KEARNY, N.J. — U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy were among a large contingent of federal, state, local, and transportation officials on hand Monday, Aug. 1, for groundbreaking for the Portal North Bridge. The new structure will replace the 112-year-old, often-unreliable swing bridge over the Hackensack River on the Northeast Corridor, said to be the nation’s busiest rail bridge.
NJ.com reports total cost of the project is about $1.8 billion. At Monday’s ceremony, New Jersey Transportation Commissioner Diane Gutierrez-Scaccetti promised a ribbon cutting for the completed structure in 2026: “We will deliver Portal North on time and … on budget.” The news site reports the event actually involved three ceremonial groundbreakings to accommodate all the officials on hand.
“This project turns the Portal North Bridge from a chokepoint to an access point. It modernizes the way that people and goods get to and from this region that is responsible for 20 percent of America’s economic product every year,” Buttigieg said in a press release. “I hope that this bridge will not only bring people to work and loved ones to where they need to be, but brings renewed confidence in our ability to get things done together. We are entering into a true infrastructure decade.”
NJ Transit last year approved a $1.56 billion contract — the most expensive in the agency’s history, for bridge construction [see “NJ Transit approves contract …,” Trains News Wire, Oct. 13, 2021].
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