By Marty Raminoff
On July 20, the construction plan for the new LaGuardia AirTrain was finally approved by The Federal Aviation Administration, following two decades of dialogue, community opposition and delays. The $2.1 billion project, led by Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, will undertake the construction of a 30-minute rail link between Midtown Manhattan and LaGuardia airport.
As reported by Crain’s NY, a station in Willets Point, Queens, will link the elevated AirTrain with the city’s subway 7 line as well as Long Island Rail Road’s Port Washington line. The AirTrain will run along the Flushing Bay promenade and transport riders between the airport and the station within six minutes. Construction could begin as early as this summer. It will mark the latest improvement at LaGuardia, which has already undergone a multi-billion dollar renovation. The AirTrain will “provide a sustainable and reliable travel option”, said Rick Cotton, the Port Authority’s executive director. “It will remove millions of vehicles from congested highways and local roads each year”.
Community groups in East Elmhurst, Flushing, Ditmars, Steinway and Astoria continue to oppose the project, as in the past, and are again mulling legal action to stop the construction. Planning for a railway or other infrastructure improvements to and from LaGuardia, and opposition to the plans, extend as far back as 1943, just four years after the airport was first opened. Throughout the 1990’s plans focused on extending the N line, which would necessitate building an elevated track through Queens neighborhoods, demolishing private property as well as spending years on construction along the busy highways.
The AirTrain at Willets Point, near Citi Field, was first introduced in 2015 by Gov. Cuomo, with a preliminary price point of $450 million. The cost has ballooned since then. On the plus side though, the project will generate 3,000 construction jobs and $500 million in contracting opportunities for minority- and women-owned business enterprises, as per estimates from The Queens Chamber of Commerce.
Critics, including politicians and grassroots groups, have opposed the planned Airtran project alleging it: will harm Queens communities, builds barriers between communities and their green spaces, would block use to the Flushing Bay promenade, takes a circular route, didn’t consider alternate options, and more. As per Crain’s the FAA has defended its approval, saying it “completed an objective and thorough review [of] 47 reasonable alternatives.” The FAA conducted public hearings and studies of the environmental resources that will be affected by the project. In its July decision, the FAA concluded “there is a substantial need for the proposed action based on the overall public interest.”
