No matter what year it is, no matter what part of the century it has been, Hudson County has been one of the nation’s busiest transportation hubs. Serving on the front lines of the infamous New York commute, Hudson transportation has gone from offering the first underwater electric train tunnel system 90 years ago to intending, this spring, to debut the area’s first light rail transit system. The $1.1-billion 20.5-mile Hudson-Bergen Light Rail, based on the technologically-savvy European and Japanese rail systems, will run from Bayonne north to Bergen County. The agency that has been making plans for the system since 1996, the Jersey City-based 21st Century Rail, is currently laying NJ Transit light rail track across the southern end of the county. The system’s first segment, to begin running this spring, will connect 34th Street in Bayonne to Exchange Place in Jersey City. The system will extend into Hoboken by the spring of 2001. In later years, the train will snake through Weehawken and North Bergen. A western spur into Jersey City’s Journal Square area is also in the works, with a completed model of the system incorporating 32 stations, five parking lots and thousands of spaces for park-and-riders. It’s E-Z In addition to the Light Rail, the job of commuting in North Jersey will also be made easier this year when the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway introduce the installation of the E-Z Pass electronic toll collection system. Already at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey’s Lincoln and Holland tunnels, E-Z Pass represents the future of toll collection, making the chore of digging through the change jammed in your car seat a thing of the past. E-Z Pass allows drivers to breeze through toll booths, cutting down on traffic jams. Available at tollbooths and on the Internet, E-Z Pass is a computerized censor that hangs in the windshield of a car. Otherwise called a “tag,” the device signals the computer in the tollbooth to deduct the specified toll from a credit-based system. Installation of the free-flowing system has already begun on the Garden State Parkway, and will be available on the New Jersey Turnpike by May of 2000. By the end of the year, bridges as far away as the Betsy Ross Bridge and the Commodore Barry Bridge will also have E-Z Pass. Ferries Alternative means of transportation, such as NY Waterway’s ferry services, have enjoyed increased success over the past couple of years. NY Waterway has stops in Weehawken, southern Hoboken and Jersey City, and has proposed an additional stop at 13th Street in Hoboken, the site of a new residential/retail development project. Improvements by the Port Authority to Newark Airport, the Holland Tunnel and the PATH system have New York council representatives up in arms, accusing the Port Authority of favoring New Jersey over the Empire side of the agency’s domain. Inside each city, changes are being made regarding parking. Changes in resident parking permit ordinances were considered recently for North Bergen and Jersey City. In Hoboken, residents will soon have a new, innovative place to park: a one-of-its-kind automated garage on Garden Street that will bring cars to a space by conveyor belt, and retrieve them the same way. As the new decade begins, Hudson County will be experiencing the most exciting developments in transportation since the beginning of this century. The Light Rail is the most significant project to be undertaken in this area since the digging of the Hudson & Manhattan Tubes in 1908. Almost 100 years later, the county has expanded to the point where cutting a tunnel to New York is no longer as important as bridging the gap between Bayonne, Jersey City, Hoboken, Weehawken and North Bergen.