Why the LaGuardia AirTrain project must move forward
that need funding, from a new bus terminal in
Midtown to New Jersey’s PATH train expansion. The
bi-state agency has so far prioritized capital funding for
AirTrain as part of its commitment to a complete transformation
of LaGuardia Airport. It would be a shame to
lose that significant investment in Queens.
The fact is that construction of LaGuardia’s
AirTrain will deliver real benefits to Queens, to the
borough’s residents, and its local and minority- and
women-owned businesses. Building AirTrain will create
3,000 good-paying, union construction jobs with
a hiring and recruitment program targeting local
residents. It will create permanent jobs operating and
maintaining AirTrain, with 80% of those posts filled
by applicants from communities nearest to LaGuardia
Airport. AirTrain will create $500 million in contracting
opportunities for minority- and women-owned businesses,
as well as local businesses in Queens. AirTrain
would include a new, ADA-accessible LIRR station at
Willets Point with full-time service to Penn Station and
Grand Central Terminal for the first time. And it would
remove millions of cars a year from local streets and
highways, reducing congestion and greenhouse gases
that contribute to climate change.
In addition, AirTrain LaGuardia delivers a robust
package of community benefits that includes a historic
$50 million to make significant improvements to the
Malcolm X Promenade at Flushing Bay and other local
parks, including long-term financial support for maintenance.
The Promenade has not seen any investment
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TIMESLEDGER | QNS.COM | OCT. 15 - OCT. 21, 2021 19
OP-ED
BY TOM GRECH, SETH BORNSTEIN AND HOPE KNIGHT
Communities in Queens face urgent needs, ranging
from schools to health care, and more recently,
improved sewage and drainage systems. However, canceling
the AirTrain to LaGuardia — a project that will
stimulate economic activity that supports small businesses;
ease traffic congestion on our roads; and invest
in our local parks — will not provide a single penny to
address those important priorities.
If LaGuardia AirTrain does not go forward, the $2
billion budgeted for the project by the Port Authority
could instead be used to pay for the agency’s capital investments
in transportation projects in other boroughs
— or even New Jersey.
Some opponents of LaGuardia’s AirTrain seem to
suggest otherwise, arguing that funding for the mass
transit project would be better spent elsewhere in the
community. We all understand the need for greater
investment in critical community resources and infrastructure,
particularly after many of the communities
nearest to the airport were hard-hit by COVID-19 and
Hurricane Ida. But those are needs that city, state and
federal officials must address – not a self-funding agency
created by Congress solely to build transportation
infrastructure and to stimulate economic development.
The Port Authority is legally restricted to spending the
revenues it raises only on its own transportation projects
and facilities.
The Port Authority has myriad transportation priorities
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in more than a generation. If we lose this opportunity,
it will likely not see any investment for at least another
generation, if not longer. More than 5,000 trees would
also be planted in the community.
AirTrain will also provide funding for STEM programs
for local middle school students and college
scholarships for students from the nearby communities
of East Elmhurst and Corona. These will be real
investments in the community that were demanded
by the community, and the Port Authority is actually
able to deliver them only because of the AirTrain to La-
Guardia. Without that project, these investments also
disappear.
AirTrain is the only rail alternative of the nearly
50 that were independently evaluated by the FAA that
would be built without the taking of any private property
and that does not run through any residential or
commercial neighborhoods. Significantly, it would be
built without any taxpayer dollars — leaving those
much-needed public funds for other worthy projects.
It should be noted that there was similar resistance
to the JFK AirTrain. Some believed it would not be utilized,
be an eyesore, and devalue the surrounding area.
The opposite has happened; it is well used, is not an eyesore
and it has spurred development.
All of this would be lost if AirTrain does not go forward.
And for Queens, that would be a tragic loss of
investment, jobs and economic activity that’s sorely
needed to help lift up and restore our communities after
the brutal effects of COVID.
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