No Hope For The Tappan Zee

There was another meeting of the Obama, Cuomo, Abinanti and Feiner Campaign committee this week in Tarrytown’s Marriott Hotel. Under the guise of area concern for jobs, growth, economic stimulation, blah, blah, blah, the players were all available for free media coverage. At issue is the need or not, to replace the Tappan Zee Bridge. The free-media prostitutes were out in force. In fact, we wonder if the entire project, doomed from the start, will ever happen? ABG doubts it is much more than an election cycle campaign strategy for the incumbents. And this isn’t a rant against the democratic party as republicans were there also. It’s just that the democrats are in control and pulling most, if not all, of the proverbial strings.


We’ve been told for years that the Tappan Zee Bridge needs to be replaced. We’ve been told through our myopic local media with various reporters and news crews near the bridge, under the bridge and on the bridge, as well as every politicians who could get there when the live feeds were running, that the bridge is in desperate and dangerous need of being replaced. It has evolved into one of the largest sound byte campaigns since the Scarsdale Diet Doctor was murdered! We're repeatedly told it could collapse at any time! People are risking their lives each time they drive over it! Followed by more hysteria that collapse was imminent and this was an emergency! And then nothing happened. Was this a Chicken Little scenario? It certainly seems so. Yet through all of this, none would detail how it would be paid for, offer a final design, nor was there a consensus of how many displaced homes and businesses would be victims of this campaign.


We’ve been told a new bridge will create jobs, growth in the area, economic stimulation and all the usual campaign lies of what benefits this project will bring to any area, but not the disruption. Can anyone say Ridge Hill? They’re touting it must be a private and public partnership, will create thousands of jobs and infuse all kinds of money into the area. It’s the same campaign platitudes we hear at every election cycle about the topic du jour. The skilled jobs, while important, won’t be in the thousands. They may be in the hundreds, but it will be the low hundreds and go to the usual players, such as Yonkers Contracting, Petrillo Contracting, etc. They in turn will hire temporary workers which does help them and the temporary workers. They will hire unskilled workers as well at a much lower rate of pay, but, it still is good for them both. Will they be required to use union workers and businesses? Will they follow the Wick’s law? Doubtful.


We’ve been told building the bridge requires slight, negligible easements to promote the growth of the area. ABG’s feeling is tell that to the people who will be losing their homes and businesses and see what’s negligible? But our politicos don’t really care about them, only themselves. And right now they are onboard this campaign boondoggle lock, stock and barrel.  While the growth in the area will pale compared to what we’re being fed, consider the devastation building this bridge will bring to the local communities. We will witness small business whither and residents leave, ultimately lose out to the election campaign.


It’s been suggested to preserve the old bridge as a park. This latest idea from The Paul, another let’s see what sticks to the wall idea, is nothing more than an attempt to pander to the environmentalist special interest groups. Tom Abinanti, the king of campaigning on the cheap, has calculated that being in favor of another Feiner Fiasco won't hurt his reelection and he may actually gain a hundred or so green votes. He doesn’t care either way as long as he doesn’t have to vote on it. In fact, since the burden of paying for the bridge/park/jumping ramp is on the feds shoulders, they can all get in on this media bonanza. It’s why Cuomo changed his tune and is now interested in possibly keeping the existing TZ as a park.


They will auction off the name of the bridge to the highest bidder for enough money to ultimately pay for one underwater piling; and the name will become the Trump Towers Bridge. Historical significance be damned! There’s the extent of your private-public partnership. The park will be dedicated in fifty-foot sections, such as Martin Luther King Lane, Christa McAuliffe Sky View, Rob Astorino Ramp, Sarge (K9) Street Memorial, HiDeHo (Cab Calloway) Highway, Jumpers Ridge View and so on. ABG means no disrespect to the aforementioned deceased contributors to our heritages. But the opportunity to have even more repeated press conferences on this new park/bridge is really the primary justification for keeping this bridge. It’s probably why Abinanti jumped in after The Paul told him why he was pushing it. They've got at least three miles worth of press conferences and dedications.  The new bridge will have bike and walking lanes. Will it have benches and grass? Probably not, after all, it is a bridge. It’s design is to move vehicles. Anything after that is unrealistic.


And what of the necessary and difficult maintenance which was the primary reason we needed to replace this bridge? Magically, it’s no longer an issue in Feiner World. The master deflector has shifted the conversation from his incompetence in Greenburgh to something he has no responsibility or purview over for more media coverage! He has every right to be involved in other issues. But while his main issue should be running the Town of Greenburgh, his primary focus has only been to run it into the ground. The bridge is merely another of his deflections.


ABG doesn’t have a problem with a new bridge. The existing bridge will be dismantled and recycled as much as possible. It’s not like the entire structure will be “dropped” in place, cluttering the underwater area where it currently stands. The aesthetics of having two superstructures cluttering an otherwise gorgeous area is absurd! Do we want to see a mass transit capability incorporated into the bridge? Absolutely. But there is no infrastructure currently in place on both sides of the proposed bridge. So it will be another bridge to nowhere. Finally, how will it all be paid for? Let’s see a final design with concrete plans that actually show what will be done. Let’s not build a bridge that’s being designed as they go, as many politicos have suggested. And once we have the final plans, and a final estimate, triple that to have what the actual costs will wind up being. Most importantly, let’s listen to the area residents and businesses’ concerns, not The Paul, and do the right thing. We can only hope.