Lincoln Tunnel goes HOT?

[jresta]

Port Authority Begins to Tackle Lincoln Tunnel Capacity Crunch

This week, Port Authority staff presented the agency’s commissioners with a plan to study ways to get more out of the Lincoln Tunnel’s jammed lanes. The main problem facing tunnel managers is that the Exclusive Bus Lane cannot fit more buses.

http://www.tstc.org/bulletin/20040426/mtr45601.html


It's interesting here b/c at a conference on BRT one of our older staff members complained that "we have maxed out freeways with little to no room for widening. Taking a lane for exclusive bus use would just make the problem worse." Spoken like a true engineer.
If you're goal is to move as many cars as possible then sure you'll have a problem.

 

[gct13]

I've got just the solution for the perplexed minds at the PA: Graviton Ceiling Tiles.

Graviton Ceiling Tiles, as I'm sure you're all aware, allow cars to safely move through tunnels (or bridges, or double-decker highways) via the ceiling. By utilizing the Gravitons, you can effectively double car capacity within the tubes: each lane on the tunnel floor will be mirrored by a ceiling lane. It's what you call a honk-honk situation in the traffic engineering world (otherwise known as a win-win in the business world ) - the busses get a new exclusive lane, and the cars increase capacity even with the lost lane.

To top it off, deem the ceiling "HOT lanes" and set the price at, say, $25. During the first year of implementation new ceiling lanes typically account for only 10% of traffic volume, yet savvy people from the "growing New Jersey-Manhattan commuter market" know that those lanes give them a 15-30 minute bonus.

And 8-14 months down the line, after the Gravitons have been successfully implemented on the Holland, Brooklyn-Battery, and Midtown Tunnels, the GWB, Triborough, Throgs Neck, Tapanzee, Brooklyn, Verazano, Manhattan, WillyB, Queensborough, and Whitestones Bridges... and have completely maxed out, allowing 10 million motor vehicles to enter Manhattan every weekday, then there's only one place to turn.

The Big Boy Catapult.

 

[jresta]

I don't just how facetious you were being but i think the point of the story was that the PA realizes that the only way they can increase the capactiy of the tunnel is to cut out cars.

the variable pricing is just a way to phase out auto use of one more lane of the tunnel and give it over to the buses. Fine by me.

 

[mgk920]

I don't just how facetious you were being but i think the point of the story was that the PA realizes that the only way they can increase the capactiy of the tunnel is to cut out cars.

the variable pricing is just a way to phase out auto use of one more lane of the tunnel and give it over to the buses. Fine by me.

Although it would cost a bundle and likely have to charge about $10-15 toll in each direction in todays money, the ultimate solution may end up having to be be a new 'Trans-Manhattan' deep-bored tunnel that would connect the NJTP (near interchange 16E) in the Secaucus, NJ area with the Long Island Expressway just west of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway interchange in the Sunnyside area of Queens NYC, reserving the Lincoln and Midtown tunnels themselves for traffic that is actually going to and from Manhattan.

This would also get through traffic off of surface streets in Midtown Manhattan.

Pipedream? Perhaps, but wierder things have actually come to fruition.

Mike

 

[jresta]

Actually, the two projects that are moving through Study&Development quickly are:

the Cross-Harbor freight tunnel (rail only) that will connect Long Island/New England with the rest of the continent (without having to go through Albany) for the first time ever. The tunnel will cross under the Verazzano Narrows connecting Brooklyn and Staten Island. The Staten Island rail connection to New Jersey has been recently improved. It's said that it will remove 3,000 trucks a day from Staten Island alone.

the second is the new passenger rail tunnel under the Hudson - essentially doubling capacity into Penn Station. Of course, Penn Station couldn't handle that volume so they're working on a Penn Station to Grand Central connection. The best recommendation i've seen so far is here -
http://www.rpa.org/pdf/NewHudsonCase_summary.pdf

The RPA also proposed a new regional express system dubbed "Rx" that would send NJTransit trains through Manhattan into CT and Long Island stopping only at major stations.

 

[mgk920]

Actually, the two projects that are moving through Study&Development quickly are:

the Cross-Harbor freight tunnel (rail only) that will connect Long Island/New England with the rest of the continent (without having to go through Albany) for the first time ever. The tunnel will cross under the Verazzano Narrows connecting Brooklyn and Staten Island. The Staten Island rail connection to New Jersey has been recently improved. It's said that it will remove 3,000 trucks a day from Staten Island alone.

the second is the new passenger rail tunnel under the Hudson - essentially doubling capacity into Penn Station. Of course, Penn Station couldn't handle that volume so they're working on a Penn Station to Grand Central connection. The best recommendation i've seen so far is here -
http://www.rpa.org/pdf/NewHudsonCase_summary.pdf

The RPA also proposed a new regional express system dubbed "Rx" that would send NJTransit trains through Manhattan into CT and Long Island stopping only at major stations.

The railroad tunnel is a proposal that I have been following with a lot of interest, too. It is a BADLY needed upgrade to the region's transport network, as right now, about the only way to get anything in and out of Long Island (including Brooklyn and Queens) is by truck. For serving almost 7.5 million population, that is a LOT of trucks on not a lot of road.

The proposal that I have seen would connect the LIRR Bay Ridge line in SW Brooklyn directly with trackage somewhere in Monmouth County, NJ with a double-track freight railroad tunnel high enough to clear standard double-stacked containers that bypasses Staten Island, although I can certainly see the cost-saving advantages of upgrading existing trackage to connect to it in Staten Island.

You are correct, too, in that the southernmost point where a standard railroad car can cross the Hudson River is near Albany. The bridge is CSXT's former Conrail/New York Central bridge just east of Selkirk, it is parallel to the New York State Thruway's Berkshire Extension bridge.

I am also intregued by that NJT proposal.

Mike

 

[jordanb]

the ultimate solution may end up having to be be a new 'Trans-Manhattan' deep-bored tunnel that would connect the NJTP (near interchange 16E) in the Secaucus, NJ area with the Long Island Expressway just west of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway interchange

No that would only be a "solution" for the about twenty years or so that it takes that tunnel to gridlock as well.

 

[gct13]

...i think the point of the story was that the PA realizes that the only way they can increase the capactiy of the tunnel is to cut out cars.

I was inspired by the line from the link where they stated they were worried about "closing off the growing New Jersey-Manhattan commuter market". I thought they were referring to cars and decided to run with it. Re-reading it now I see they were referring to bus traffic.

the variable pricing is just a way to phase out auto use of one more lane of the tunnel and give it over to the buses. Fine by me.

Fine by me too.