Trump fires MTA from long-awaited Penn Station revamp, puts feds in charge: ‘Blank checks are over’
Next stop: Trump Station
President Trump fired the MTA from the long-awaited revamp of Penn Station on Thursday, instead putting the feds in charge of a gold-plated makeover for the decrepit transit hub.
Amtrak will spearhead the renovation as the feds champion a “public-private partnership model,” announced Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.
“President Trump has made it clear: The days of reckless spending and blank checks are over,” Duffy said in a statement.
“New York City deserves a Penn Station that reflects America’s greatness and is safe and clean.”
Gov. Kathy Hochul had been engaged in tense face-to-face talks with Trump over Penn Station — and recently reportedly joked about renaming it after him to get more federal cash for the project.
Making Penn Station great again has been a years-long dream — and nightmare — for New York leaders.
The feds’ surprise move puts two long-gestating, parallel Penn Station projects — one to reconstruct the crumbling building and another to expand its rail capacity — under the same umbrella.
Hochul sarcastically celebrated Trump’s hostile takeover of the Penn Station redevelopment quagmire with a statement effectively saying the “Art of the Deal” author had bought himself a money pit.
“In multiple meetings with President Trump, I requested that the federal government fund the long-overdue overhaul of Penn Station. Clearly that effort has been successful, and I want to thank the President and Secretary Duffy for taking on the sole responsibility to deliver the beautiful new $7 billion station that New Yorkers deserve,” she said in a statement.
Hochul also hinted that she has no intention of ponying up the $1.3 billion that New York lawmakers had allocated toward the project in 2021.
“This is a major victory for New Yorkers, and the use of federal funds will save New York taxpayers $1.3 billion that would have otherwise been necessary for this project,” she said.
The shocking announcement came amid a raging tug-of-war between Duffy and Hochul over the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
Duffy took the opportunity to twist the knife into the MTA, as he contended that the Federal Railroad Administration’s move to re-scope and slash the federal grant to Amtrak for the project will save taxpayers roughly $120 million.
“The MTA’s history of inefficiency, waste, and mismanagement also meant that a new approach is needed. By putting taxpayers first, we’re ensuring every dollar is spent wisely to create a transit hub all Americans can take pride in,” Duffy said in his statement.
The MTA had long been planning to rebuild Penn Station without moving Madison Square Garden, which sits above it, while also working with Amtrak and NJ Transit on a possible expansion project.
Many details about the Trump-led makeover remained unclear Thursday, including whether the feds would seek to relocate MSG.
A group backed by Trump donor Thomas Klingstein recently proposed moving the Garden across Seventh Avenue as part of a redesign befitting the president’s taste for “classical and other traditional architecture,” Gothamist reported.
Representatives for MSG owner James Dolan didn’t return a request for comment.
The talks between Hochul and Trump began shortly after he was elected the nation’s 47th president.
Trump told the governor he was interested in fixing up Penn Station, a Midtown eyesore that Hochul herself called a “hellhole.”
The pair continued their discussions even as Duffy tried to carry out Trump’s promise to kill congestion pricing, prompting a lawsuit from Hochul and much back-and-forth sniping between the transportation secretary and the governor.
Hochul recently floated the idea of renaming Penn Station’s nearby Moynihan Train Hall after him as a way to ingratiate herself with the real estate magnate-turned-president, The Post reported.
A spokesman for the governor previously told The Post that Hochul considered the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-NY) a “mentor” and wouldn’t propose renaming the transit hub after Trump.
But the rep said: “The governor did make a lighthearted joke about how to get President Trump interested in contributing federal funds to renovate Penn Station.”
Hochul this week openly blamed Amtrak for holdups in the project, calling the national railroad company a “barrier” to redesigning Penn Station.
The governor said in an interview with NY1’s Errol Louis that Trump called her earlier this month to say he’s “working on Amtrak” as part of the deal.
“I was letting him know that Amtrak was a barrier to why it’s taking so long,” Hochul said.
“It was a very quick call. He goes, ‘I’m working on Amtrak,'” she said, describing the phone conversation with Trump.
Assemblyman Tony Simone (D-Manhattan), who reps Penn Station, said he was “skeptical” about the feds’ ability to handle the project and said the MTA should still be involved.
“It is imperative that the MTA and local stakeholders continue to be full partners in any plan so that we create a Penn that works for both our region and city,” Simone said. “I am beyond skeptical that this federal government can manage a project of this size by seizing control while simultaneously slashing funding.”
State Sen. Brad Hoylman-Sigal (D-Manhattan) agreed with Hochul’s idea to pull back the cash the state had set aside for the Penn renovations.
Hoylman-Sigal is no friend of Trump’s.
He was flamed last year for comparing a Trump rally at MSG to a Nazi rally held there in 1939.
“I guess we’re looking at some gold-plated escalators, I don’t know,” he said Thursday.
