Former MTA honcho Tom Prendergast was appointed the head of the Gateway Development Commission Thursday, responsible for the sweeping $40 billion project to dig a new rail tunnel under the Hudson River and lay miles of new train track through the New Jersey Meadowlands.
“The responsibility you’ve entrusted in me is significant — it’s not something I take lightly,” Prendergast said following his unanimous approval by the project commissioners.
“The Hudson Tunnel project is the most urgent project in the United States of America,” he said, adding, “Infrastructure is what built New York.”
Prendergast — who served as MTA chairman from 2013 to 2017 as part of a 25-year career at the agency — comes to the commission from infrastructure consulting firm AECOM, where he’s been since 2020.
In his time at the head of the MTA, Prendergast oversaw the long-awaited opening of the first phase of the Second Ave. Subway. He also served at various times as the head of the Long Island Rail Road and New York City Transit and as the senior vice president for subways.
The massive Gateway project he now leads is meant to eventually double rail capacity across the New Jersey Meadowlands and into New York Penn Station while modernizing and expanding an aging section of the Northeast Corridor rail line.
Initial work is underway on the crown jewel of the project, the Hudson River Tunnel, which will connect New York Penn to northern New Jersey with two new rail tubes. When that new tunnel is completed, crews will begin repairs to the twin tubes of the 1910 North River Tunnel currently serving Penn Station.
The plan also includes feeding those four river crossings with expanded tracks across the swamplands of New Jersey, a project that involves replacing the Portal Bridge in Kearny, N.J., as well as adding or rehabbing several smaller bridges in the Meadowlands, plus adding track capacity near Secaucus Junction.