Statue of Liberty

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Port Authority Toll Hikes Hammer Commuter Buses

The recently approved Port Authority fare and toll hikes will end up hammering commuter bus companies, including NJ Transit. These companies and agencies have a reduced toll, but will feel the effects of the increases. While they're claiming that they wont pass the hikes on to the commuters, you can bet that they eventually will have no choice but to do so.

Bus operators will also have to find extra cash — in some cases millions more each year — to cross the George Washington Bridge and travel through the Lincoln and Holland tunnels.

For example, NJ Transit and Paramus-based Coach USA — which pay $4 per bus to use any of the three Hudson River crossings, will see a 150 percent increase to $10 per bus, following last month's move by the Port Authority to hike tolls.

That amount, which applies to buses enrolled in the E-ZPass program, will climb each year until 2014, when the toll will be $13, said Port Authority spokesman Ron Marsico.

The dramatic increase has some transit advocates rattled and questioning whether those costs will eventually be passed on to customers.

"It's terrible," said George Grieve, president of Mahwah-based ShortLine Bus, a subsidiary of bus operator Coach USA. "They dropped it like a bomb."

Grieve said he spends about $300,000 per year in tolls to send buses from New York State and along Route 17 through Bergen County to the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Manhattan. "It's going up to $800,000," he said Tuesday. "It's tremendous."

He said managers throughout Coach USA will be meeting today to discuss how to deal with the increases.

"We haven't decided that yet," Grieve said. "With the price of fuel going so high — we have significant increases in health care. Then they throw this toll hike."

He said his buses make 1,352 trips per week through the Lincoln Tunnel and 25 use the George Washington Bridge.

NJ Transit, meanwhile, will see an even bigger increase. The Newark-based agency spent $4 million in 2010 on bus tolls, said Penny Bassett Hackett, agency spokeswoman. It will spend an estimated $8.6 million in 2012, she said.

But Bassett Hackett emphasized NJ Transit, which raised its own bus and rail fares between 10 and 25 percent last year, will not be passing on a new increase to customers to offset the higher Port Authority tolls.

The agency last year also eliminated discounted off-peak fares as part of an effort to close a $300 million budget gap.

"We will be able to absorb it," she said. "It will have no impact on our fares. [Executive Director] Jim Weinstein was very clear that we will not raise fares" this year.

The Port Authority is essentially taxing other state instrumentalities for the right to use its property, and this is something that both Gov. Christie and Gov. Cuomo have to reevaluate in light of the need to promote mass transit to reduce congestion and pollution in the region.

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Flooding Continues Across North Jersey

The remnants from Tropical Storm Lee are causing widespread misery across much of the same region affected by Hurricane Irene. Floodwaters, which had receded in many places, have again been creeping upwards and road closures are in effect or are expected as rains continue.

Hard hit areas like Wayne's Hoffman Grove have not seen the Irene floodwaters recede, but some places that had been able to begin cleaning up are putting efforts on hold as floods resume across the Passaic River floodplain.

State officials are closely monitoring the situation, and the US Senate appears to be in the process of approving $5 million for a home buyback program to buy homes in the flood zones, but it still requires the House to approve a similar measure. One of the issues is that it's a rather paltry sum and another is that far too many affected homeowners think that the buybacks shortchange homeowners because they're not paying what the owners think the homes are worth.

If a home continually gets flooded out, the value should plummet but owners think that the values are higher than the market would bear.

Should this buyback get approved, it would allow localities to buy and demolish homes in flood zones to create new wetlands that can help absorb flood waters.

Moreover, one has to wonder at the rationale for owners finishing out basements in flood-prone areas. It's bad enough when a basement floods, and the costs to replace HVAC and stored possessions can reach $10,000 or more, but finishing a basement is an unnecessary cost and localities should be moving to prevent such work from being done to lessen the costs to the homeowners, insurers, and taxpayers. While I completely understand the need to maximize space within a home and that building up or adding rooms can be far more costly, a basement flooding out on a periodic basis undermines the utility of that space and would be akin to keep a boat in the basement - it keeps costing.

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Don't Expect Flood Mitigation Plans Anytime Soon

After disastrous flooding in New Jersey and upstate New York, we're getting the usual round of calls for fixes that may prevent future flooding.

The problem is that all those fixes require money and time.

A $330 million project for Bound Brook is not yet complete, and showed some of the limitations of the flood mitigation project. For one thing, the flood control project planned for a 150 year event, and Irene was a 500 year event (but expect that kind of storm damage to become more common place).

Heck, they usually require planning and it turns out that a New York State Panel empowered in 2006 to look at flood fixes for the Mohawk River near Albany never met.

A task force created to find ways to lessen water damage after a 2006 flood hit the Mohawk Valley and the state canal system has never met despite a state mandate. Flood damage in the wake of Tropical Storm Irene raises questions about the failure to develop a plan that could have reduced losses this summer.

Plans for a water diversion tunnel in New Jersey that would shift water from the Passaic River to Newark Bay have been floated several times, and there was even money set aside for that purpose, but environmentalists ended up killing the tunnel.

Population density is part of the problem within the Passaic watershed. There's far too many properties within the flood plain and flooding is complicated by runoff from more developed areas. Buyback plans to condemn and demolish homes and businesses in the worst flooding areas are nearly tapped out; these areas soak up floodwaters and reduce downstream flooding.

Some localities have called for dredging of waterways that have become choked with silt from runoff but environmentalists block such moves on grounds that it is a temporary solution, or that it will disturb polluted areas releasing more contaminants into waterways, etc.

Flood control projects meant to protect downstream areas get blamed for upstream flooding, which becomes a contentious issue as political disputes end up blocking any action at all - and these issues require interstate and regional solutions since watersheds often cross political boundaries.

Areas upstate are considering the unthinkable - instead of rebuilding along the same streams and waterways that have flooded several times in recent years, they are contemplating moving to higher ground and moving all the infrastructure that goes along with it. There are also calls for no new development within the Catskill watershed (which includes the NYC water supply area) and other efforts to reduce flood damage by moving structures out of projected flood areas.

Such plans wont help places like New York City, where much of the area is within a flood zone including Lower Manhattan.

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Rep. Michelle Bachmann's Presidential Aspirations Going Down In Flames

You know your campaign is toast when your own political consultants are jumping ship saying that you're a third-rate candidate.

Your career-warning light is now flashing in the red Rep. Bachmann. Ed Rollins has health issues, which is the basic reason that he's leaving the campaign, but Rollins' deputy is also quitting, and that leaves a vacuum at the top.

Citing health reasons, veteran GOP strategist Ed Rollins stepped down as campaign manager. Bachmann said one of her strategists would take over on an interim basis as Rollins moves to a senior adviser role.

"In less than 50 days and with fewer resources than other campaigns, Ed was the architect that led our campaign to a historic victory in Iowa," Bachmann said in a statement released late Monday, pointing to her win in the Ames Straw Poll last month.

"I am grateful for his guidance and leadership, and fortunate to retain his valuable advice even though his health no longer permits him to oversee the day-to-day operations of the campaign," she added.
Video: Meet the Candidate: Michele Bachmann (on this page)

Speaking to CNN, where he was a contributor before the Bachmann campaign, the 68-year-old Rollins said the front-runners were now former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

He said Perry's late entry into the race slowed Bachmann's buzz and fundraising.

"I think legitimately it's a Romney-Perry race," he said. "I think she's the third candidate at this point in time — which is way different and better than we'd thought when we started this thing — and she's very much in this thing."

'Great affection for her'
Rollins, who suffered a stroke a year and a half ago, said his plan had been to put together a team and get through the Iowa straw poll and then make a transition.

"I have great affection for her. I'll do everything I can to help her. It's still very much the team I put in place. I just don't have the endurance to go 12-, 14-hour days seven days a week anymore," he said.

Rollins' departure as campaign chief was first reported by Politico.

His deputy, David Polyansky, who worked with him when they ran former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee's presidential bid in 2008, also planned to step aside, Rollins told CNN.

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Assad's Security Goons Murder Fleeing Syrians

Once again, Bashar Assad's security forces have opened fire on civilians and murdered them in cold blood. This time, it was Syrians who were fleeing across the border to Turkey.

"Yesterday there was a bunch of people trying to cross the border to Turkey," said a Turkish Foreign Ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity according to diplomatic protocol. "While one of the groups tried to pass, there were shots fired from the Syrian side, I assume from the Syrian soldiers... two people were shot, one died on the Syrian side of the border, and (his body) was also carried with a wounded guy to the Turkish side."

A video emerging on YouTube showed an apparently dead man lying on the floor with blood leaking from his head. Off camera, a man says in Arabic "they shot him, the snipers." The video identified the victim as Abdul Salam Hasoon.

The description of the incident and the name of the victim were both confirmed by the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

"He was killed by snipers from the Syrian side while he was crossing the border," wrote the Observatory's Mousab Azzawi, in an e-mail to CNN.

According to the Turkish Foreign Ministry, at least 330 Syrians fled on Monday through an old border checkpoint at the Turkish village of Belengoz.

More people were killed by security forces through the northern part of Syria:



The world shrugs its shoulders as Assad's security forces continue murdering people whose only crime is to protest Assad's right to govern.

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Tornado Touches Down Along NYS Thruway Near Amsterdam

Upstate New York isn't catching a break. After the devastating floods from Hurricane Irene, the area is caught in a cold front that is bringing up the remnants from Tropical Storm Lee.

Ahead of that, there's been some wicked weather, including this tornado, which crossed over the NYS Thruway near the Mohawk rest area in Amsterdam.


The EF-1 storm was caught by a storm chaser who had come from Kansas to watch for tornadoes along the East Coast:

cut a seven-mile path from Florida in Columbia County to Glenville in Schenectady County.

The storm with winds as high as 110 mph was on the ground for about 15 minutes starting around 5:20 p.m., grew to as much as half-mile wide and left the most destruction in the Cranesville section of the town of Amsterdam, the weather service said.

Montgomery County Emergency Management Director Dwight Schwabrow said "numerous" buildings -- including the Cranesville Volunteer Fire Department -- were damaged.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo sent State Police and other officials already assigned to Tropical Storm Irene to respond to the Cranesville damage. One National Guardsman from Utica said his unit was re-assigned from Irene clean up the tornado's aftermath.

"We probably had between 25 and 30 homes that were damaged in one fashion or another," Schwabrow said. As of 11:30 a.m., nearly 2,000 National Grid customers in Fulton and Montgomery counties were without power, with an additional 547 in Rensselaer County, 772 in Saratoga County and 276 in Schenectady County in the dark.

Weather Service meteorologists said the video evidence strongly suggested that it was a tornado, but the today's investigation should determine wind speed, direction and extent of the damage before a tornado is confirmed.

The tornado was captured by Rotterdam resident Lindsay Phillips, a storm chaser who has traveled to Kansas, South Dakota and Wyoming to catch fleeting glimpses of the destructive power of tornadoes.

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Showdown Looms Over FAA and Federal Gas Taxes

The fight over FAA funding will once again rear its ugly head as the September 16 deadline looms and Congressional Democrats and Republicans can't come to an agreement on authorizing another extension.

When the sides allowed the tax to lapse, the FAA lost nearly $250 million in revenues, which funds FAA operations, infrastructure improvements, and safety programs (although the Department of Transportation shifted funds around to keep safety and air traffic control operating). At the heart of the fight is continuing to operate a rural airline program to small airports.

But that fight is chump change next to the looming showdown over the extension of federal gas taxes. We're talking about a gas tax that provides $52 billion in revenue and funds hundreds of thousands of jobs in places like New York (118,000+ jobs) and Texas (128,000+ jobs) alone.

federal authorization for the federal gas taxes ends on September 30, and so far there's no indication that Congress will extend the tax, which is used to fund infrastructure maintenance and improvements throughout the country.

Both the federal authority to collect the 18.4 cents a gallon in federal gas tax and authorization to spend the revenue on transit and highway projects are due to expire.

“When Congress comes back, they’re only going to have 11 days to take action,” said Susan Martinovich, president of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials. “There is a crisis brewing.”

Until the FAA extension turned into a major test of wills between House Republicans and Senate Democrats, it was considered relatively routine for Congress to extend current funding while working on big spending packages.

The Senate balked when the House sent over an FAA extension with other provisions attached. The Senate finally buckled and approved the extension, raising the fear that House Republicans might repeat the move when that extension expires Sept. 16 and when the two surface transportation measures come due two weeks later.

The state administrators said that the Senate had committed to passing a six-month surface transportation extension but that House Transportation Committee Chairman John L. Mica (R-Fla.) had not responded to their inquiries.

Although the two houses are in final negotiations over a long-term FAA reauthorization, neither the House nor Senate has approved a long-term surface transportation bill. State officials consider long-term funding plans essential because they need to be confident that funds will be forthcoming when they launch highway and transit projects.

President Obama has called for a clean bill with no provisos or limitations on the extension, but Republicans are looking to restrict how and where the money can be used.

Infrastructure spending is woeful around the country, and that affects safety and interstate commerce - both of which are federal government obligations under the Constitution. Infrastructure needs to be maintained and improved, and that costs money and the Republican demands to cut spending will hamper economic growth and potential, to say nothing of imperiling drivers and commuters and ends up costing taxpayers more down the road as the deferred maintenance allows minor problems become major ones that cost significantly more.

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Turkey Expels Israeli Ambassador After UN Report Finds Flotilla Raid Legal

The United Nations somehow managed to conclude that Israel's actions as a sovereign nation to defend itself was legal (which isn't a given when it comes to the United Nations) but still somehow managed to fault Israel for its use of force when its boarding party used force to defend itself from terrorists on board one of the boats in the flotilla seeking to break the blockade around Gaza.

The report, expected to be released Friday, also found that when Israeli commandos boarded the main ship, they faced “organized and violent resistance from a group of passengers” and were therefore required to use force for their own protection. But the report called the force “excessive and unreasonable,” saying that the loss of life was unacceptable and that the Israeli military’s later treatment of passengers was abusive.

The 105-page report, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Times, was completed months ago. But its publication was delayed several times as Turkey and Israel sought to reconcile their deteriorating relationship and perhaps avoid making the report public. In reactions from both governments included in the report, as well as in interviews, each objected to its conclusions. Both said they believed that the report, which was intended to help mend relations, would instead make reconciliation harder.

Turkey is particularly upset by the conclusion that Israel’s naval blockade is in keeping with international law and that its forces have the right to stop Gaza-bound ships in international waters, which is what happened in the 2010 episode. That conclusion oversteps the mandate of the four-member panel appointed by the United Nations secretary general and is at odds with other United Nations decisions, Turkey argued.

The report noted that the panel did not have the power to compel testimony or demand documents, but instead had to rely on information provided by Israel and Turkey. Therefore, its conclusions cannot be considered definitive in either fact or law.

The Foreign Ministries in Turkey and Israel declined to comment publicly on the report, saying they preferred to wait for its official release. No one was available to comment in the office of the United Nations spokesman.

Israel considers the report to be a rare vindication for it in the United Nations. A United Nations Security Council statement at the time assailed the loss of life, and Israel faced widespread international condemnation. It thought that by offering to negotiate an agreement with Turkey that would stop the report’s publication, Turkish officials might soften their position.

The fact that the United Nations had to issue a report about a sovereign nation's inalienable right to defend itself shows the farcical nature of the Arab-Israeli conflict and how the United Nations has gotten wrapped up into knots over the ongoing conflict to the point that any action taken by Israel is instantly criticized and only later does a potential vindication come.

It should have been self-evident that Israel had the right to stop the blockade and to protect itself. Deaths resulting from the stop should be on the IHH, not Israel. But the report lays blame on Israel for not giving sufficient warnings and using too much force (as though the terrorists on board were not willing to use deadly force themselves - as viewed in the videos and photos taken before and during the raid).

For that, Turkey has decided to send Israel's ambassador packing.

Never mind that Turkey has no problem invading a sovereign nation - Iraq - in the ongoing hunt of Kurdish terrorists and has caused tens of thousands of casualties over the years and not once has the United Nations sought to issue a report or criticize the cross-border raids.

Israel was completely within its rights to board and search the Turkish flotilla that was organized by an extremist group, the IHH. It's another one of those but-for situations.

But for Palestinian terrorism, Israel would not have needed to impose a blockade, let alone carry out a raid to thwart pro-terrorist sympathizers from running the blockade to Israel's security detriment.

It was not unreasonable for the Israelis to carry out the raid, and members of the IHH aboard the Mavi Marmara were armed and were seeking to induce a conflict. They were more than willing to use deadly force against the Israeli commandos, and therefore Israel's actions were fully justified. Once the terrorists aboard the ship attacked the commandos, the Israeli commandos were justified in their use of force.

That is borne out in the harsh criticism of the IHH and its reckless disregard for safety. In other words, the UN considered the IHH flotilla a stunt and that Israel was justified to carry out the search.

Yet, Turkey's government is whipping up the Islamists and anti-Israel sentiment over the raid and would rather see its relations with Israel falter rather than admit that its own actions were in poor judgment. The diplomatic expulsion is meant for domestic consumption in Turkey, and it shows that the Islamists in Turkey are increasingly taking control over the political process there, which will be detrimental to Turkey's future economic and sociopolitical development.

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NJ Transit Finally Provides Bergen/Main Line Customers With Revised Schedule

Following the devastating damage to the Port Jervis line resulting from Hurricane Irene, NJ Transit fumbled about for several days with no clear plan or notification to Bergen county commuters as to what to expect. Finally, just after 5pm today, NJ Transit released a statement providing what it calls a schedule. This is what it intends to do with Bergen Line trains during rush hour:

The following NJ TRANSIT trains will add stops in New Jersey from cancelled Port Jervis Line trains:

Inbound Train 1252, the 7:14 a.m. Waldwick departure, will add Suffern and Route 17 stops from cancelled Train 48, to form new combined train No. 1192, which will keep the same station stop times and arrive in Hoboken at 8:08 a.m.
Inbound Train 1254, the 7:48 a.m. Waldwick departure, will add Suffern, Mahwah, Route 17, and Ramsey stops from cancelled Train 52, to form new combined train No. 1194, which will keep the same station stop times, and arrive in Hoboken at 8:31 a.m.
Inbound Train 1210, the 8:35 a.m. Waldwick departure will add Suffern and Route 17 stops from cancelled Train 54, to form new combined train No. 1138. The combined train is rescheduled to arrive in Hoboken at 9:38 a.m., 7 minutes later than 1210, to account for possible delays resulting from the added stops.
Suffern and Route 17 times are 6-7 minutes later than Train 54, at 8:25 a.m. and 8:30 a.m., respectively.
Outlying station times from Waldwick to Secaucus do not change.
Previously published Secaucus and Path connections do not change.
Ferry connection shifts 10 minutes later to 9:40 a.m. departure/9:50 a.m. arrival
Outbound Train 1169, the 5:45 p.m. Hoboken departure, will add a stop at Route 17, to replace the Route 17 stop on cancelled Train 57.

What does this actually mean?

It means residents using peak time trains in the heart of Bergen County have to deal with crowded trains for the foreseeable future and NJ Transit offers no explanation of how it plans to mitigate the problems. NJ Transit will start trains that were normally packed by the time they reach Radburn and are instead starting them in Suffern, meaning that the crowding conditions will be insufferable and pose an ongoing unsafe conditions.

NJ Transit is simply passing the buck and claiming that it will maintain this sub-par service until Metro North can fix the problems, which will take months.

NJ Transit apparently couldn't find three additional train sets to run from Suffern to handle the overflow, and they have made no plans to add railcars to the affected trains to reduce the cattle-car like atmosphere on board the affected trains.

NJ Transit offers no apologies and no explanation as to why it took so long to inform customers what it was doing (and had been doing since it claimed service returned to normal. Customer service once again was sorely lacking and atrocious considering that the agency is supposed to be serving the public and attempting to get people to consider commuting by train rather than by car.

The crowded conditions continue to pose a safety hazard and NJ Transit continues to act as though customers have no choice but to accept their service regardless of how poor it is.

My main beef with the agency is its atrocious public relations and inability to timely inform commuters of these kinds of problems. There was no notice that these trains would be combined and that by the time they reached the heart of Bergen County that there would be no space to board safely. It's a situation that will only get worse once we get past Labor Day and everyone attempts to go back to work.

Meanwhile, Metro North has announced that it will attempt to expedite repairs, including seeking various contracts to get repair work underway. It will take months before they can restore service, which means it will probably be next summer before service is completely restored. Until then, commuters will have to put up with atrocious service.

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The Great Falls of Paterson During the Floods of 2011

Hurricane Irene is leaving its mark on the NYC metro region, but one place where we can see some beauty amid all the deaths and devastation is at the Great Falls in Paterson (if you can actually reach the falls since the floods are blocking most roads in and out of Paterson).

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Hurricane Irene Cleanup Continues Across NYC Metro Region

We're still kinda soggy around Northern New Jersey and even into New York, Connecticut and Vermont, but the nice weather is helping to dry things out. Things are starting to return to normal, if by normal you mean that there are still more than 250,000 people without power in the NYC metro area (110k are without power in NC where Irene first roared ashore). That's a vast improvement from the millions without power in the hours and days immediately after the storm came ashore, and some of these folks will be without power until the storm flooding recedes and power crews can safely work on restoring the power lines and damaged systems.

Flooding will persist in some parts of New Jersey through the weekend, when President Obama will visit Paterson to tour the damage and see the aftereffects of the flooding first-hand.

Meanwhile, Gov. Christie has slammed Congress for even appearing to play games with storm assistance funding - a direct slap at folks like Rep. Eric Cantor (a fellow GOPer) who has stated that he would only support disaster aid accompanied by offsetting cuts. Expect Cantor to back off that nonsensical position because it's the government's job to help deal with natural disasters and help local communities recover from catastrophic damage resulting from storms and other calamities.

The nice weather reprieve may not last that much longer though. TS Katia is now a hurricane and has the potential to make waves for the East Coast. It's still too soon to predict with 100% certainty that it will stay offshore, but there's actually a tropical disturbance in the Gulf that may pose more of a threat as moisture from that system may find its way towards the Northeast in the next week.

Just what the flooding victims are least likely to want to hear.

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NJ Transit Continues Failing Main/Bergen County Line Riders

If you read through the NJ Transit website, there is absolutely no mention of schedule changes or train consolidations relating to the damage to the Port Jervis line and accommodating the ridership that is being bused in from points above the damage.

There are no rider advisories.

Sep 01, 2011 09:21:25 AM
Port Jervis service will remain suspended between Port Jervis and Suffern due to flooding. Private carrier bus service provided to/from Harriman and Ramsey Rt. 17 only.
Service Advisories
Aug 31, 2011 11:14:26 AM
Update: Port Jervis Line - Substitute Bus Service between Harriman and Middletown for Trains 49 and 66 Cancelled

There are no revised schedules to refer to.

If you're hoping to hear something from the media outlets about service changes, good luck because they'll simply look at the NJ Transit website or hear from NJ Transit reps and they'll tell you that service has been restored and things are running normally.

That can't be further from the truth.

There is nothing but silence and wishful thinking that a train will come that can safely board passengers on trains that have been combined.

Every time there's a crisis relating to service on NJ Transit, the agency promises to do better, but nothing changes.

Service interruptions are regularly mismanaged and there's no communication about problems.

Today's conductors aboard train 1254 said that riders needed to contact our elected representatives to put pressure on Metro North to rebuild the damaged infrastructure.

That's laughable. They'd rather pass the blame onto Metro North, which suffered catastrophic damage to its rail line from Sloatsburg on north to Port Jervis, instead of admitting that they don't have sufficient rail cars to handle the existing traffic (they're combining trains on service that wasn't affected by the Port Jervis line).

Where are all the railcars that were taken out of service once the more than 300 railcars that were recently purchased or refurbished put into service? Why are there railcars sitting idly in Hoboken yard not attached to locomotives and used to alleviate crowding conditions?

It's all part of a pattern of incompetence by NJ Transit to accomplish its reason for existing - serving customers to get them to their destinations.

It's clearly failing NJ Transit rail commuters in North Jersey.

UPDATE:
The latest updates on the NJ Transit page do little to change my mind about the agency's handling of the situation:

Sep 01, 2011 02:00:59 PM
Busing to Beacon Station from Port Jervis and Middletown: Buses (with the exception of one round trip in the afternoon) will originate at Port Jervis Station, stop at Middletown Station, then go directly to Beacon Station on our Hudson Line for train service to Grand Central; outbound is the reverse.

Busing to/from Harriman and Ramsey Route 17: Metro-North is busing to/from Harriman Station and Ramsey/Route 17, where customers can transfer to train service. Buses follow the train schedule.

Still no mention of combined trains or other problems with service on the Bergen/Main line, which affects all customers, including those being bused in from above Suffern.

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