New R.R. Commuter Plan Offered For Area Relief
Expert Would Improve, Integrate, And Speed Existing Facilities In N. J. And N. Y.
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New York, Aug. 16 (AP) — A new railroad commuter plan has been offered to relieve the mounting traffic congestion besetting the New York Metropolitan Area.
UNIFIED SERVICE
The plan calls for a Tri-State agency to set up a high-speed rail system using improved and integrated existing facilities to give New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut a unified service.
Cost of the system was put at a maximum $317 million, compared to a minimum of $915 million for an entirely new system.
This latest proposal for solving the area’s traffic problem came from Colonel S. H. Bingham U.S.A., Ret., an engineer specializing in railroads. From March 1954 to February 1956, when he left for his own consulting business, Bingham was executive director and general manager of the New York City Transit Authority.
His plan, embodied in an 18-page report sent to Governors of three States, was made public yesterday. Bingham said it was not offered to create competition for highway travel but to ease congestion for future growth.
He estimated that fast, comfortable, and convenient train service could lure motorized commuters off the roads.
Bingham suggested rail links and extensions to tie the various lines serving the city into a unified network. Morning-hour trains into the City could stay here until evening rush hours to avoid empty runs, he explained.
Other elements in the plan: a central control point to monitor train movements; lightweight, air-conditioned cars; and improved designs for faster car loadings and shorter station stops.
Bingham put the cost at $210 million without a tunnel under the East River to Long Island. A tunnel would raise expenses $107 million.
His proposal envisaged:
1. A line from the Bound Brook junction of the Central Railroad of New Jersey and the Lehigh Valley Railroad, to Cranford, N.J. The line would continue to Newark, to connect there with the Hudson & Manhattan Railroad to Jersey City. There the route would branch, one going to the H & M terminal in lower Manhattan, the other to the line's midtown Manhattan terminal.
2. Extension of the H & M Subway north to the New York Central tracks now serving both the Central and the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroads.
3. Continuation of this line to Pleasantville, N.Y., with a branch using the New York, New Haven and Hartford tracks to Fairfield, Conn.
4. An East River tunnel to reach the North Shore Division of the Long Island Railroad to Port Washington.
5. A new station in the East 149th Street area to free the New York Central of separate commuter service by integrating the line's Hudson Division to Ossining into the network.
6. A New Jersey branch along the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad to serve such areas as the Oranges, Maplewood, Summit, and Morristown.