Fulop says he’ll repair Newark Bay Bridge, cancel new bridge project

The proposed $6 billion Newark Bay Bridge replacement received a permit from the U.S. Coast Guard – a major hurdle in the construction process set to commence early next year – but staff at the New Jersey Turnpike Authority this morning pushed back on the idea that a new governor could still call off the first step toward a controversial plan to widen the New Jersey Turnpike through parts of Hudson County.

“A new governor, or any governor, is going to have to reckon with the public safety issue,” said Tom Feeney, a spokesman for the authority.  “Just cancelling it is not going to be an option with public safety as the primary consideration.”

But the answer doesn’t satisfy one major gubernatorial contender, Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop, a fervent opponent of the project.

“We need more mass transit and not more highways,” Fulop stated.  “As governor, we will complete safety improvements to the bridge and cancel the balance of this widening to reallocate the money to mass transit.”

In 2010, during his first year in office, Gov. Chris Christie cancelled the ARC Tunnel project, citing false claims that construction costs were on track to come in more than $1 billion over budget.  New Jersey’s share of the funds appropriated by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey was later, at Christie’s direction, used to plug holes in the New Jersey Transportation Trust Fund.

Fulop said it was “shameful” that Gov. Phil Murphy is backing the project.

“In the next few weeks, we will pursue litigation against the state with regard to the process around this project, similar to what we did to Christie when he intended to privatize Liberty State Park, as he was the outgoing governor,” said Fulop.  “We were successful then, and we will be successful here.”

Lisa Navarro, a Turnpike Authority engineer leading the bridge replacement project, said the current bridge has a service life through 2031, but agency officials noted that the bridge is “not going to fall down in 2031.”

Greg Hitchen, the vessel traffic service director at the Coast Guard Sector New York, said his agency’s review of the project came up with no significant impact on the region and said the authority has five years to begin the bridge construction without going through a re-permitting process.