It cuts like a canyon through the heart of Jersey City, and now a defunct rail bed and series of tunnels known as the Bergen Arches has elected officials, activists and railroad officials divided over a plan to turn the trench into a four-lane highway.
Supporters, including a long list of city, county, state and federal officials, say building the roadway to connect Tonnelle Avenue with the Jersey City waterfront is crucial to moving people to and from developments that are mushrooming along the Hudson River.
Meanwhile, a newly formed citizen group and other transportation advocates are gearing up to block the project, saying the highway would divide the city, increase congestion and further foul the city's already polluted air.
A new highway, they argue, would undercut the purpose of the $1.2 billion light rail system now under construction.
And the railroad companies who own the rocky corridor have their own wild card.
Freight line officials weighed in this week, saying they may soon need to put the single-track corridor back to use for the first time since 1957.
All three sides made their cases Wednesday to the North Jersey Transportation Agency, which is planning a $1 million study needed to free up the first $27 million in federal funds already earmarked for the project. The total cost is estimated at $100 million.
The 2.5-mile road would be built on an unused rail corridor running parallel to the State Highway, then cutting through Downtown near 10th Street and exiting onto Newport Parkway.
No longer would drivers have to sit in Holland Tunnel traffic to reach places like Newport or Hoboken. New York-bound traffic would take the Depressed Highway, while the new roadway would handle only traffic headed to Downtown Jersey City or Hoboken.
Citing his own frustration during a recent hour-long attempt to exit the city, Jersey City Mayor Bret Schundler said the roadway would also provide much-needed egress from city neighborhoods.
"There is an incredibly significant need for this roadway," Schundler told the NJTPA.
"This is important not just for people from Montclair to reach the waterfront, but for me and other people who live here to get out. People headed for New York City will have their dedicated roadway and we'll have ours."
Schundler added the improved traffic flow would create "far less idling, far less pollution, far less traffic on our inner-city streets."
Opponents say the plan to bring more automobiles into Downtown Jersey City is just one folly in the planners' misguided vision for the waterfront.
Members of the recently formed Hudson Alliance for Rational Transportation question the logic behind construction of a new highway simultaneous with a Hudson-Bergen light rail system designed to decrease waterfront commuters' dependency on automobiles.
HART members, who have proposed running a light rail spur through the arches, know they face an uphill battle against a project whose supporters include nearly every elected official in the county.
"We're going to be a divided city (if the road is built)," said HART organizer Mia Scanga who fears planners will eventually seek to add more lanes to the four-lane scheme.
"The Bergen Arches will be a six-to-eight-lane open trench with no cover, with tractor-trailers running through it 24 hours a day and no access from local roads."
Beyond dirty air and quality-of-life issues, transportation advocates say building another highway through the area runs antithetical to the "smart" planning vision of a pedestrian-friendly city centered on public transit like the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail.
Schundler and other city officials have said the roadway is crucial to attract firms whose suburban employees are accustomed to driving to work. But transportation activists say bringing thousands of motorists to the waterfront is exactly what planners should be trying to discourage.
Increasing the number of cars would force developers to create less dense, suburban-style development in which parking garages take valuable space that could be used for office buildings that attract more jobs - and pay more in taxes.
"The question is, do we want to turn Jersey City into a suburb?" said Greg Meyer, New Jersey Coordinator for the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.
Meyer told NJTPA officials that the agency's study should include alternatives to the four-lane highway. "We'd like to see a full study that isn't just an apology for a roadway," he said.
The single-track rail bed is currently owned by Conrail, whose operations, as of June, will divided between Philadelphia-based Norfolk Southern Corporation and Virginia-based CSX Corp.
Both companies say a projected increase in freight traffic to and from the Hudson ports may force them to put the tunnels back to their old use.
Representatives from both companies told the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) to consider a new freight line alongside the highway.
"If it's simply, 'Let's take this right-of-way away and use it for a road without providing any alternative' - we have a problem with that," said Mike Brimmer, CSX assistant vice president for strategic planning.
Brimmer and Norfolk Southern manager of Corporate Affairs, Alexander H. Jordan, told NJTPA officials that plans to dredge and upgrade ports in Bayonne and Jersey City could increase freight travel to and from the waterfront. If that happens, they may need the Bergen Arches.
"We see the possibility of a real bottleneck," Jordan said. "And we see the Bergen Arches as a possible alternative."
The NJTPA, a federally-funded agency that oversees more than $1 billion in transportation spending in the 13 northern counties each year, is accepting public comment on the planned study until Feb. 15.
The board of trustees, which consists of one local elected official from each of the 13 counties, Newark, and Jersey City, will vote on the study and what it should include, on March 8.
