibility studies and environmental reviews sponsored by various governmental agencies and public officials over decades. They generate some money for consultants along with free publicity for elected officials who promise a bright future but all too often move on to another public office before delivering. Taxpayers are frequently left holding an empty bag with unfilled promises. 

There is only $70 million for advancing an environmental study along with preliminary design and engineering for the Cross-Harbor Freight Tunnel within the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey 2017 - 2026 Capital Plan. This leaves a $9.930 billion shortfall to complete this project. Manhattan-Brooklyn Congress member Jerald Nadler claims that there is real progress for his favorite Cross-Harbor Freight Tunnel project. This doesn't add up if you look at past history. This project has been championed by Congress member Nadler as his number one transportation priority for almost thirty years. After all that time, it has yet to progress beyond the federal National Environmental Protect Act review process. In theory, it might move thousands of trucks on a daily basis off the roads and on to railroad tracks for significant portions of the journey between New Jersey and Long Island.

Construction of any new freight, public transportation tunnel or bridge project can take years, if not decades, by the time all feasibility studies, environmental reviews, planning, design, engineering, real estate acquisition, permits, procurements, construction, budgeting, identifying and securing funding is completed. 

 It is wishful thinking that the Port Authority can count on billions in future federal funding to make up the difference. Don't be surprised in waiting another 30 years until future Port Authority ten year 2027 - 2036 and 2037 - 2046 Capital Plans are approved before a complete $10 billion or more funding package is in place. This is necessary to support awarding construction contracts.)

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Me, "This is what happens when you have a lot of great transportation projects, but very little money to move them along."

New News out of Boca Chica. SpaceX's Future SpacePort.

SpaceX seeking additional $5 million in spaceport funding from state

SpaceX is seeking new state funding to build a commercial spaceport in Texas, even though the high-profile project that it began near Brownsville in 2014 is behind schedule and millions in state tax dollars already set aside for it have yet to be spent.

From article, (SpaceX is seeking new state funding to build a commercial spaceport in Texas, even though the high-profile project that it began near Brownsville in 2014 is behind schedule and millions in state tax dollars already set aside for it have yet to be spent. 

Hawthorne, Calif.-based SpaceX — founded by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk with the aim of reducing the cost of space travel and one day facilitating the colonization of Mars — is seeking up to $5 million more from the state to help build infrastructure related to the launch facility at Boca Chica beach outside Brownsville, a Cameron County official has confirmed. 

 A total of $13 million from the Spaceport Trust Fund was earmarked for SpaceX’s project at Boca Chica beach in 2014, but only $2.6 million of it has been spent. In addition, SpaceX has been pledged $2.3 million from the state’s jobs-focused Texas Enterprise Fund, but only $400,000 has been distributed to it — and the company has returned about $81,000 of that sum — because the project hasn’t kept pace with employment targets. 

The slower-than-expected rate of development at the Boca Chica spaceport is partly the result of difficulties building on the beach after the bedrock proved to be deeper than expected and the water table turned out to be higher than expected, prompting SpaceX to bring in hundreds of thousands of cubic yards of new soil to stabilize the site to support future structures. 

Other slowdowns have been caused by the company’s focus on more pressing issues after one of its rockets exploded in 2015 shortly after liftoff from a leased launch pad at Florida’s Cape Canaveral Air Force Station and another exploded on the pad in 2016, temporarily grounding some of SpaceX’s commercial operations both times. 

Musk -- who started electric car-maker Tesla, among other companies, and is known for bold and futuristic pronouncements -- said during the Boca Chica groundbreaking in 2014 that rockets launched from the site would carry commercial satellites at first but it eventually could be critical to establishing a human presence on Mars. 

“It could very well be that the first person that departs for another planet will depart from this location,” Musk said at the time.)

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