Things are looking up for the proposal to build new commuter train tunnels between New Jersey and Manhattan. The chair of the Port Authority is publicly talking the project up, seemingly wherever he goes, and New York City’s top business group is now also on board. The project is a critical one for the region’s mass transit system and economy. Its improving prospect is a rare piece of good news as projects like the Second Avenue subway and Long Island Rail Road connection to Grand Central hang in limbo.

Port Authority chair Anthony Coscia says his bi-state agency could commit up to $2 billion for the new tunnels. Coscia told the Bergen Record that supporting the project "is completely consistent" with the Port Authority’s mission to sustain and improve transportation across the Hudson.

New Jersey’s congressional delegation has been united behind the project for some time. New backing by the NYC Partnership adds to the project’s momentum. Presentations by Coscia and NJ Transit chief George Warrington make a compelling case that New Jersey’s growing commuter population needs viable connections to Manhattan, and that the existing tunnel and tracks between NY Penn Station and Secaucus are at capacity. NJ Transit recently told the NY Times that the agency has doubled the number of trains it runs into Manhattan since 1994. New Jersey is expected to shoulder the lion’s share of the NJ-Manhattan train tunnel’s cost.

NYC Partnership director Kathryn Wylde told the Times that New Jersey and New York should work together to get the project done. The Partnership’s position represents a rare moment of rationality in infrastructure politics in the region. The most vocal business lobbying for a big regional transit project is for a new connection between lower Manhattan and the stagnant Long Island commuter market, even though the MTA already plans a new LIRR connection to Grand Central terminal.

New Jersey’s outreach to New York for the project is also a regional model the city would do well to emulate for plans like the proposed freight rail link and the city’s garbage export plan, which will require access to New Jersey’s freight rail lines.

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