On Day 3 of Delays, Rail System’s Shortfalls Are Painfully Clear

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Asher Kaufman, 8, waited for a train at the New Jersey Transit New Brunswick station on Wednesday.

The Northeast Corridor line was experiencing delays during the morning rush.

CreditBryan Anselm for The New York Times

The delays, coming a week after the board of New Jersey Transit approved a major fare increase, created chaos during the morning rush and gave rise to another round of questions about Gov. Chris Christie’s decision five years ago to halt construction of a new rail tunnel.For the third day in a row, electrical problems in century-old rail tunnels under the Hudson River on Wednesday stymied the commutes of tens of thousands of New Jersey Transit riders, illustrating again the shortcomings of the region’s languishing infrastructure system.

Commuters, many of whom have grown inured to grinding delays and overflowing platforms, lashed out on Wednesday, blaming the transit agency for being habitually late to work and criticizing Mr. Christie for failing to find a solution to the state’s drained transportation fund.

The deteriorating tunnels are a chokepoint for rail traffic from Boston to Washington, the busiest railroad corridor in the United States, and serve as the most vital artery for New Jersey Transit, the nation’s third-largest provider of commuting services.

 

The federal transportation secretary, Anthony Foxx, during an appearance in New York on Tuesday, called the lack of action to repair the shoddy tunnels “almost criminal.”

The disruption on Wednesday stemmed from problems in the overhead electrical wires that power the trains, which suspended New Jersey Transit service into and out of Manhattan’s Pennsylvania Station and caused hour long delays throughout the morning commute.

Wendi Glassman, a lawyer who has been riding the 13 miles from her home in Elizabeth, N.J., to Manhattan on New Jersey Transit for 30 years, said her 26-minute commute took her about three hours on Wednesday. Late for another meeting, she waded through a sea of delayed travelers and their suitcases, backpacks and shopping bags in Pennsylvania Station.

“It used to be amazing service,” Ms. Glassman said. “But I could have walked here faster today. People are furious and there’s been no response.”

She added, “I think Governor Christie is to blame. Until he starts devoting more money to transit, this is going to keep happening.”

Power was shut down to both tubes of the Hudson River Tunnel around 5:45 a.m. after a switch that controls a high-voltage cable malfunctioned, said Craig Schulz, a spokesman for Amtrak, which owns the tunnel.

Different problems with the same overhead catenary system also snarled New Jersey Transit commutes on Monday night and Tuesday morning. Engineers are trying to determine whether issues such as aging tunnel infrastructure or heat may have played a role, but Mr. Schulz said the deterioration of the tunnel walls, especially after Hurricane Sandy, had increased the likelihood of electrical problems.

The seawater and salt that inundated the tunnel during the hurricane “have been eating away at the concrete bench walls where the signal and power cables reside,” he said. “These kinds of disruptions are what we are hoping to avoid by advancing our efforts to build a new tunnel.”

Mr. Christie, a Republican who is now running for president, torpedoed a plan to add tunnels in 2010, just after work on them had begun. Despite an independent federal report saying he exaggerated the costs, Mr. Christie said he worried the project would have unduly burdened New Jersey taxpayers.

He ordered that $3 billion from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey set aside for the plan be redirected to other projects in New Jersey.

New Jersey Transit officials took notice of the growing irritation, writing in an unusually frank notice to commuters that “the quality of your commute during the last several days has been unacceptable, and we share in your frustration.”

Asked about the latest service interruptions, Mr. Christie’s office referred questions to New Jersey Transit, which blamed maintenance problems on Amtrak.

“NJ TRANSIT pays Amtrak approximately $100 million annually toward keeping the Northeast Corridor running, and we have requested of Amtrak to know if our money is truly going toward ensuring reliable rail service for our customers,” Veronique Hakim, the agency’s executive director, said in a statement.

But federal officials and commuters alike said they were losing patience with efforts to reduce strain on the tunnels, which are 105 years old and which Amtrak has said will need to be temporarily shut down to repair damage from Hurricane Sandy. Commuter demand between New Jersey and Manhattan is expected to rise 38 percent by 2030.

Mr. Foxx, the federal transportation secretary, said at a conference on Tuesday that the proposal to build new rail tunnels, known as the Gateway project, was “one of the — if not the — most important projects in the country right now that’s not happening.”

He added, in an interview, that he needed help from elected leaders in New York and New Jersey before it was too late.

“I think that everybody at the state level is saying positive things, but we need to get down to brass tacks,” Mr. Foxx said. “I can’t say that I see a well storm of momentum.”

A chorus of grumbles and moans rose from Pennsylvania Station on Wednesday as commuters described the family events, sightseeing excursions and meetings they were late for. The pain was compounded by a New Jersey Transit board vote last week to approve a fare increase of about 9 percent that will take effect in October. The increase will add as much as $40 to the price of a monthly pass for some commuters who ride to Pennsylvania Station.

A salesman from Allenhurst, N.J., named Ken, did not want to give his last name, hoping nobody at his office would notice the hour-plus delay. “I’m not happy,” he said, glancing nervously at his watch. “Everyone’s probably used to it at this point, but it’s still frustrating.”

Michael P. Lyons, a talent manager from Westfield, N.J., commended New Jersey Transit for accommodating passengers — tickets were being honored by PATH, buses and New York Waterway — but added: “It’s an infrastructure problem if you ask me.”

The power problems on Wednesday morning forced trains to use a single track in the north tube of the tunnel, until power to the other tube was restored around 7:45 a.m. By late Wednesday morning, delays from an hour to 90 minutes had dropped to about 45 minutes.

Those wait times were similar to what commuters faced on Monday night and Tuesday morning during rush hour.

A circuit breaker trip in a power substation west of the Hudson River Tunnel briefly shut down power to the tunnel on Monday night, Mr. Schulz, the Amtrak spokesman, said.

Then on Tuesday around 5 a.m., there were signal problems near Princeton, N.J., followed shortly thereafter by another trip of the same circuit breaker that caused problems the night before. Engineers were deployed to the substation and remain there in case there are additional problems, Mr. Schulz said.

The switch problem on Wednesday morning was temporarily repaired in order to restore service, but engineering personnel would need to return overnight for more permanent repairs.