Yankee Station: What a Surprise!

By Staff 4/06/06 12:06pm

Joyce Purnick notes today (subscription required) how the last-minute endorsement by Mayor and Governor for a Yankee Metro-North station (paid for by M.T.A. taxpayers and riders) was all that was needed to convince some pols to vote yes for Yankee Stadium. But wasn’t that a card Bloomberg and Pataki had been keeping up their sleeve all along until the opportune moment?

At times, that card did get shown, but no one remembers.

Last June in the Daily News, just before the official unveiling, T.J. Quinn, citing unnamed sources, reported:

The state and city will spend up to $300 million to replace and enhance park land that will be lost to the new site, build new parking structures, extend the subway platform, build a Metro-North station and build up the Bronx waterfront. (Archive fee.)

Two weeks later, the News reported that the new station, along with the subway improvements, would cost $90 million. (Another archive fee.) Now, Yankee fan Adolfo Carrion is saying the Metro-North station would cost but $30-40 million. Ah, thank goodness for deflation.

-Matthew Schuerman

UPDATE: The Metro-North station was actually part of the Borough President’s plan for the area. The final environmental impact statement for the stadium indicates the Mayor supported the idea back in February when it came out :

[A]lthough a new Metro-North station is not part of the proposed project, the City and the Yankees support the construction of the proposed Metro-North Yankee Stadium station, and the proposed project has been developed so as not to preclude the future construction of a new station. (p. 541)
See also
The Public Life of Joyce Wadler The Train Station That Ruth Didn't Build Report: Public Cost of New Yankee Stadium Up $217 M. Next Stop, Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium Garages Get City Help
topics: Joyce Purnick, Metro-North Commuter Railroad Company, T.J. Quinn, The Real Estate, Yankee Stadium
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