JERSEY CITY, N.J. — A state appeals court has ruled that seven insurance companies have to pay to repair NJ Transit equipment damaged by flooding from Hurricane Sandy in 2012, a ruling that could be worth $400 million to the transit agency.
NJ.com reports that the decision upheld a 2017 court ruling that the transit agency was entitled to coverage up to the full $400 million in policy limits for 343 locomotives and railcars damaged by flooding at the Meadowlands Maintenance Complex in Kearny, N.J. The New Jersey Law Journal reports that he insurance companies contended NJ Transit had reached a $100 million limit for flood damage, while the transit agency contended it was entitled to the larger amount because the damage was caused by “a named windstorm.”
Judges wrote that “The evidence pertaining to this claim was ‘so one-sided’ that NJT was entitled to prevail as a matter of law.”
The damage from the 2012 storm has led NJ Transit to purchase land for a new maintenance facility, with emergency equipment storage space, in New Brunswick, N.J. [see “NJ Transit board approves new maintenance, storage facility,” Trains News Wire, March 14, 2019], as well as a number of other projects to recover from that event and prepare for future storms [see “NJ Transit to receive more FTA funding for Hurricane Sandy recovery,” Trains News Wire, Aug. 24, 2015].
