Thanks to the state Freedom of Information Law, we at Reinvent Albany got a copy of the Penn Station “collaboration agreement” Amtrak has been pushing the MTA to sign. As lifelong NYC transit advocates, we are intensely interested in President Trump’s Penn Station Project and took a careful look.
The MTA should not sign it. This agreement — and the project as it stands now — could hurt New York in several ways.
First, the agreement could weaken the MTA’s Long Island Rail Road lease with Amtrak — which has been pre-paid through the year 2186. The lease is the MTA’s strongest defense against getting steamrolled by the Trump administration.
Second, it says Amtrak will coordinate with MTA and NJTransit on press and public announcements, but then includes a clause essentially allowing U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to say whatever he wants about the project. U.S. DOT and the Federal Railroad Administration could issue statements without MTA’s consent — or even Amtrak’s — telling the public one thing while the project team says something else.
Third, we still don’t know how much the project costs. Amtrak says it won’t know until “early 2027” after the “design is more mature.” We think it could be much more than the $8 billion floated. The MTA’s estimate for a more modest project that did not include a “grand” Eighth Ave. entrance was $7 billion back in 2022. Despite having no price tag, the collaboration agreement asks the MTA to “cooperate and support…Amtrak’s efforts to obtain state and federal funding.”
Fourth, the agreement gives MTA a smaller role as a “Coordinating Partner” versus the “Funding Partner” status given to NJT. This is despite the feds not putting real money on the table for project construction. The agreement only mentions “pre-development” grants of $43 million, and matching funds of $10.7 million.
Tellingly, two ways that have been proposed by the Trump administration and project sponsors to fund the project would benefit Trump’s big political donors.
A $1 billion appropriation was inserted into a defense spending bill in Congress soon after Trump met with Madison Square Garden owner James Dolan. We think this is intended to buy the InfoSys Theater from Dolan, who was slated to get $500 million in a 2023 plan proposed by one of Amtrak’s current private project partners.
Perhaps most odiously, an amendment to the U.S. House surface transportation authorization bill proposed earlier this year would allow Amtrak to override New York City zoning and taxation authority in the area near Penn Station. This unprecedented federal overreach could be used to siphon billions from NYC to pay for Trump’s Penn Station. The same bill also zeroes out guaranteed funding for Amtrak, making it harder for the feds to pay for the Penn Station project directly.
Congressman Jerry Nadler, who represents the Penn Station area, has sounded the alarm, saying that Penn Station developers (including Vornado) appear to have “colluded to use the Surface Transportation Reauthorization process to enrich Donald Trump’s billionaire allies at the expense of everyday New Yorkers.”
Fortunately, neither of these proposals has been enacted by Congress.
State Sen. Liz Krueger says that New York should not “say yes to the dress” if Amtrak does not answer basic financial questions.
She’s right, and so is the MTA. The MTA should not sign away New York’s leverage by joining this collaboration agreement. Collaboration takes trust, and without basic financial commitments and project costs, New Yorkers have no reason to believe this is a good deal.
Fauss is senior policy advisor at Reinvent Albany.