The ten elected officials who testified referred often to the need to accommodate additional job and residential growth in vibrant parts of the city. Public Advocate Mark Green said the city could ill-afford not to make infrastructure investments that would promote such growth. Bronx Borough President Fernando Ferrer testified that better transit links would reinforce and propel the rebuilding taking place in many Bronx neighborhoods, and also noted the new Queens and Brooklyn services the Regional Plan Association's MetroLink plan would provide.

A representative for State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said that the MESA study had missed its mandate to find ways to provide better transit to Manhattan's east siders. She said Silver supported a full-length Second Avenue line with connections to the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens.

The NYC Transit Riders Council and the Regional Plan Association both pointed out that MESA could not become a "first phase" of a larger Second Avenue project, since the MTA possessed no larger 2nd Ave. plan within which MESA could be situated.

RPA released a detailed critique of MESA at the hearing. Among other issues, including commentary on the likely construction impacts of various approaches to the Second Avenue Subway, RPA noted that:

· MESA falls short of meeting even its own, very limited planning objectives - to relieve Lexington Avenue Line crowding and shorten East Siders' walking distances to subways.
Regarding crowding, the Upper East Side to East Midtown ranks only 7^th among top Lexington Line markets. Brooklyn, the Bronx and Queens contribute many more riders, but were excluded from the MESA study area. The travel markets that would be relieved account for only 16% of Lexington line riders - thus MESA's diversion from the Lexington Line would not even keep pace with the expected ridership growth trend (not even counting the riders the planned LIRR-Grand Central link will add to the Lex), leaving the Lexington Line more crowded than ever.

· MTA's long range planning framework isolates various projects from each other - thus, no non-Manhattan travel markets were studied by MESA, and the LIRR-Grand Central Link's impact on the Lexington Line is not addressed.

· The MESA study does not contain information sufficient to paint a clear picture of the screening out of other alternatives, including a full-length Second Avenue subway line, or how critical benefits of a full-length Second Avenue line, like links to the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens, were dismissed against MESA's stated goals.

Whether any Second Avenue project will be a part of the MTA's new 5-year capital program is still at issue. The MTA will likely release its new plan September 29. In the downstate region's recent Transportation Improvement Program, the MTA budgeted less than $100 million for subway expansion projects.

But the NY Post cited an unnamed MTA official Thursday who said at least $500 million for the MESA project would be included in the new MTA capital program.

Still, the Empire State Transportation Alliance, a diverse groups of business and civic leaders and environmental and labor organizations, called last week, as part of its overall transit repair and expansion program (see MTR #236) for the new capital plan to devote $2 billion to the RPA MetroLink plan, whose linchpin is a full-length Second Avenue subway.

MTA Capital Plan Debate - Coming Attraction
September 29, 9am MTA Board Meeting (likely release of MTA proposed 5-year capital program), 347 Madison Avenue, 5th floor.

MTA Capital Program: Internet Links

· ESTA and its assessment of MTA capital needs.

· Regional Plan Association's Metrolink subway construction plan.

· RPA's detailed critique of the MTA MESA study (for download).

· Executive summary of MTA Manhattan East Side Alternatives (2nd Ave. Subway) study.