Another NJ Transit Boondoggle Awaits?

Plans are afoot to resurrect an abandoned rail line between Hoboken, New Jersey and Scranton, Pennsylvania. They're suggesting that the cost will be $500 million.

A transportation planning authority is pushing ahead with plans to bring back a passenger rail line between Hoboken and Scranton, Pa.

The North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority put a 7-mile stretch of the line on its transit plans, which makes it eligible for federal funding.

There has not been passenger rail service along the route since before 1985, when the tracks were dismantled.

Before that, though, trains had taken passengers between Hoboken and northeastern Pennsylvania for some 70 years.

The cost to restore service is estimated at more than $500 million.

Double that amount and you're beginning to approach what the final cost will be to taxpayers. Indeed, other reports already peg the costs at $551 million. I have no doubt that this project will cost closer to $1 billion if for no other reason the ongoing skyrocketing costs of construction in the NYC metro area.

While land acquisition costs aren't going to be particularly high, the fact that there's insufficient NJ Transit rail equipment to handle new traffic (there's insufficient equipment for the existing lines and additional commuters entering the NJ Transit system already), how exactly is this new line going to operate without additional money spent for new operating equipment unless the agency is going to cannibalize existing routes for equipment?

How many people are expected to use this new line, and would it not make more sense to use those funds to improve transit options in North Jersey where congested roads put the region at a disadvantage? Improved parking at existing rail stations would make more sense than spending on expanding a system would only likely increase suburban sprawl.