[Speech by David McKay Wilson]
As the Obama administration moves to erect a new Tappan Zee Bridge, we’re promoting the bridge’s preservation and transformation into Tappan Zee State Park – a three-mile-long strand of concrete and green, a world-class destination for cyclists and pedestrians.
That bridge has been rebuilt over the past decade with $500 million in public funds. It’s slated for another $1.3 billion in repairs by the time the last car crosses the bridge less than a decade from today.
That’s a huge investment in transportation infrastructure that we believe may still have substantial life if it comes time to dismantle the Gov. Malcolm Wilson Tappan Zee Bridge to build a second new cross-Hudson span.
Like many of you here, I’ve done the Wilson TZ on the annual October fundraising ride for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. We’ve climbed the 1.2 percent grade – not 20 percent as reported inaccurately in the New York Times – and either coasted or pedaled down into Rockland. I’ve hit an exhilarating 35 miles an hour on the downhill. I’ve also meandered along the flats, feeling the wind blow up river, and seeing my shadow stretch out before me as I head west in the morning light.
Imagine those 33 acres as an urban park, reaching through one of the world’s most densely populated region with a pathway, gardens, patches of woods, cozy places to experience the Hudson. It would be the lower Hudson Valley’s Highline, our own Walkway across the Hudson. Both of those linear urban parks – the Highline in Manhattan and the Walkway in Poughkeepsie – have proved wildly popular. And they were developed with substantial financial support from the private sector, a key element of any plan to save the old TZ.
The Walkway and Highline are green economic engines that engage entrepreneurs and spark community.
The bridge is now in the prime of middle-age at 56 years old. The original plan would erect the northern span first, with its seven lanes to provide two-way traffic so the Wilson TZ could be shut down. Then, the 62-year-old span would be dismantled by crane, lowered to a barge, and shipped to a reprocessing plant. Pilings would be torn from the Hudson’s river bed, disrupting the fragile ecosystem that’s already under stress from its well-developed shores.
Dismantling the bridge will cost hundreds of millions of dollars and consume gobs of fossil fuel. Taxpayers would be paying to take down the superstructure that they just spent $1.8 billion fixing.
We’ve yet to hear what the Cuomo and Obama administrations want to do with the Wilson TZ. There is no mention of demolition in the scoping document. And when I talked to a spokesman in early November in the governor’s office – that’s our Westchester governor, Mount Kisko’s Andrew Cuomo – he wouldn’t go on the record with the administration’s position on demolition.
That gives me hope.
So does the fact that the Wilson TZ was deemed eligible by the state Office of Historic Preservation for the National Register of Historic Places, the official list of the USA’s historic places worthy of preservation. This bridge is our heritage, the iconic image of the lower Hudson Valley suburbs. It features groundbreaking engineering from the 1950s, with its main span supported by eight hollow concrete caissons that help support its load.
The Wilson TZ is worthy of preservation. Why not preserve it? Why not make it a preserve?
It seems likely that the Wilson TZ will have significant life left in it seven years hence, when the northern span would go up under USDOT’s expedited plan. Wouldn’t it improve our region to have this green ribbon of parkland linking Westchester and Rockland counties across the mighty Hudson? Count on it to ignite a boom in healthy living and bolster economies on both sides of the river.
There are substantial hurdles before us. Access to the Wilson TZ could be impaired by the new structures, so the engineers would have to figure out a way up to the decks.
The elephant is the room is money, which is in short supply on the state and national levels. But the High Line and the Walkway Across the Hudson have attracted considerable private funding, including Barry Diller’s recent $20 million donation to the High Line.
But how much we’ll need will depend on what the Wilson TZ needs in annual maintenance to keep the bridge – which will meet safety standards for 140,000 vehicles a day when it’s days are done in 2017 – in decent shape for bikes and pedestrians.
How bad is the superstructure for use as a park? The structural deficiencies noted in the scoping document included the Wilson TZ’s inability to withstand an earthquake, requirements of the federal law that makes our Interstate system safe for cars, commerce, and Department of Defense convoys.
Regulations for the structural security for above-water parks are less strict than for a super highway. We need an independent analysis to inform this upcoming decision.
The Thruway will have invested $1.8 billion in the Wilson TZ over 20 years by the time its toll-collected days are done. Will that be enough to ensure the Wilson TZ could stand as a park across the Hudson for decades to come?
