Gov. Christie exposes the rats...a tunnel to nowhere

The Rest of the New Jersey Tunnel Story

When Gov. Chris Christie put the kibosh on the mega project, he cited cost overruns as the reason. But recently he said overruns were only the final straw.

By MARY ANASTASIA O'GRADY

When New Jersey Governor Chris Christie put the kibosh on the mega infrastructure project known as the ARC train tunnel last summer he cited billions of dollars in projected cost overruns as the reason. But during a visit to The Wall Street Journal's offices on Wednesday Mr. Christie, a Republican, told us that the overruns were only the final straw. Almost as important was the design of the project, which Mr. Christie called "ridiculous."

"I was willing to live with what I thought was an ill-conceived and drastically imperfect plan if it stayed within budget," he said. But when it became clear that the cost overruns were "a certainty," there was no way he could defend it.

Mary Anastasia O'Grady on the N.J. governor's cancellation of a tunnel project.

The issue is far from over. New Jersey spent $271 million of federal money on the initial stages of the project. He said that the federal government's decision to release that money when ARC did not have final approval and did not have safeguards in place to protect against waste should have been a no-no. "That's my argument of why I don't have to pay the money back."

"ARC" stands for Access to the Region's Core and the tunnel was supposed to enable New Jersey train riders to connect to Penn Station in New York and the east side of the city. But the final design had trains dumping passengers elsewhere. "No one wanted to go into the basement of Macy's, 10 stories underground, come 10 stories back up to Herald Square and walk over to Penn station to get another train." It was not what was promised, he told us.

New Jersey was also bearing too much of the cost in his view. When he halted the project, he said that "the only phone calls of protest I got were from [New York] Mayor [Michael] Bloomberg, [then-New York] Governor [David] Paterson and New York City real estate developers. And I thought to myself, 'Hey, you know, I think I might've stumbled onto something.'" The governor said he started to see the project as "access to New York's core, thanks New Jersey."

Mr. Christie said that he told Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood that he could not "justify to New Jerseyans that we are paying 70% of the cost of this project plus the overruns when [the federal government is] building high-speed rail between Orlando and Tampa and paying 80% of the cost." Mr. Christie said he also told Mr. LaHood that he understands that "Florida has more electoral votes than New Jersey and that New Jersey is not competitive and Florida is. But, enough."

So how come a badly designed project was recklessly put in gear, with federal assistance? Mr. Christie cited an inspector general's report that says the plan was hurried "for a ground breaking ceremony in July 2009 in the middle of the [gubernatorial] campaign." There was no final approved plan, he says, but the [department of transportation] allowed the federal money to be spent anyway "because they were trying to help the incumbent governor get re-elected."