Frightening Complacency

Nearly four years after the 9/11 attacks and people still don't get it. The terrorists will continue to try to kill innocent civilians doing the ordinary tasks of everyday life. Taking the subway. Riding a bus. Going to work. At work. At play. Coming home.

And yet, there seems to be little worry about our neglected transportation infrastructure that would be susceptible to mass casualty attacks not unlike what we've seen with the Madrid bombing last year or the London attacks this year. The Journal of Homeland Security highlights potential hazards and mitigations.

New York City has more than 230 miles of subway tunnels. There are miles more of tunnels for PATH trains and Amtrak, Metro North, LIRR, and NJ Transit lines. Some have adequate safety equipment installed. Many don't. In particular, the Amtrak owned Hudson and East River tunnels operate at peak capacity and are more than 100 years old. Hundreds of trains tranverse those tunnels daily and they are not built up to modern code, nor do they have proper sprinkler or ventilation systems in case of an emergency. These issues were first highlighted in the weeks following 9/11 (NJ Senator Toricelli spoke of this on the Senate floor on 10/10/2001), and again after 3/11, but it doesn't seem to have generated any concrete action. In fact, Congress had bills in both houses with bipartisan support and yet none of the bills were passed and signed into law (Search of 108th Congress; Search of 109th Congress - click on each bill).

Will it take a mass casualty incident in one of these tunnels to reconsider the expenditure of millions to make the daily commute of hundreds of thousands of people safer?

UPDATE:
Fixed factual issue above relating to number of miles of tunnels. According to the MTA website, "Approximately 660 in passenger service. Counting track used for “non-revenue” purposes (e.g., in subway yards), the number is more than 840 miles." However, there is more than one way to count the mileage. One method is route miles for the subway system, which totals 230. Track miles includes the fact that many routes have two, three, or even four tracks laid down for the same route (New Yorkers know that three and four track routes have express service to bypass certain local stations). Thus, the mileage is considerably higher.