Dive Brief:
- Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and the Amtrak Board of Directors on Wednesday named Penn Transportation Partners, a partnership between design, development and construction firms Halmar and Skanska, as the master developer for the New York Penn Station renovation.
- The $8 billion project includes expanding track capacity, a new Eighth Avenue entrance to a new train hall, and improving the station’s existing subterranean structure.
- The Federal Railroad Administration also announced $200 million in additional funding for the New York Penn Station Transformation project. Construction is set to begin next year once contracts and permits are finalized, according to a press release.
Dive Insight:
“We are one step closer to delivering a world-class travel hub that daily commuters and travelers have dreamed of for decades,” Duffy said in a statement.
Owned and served by Amtrak, Penn Station also serves New Jersey Transit and the Long Island Rail Road. The station opened in 1910 and was reconfigured in the 1960s following demolition of the original structure. The new design for Penn Station “takes inspiration from this lost architectural gem,” Amtrak and DOT said in a joint news release.
A former post office building on Eighth Avenue was reconfigured and reopened in 2021 as the Moynihan Train Hall, serving Amtrak and the LIRR. The new Penn Station design will fit in with the train hall, according to the announcement.
The DOT last year reassigned Amtrak’s Andy Byford, hired in 2023 to oversee high-speed rail development, as special adviser to the Amtrak board of directors. He was put in charge of the Penn Station redevelopment and oversaw the competitive procurement process. Previously, he headed the Toronto Transit Commission, the New York City Transit Authority and Transport for London.
“The rapid completion of a rigorous procurement process represents more than just delivering on a highly ambitious milestone; it demonstrates that Amtrak and USDOT are uniquely capable of making this vision a reality,” Byford said in a statement.
However, construction of the Hudson Tunnel project to build a new two-track tunnel and rehabilitate the existing 116-year-old North River Tunnel, which carries Amtrak intercity passenger trains and New Jersey Transit commuter trains to and from Penn Station, was halted for about a month earlier this year when the Trump administration withheld funds.
Funding is flowing again. The Gateway Development Commission, in charge of the project, awarded a $1.3 billion contract in April to bore the two new tunnel tubes.
