Hoboken officials last week strongly criticized a recent PATH train schedule change that reduced rush hour service on the Hoboken-33rd Street route by 14 percent. The service adjustments, unannounced by the Port Authority and first publicized by Mayor Dawn Zimmer on Tuesday, eliminate five trains departing Hoboken during morning rush hour and three trains during the evening rush hour, according to the city.
Port Authority Executive Director Patrick Foye confirmed the new schedule in a letter to Zimmer this past Tuesday. He said the interval between trains along the Hoboken-33rd line had increased from six to seven minutes on weekdays between approximately 7:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. The changes went into effect on April 26.
Hoboken officials said that late evening weekday service had also been decreased from 11 to 9 trains, a change Foye denied. Weekday overnight service – which became a hot button issue earlier this year after a Port Authority panel recommended cutting it altogether as a cost-saving measure – was not affected.
According to Foye, “Train frequency was adjusted to accommodate station and platform crowding at certain other stations on our system.”
The reductions amount to a decrease from 19 to 14 trains passing through the Hoboken PATH station during morning rush hour and from 24 to 21 trains during the evening rush hour, according to the city.
Port Authority spokesman Steve Coleman said that train frequency on the Hoboken-33rd route had been decreased to increase train frequency on the Journal Square-33rd Street route during rush hour.
Strong criticism
Speaking at a Hoboken Chamber of Commerce event on Tuesday morning, Mayor Dawn Zimmer slammed the move.
“It’s outrageous for a couple of reasons,” she said. “Our PATH has seen the highest growth in the past two years of any other PATH station in the state, so how the heck can they cut us when we’re growing? Our residents are doing the right things and taking public transportation and here they are cutting our service.”
City Council President Ravi Bhalla said the service cuts cast doubt on the wisdom of moving forward with the build-out of the Hoboken Yards Redevelopment Plan approved by the City Council last December, which could bring up to 583 new residential units on NJ Transit rail yard property near the Hoboken PATH station.
“The issue here is not procuring more trains.” – Steve Coleman
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On Wednesday, the City Council unanimously passed an emergency resolution expressing its opposition to the PATH service reduction.
“I think it’s imperative that this service be restored and that the Port Authority buy more trains,” said Councilman Tim Occhipinti. “Our fare money should go towards buying more trains so that we can have the level of service that we deserve.”
Balancing act
Unfortunately for Occhipinti and Hoboken commuters in general, Port Authority representatives said that train frequency cannot be simultaneously increased on both the Jersey City and Hoboken PATH lines, regardless of how many additional trains are purchased.
According to Coleman, the Port Authority spokesman, trains departing Hoboken and Journal Square en route to 33rd Street share the same tunnel once they dip beneath the Hudson River, and only a finite number of trains can pass through the tunnel every hour.
“The issue here is not procuring more trains,” said Coleman. “The issue is that the system can only accommodate so many trains per hour and we are at max capacity now.
With this bottleneck in place, he said, Port Authority’s only real choice short of digging a new tunnel is deciding which line to give fractionally higher train frequency, either Hoboken or Jersey City.
Hoboken officials like Zimmer argue that their line should be favored because the Hoboken PATH station saw the largest percentage increase in average weekday ridership of any PATH station in New Jersey between 2012 and 2014, at 11.32 percent.
Port Authority officials say the crowding issues on the Journal Square-33rd Street line are significantly worse than they are in Hoboken. While the Hoboken-33rd line serves only one station in New Jersey, the JSQ-33rd line serves three stations in the state.
Thus, while the average weekday ridership of the Journal Square, Grove Street, and Newport PATH stations together increased by only 2.68 percent between 2012 and 2014, their cumulative average weekday ridership was 62,152 in 2014, compared to only 26,976 for Hoboken.
According to Coleman, the severity of the overcrowding at the Journal Square PATH station in particular was such that it had become a potential public safety problem, something he said was not the case in Hoboken.
The Port Authority has promised to monitor the effects of its schedule change through the spring and summer, but in his letter to Zimmer, Executive Director Foye said, “PATH has not observed additional overcrowding on the Hoboken to 33rd Street line as a result of the adjustments and rebalancing of service.”
Public process?
Whether the PATH schedule changes are an appropriate deployment of its train fleet based on population trends and observable overcrowding is an entirely separate question from whether Hoboken officials were adequately notified of the schedule change.
According to Zimmer, the city first learned of the changes after receiving multiple complaints from commuters that the rush hour crush at the Hoboken PATH station had become even worse in recent weeks.
“There was no public process,” said Zimmer at the Hoboken Chamber of Commerce event. “I think they assumed they could change the schedule and residents wouldn’t notice but the change is so severe that residents definitely have noticed.”
Coleman, the Port Authority spokesman, suggested that adequate warning of the service changes had been given.
“The schedule including this adjustment was published in advance, and advertised as such. Schedule adjustments normally are through social media, in station schedules and online,” he said in an email. “PATH and Port Authority staff met with Mayor Zimmer and her staff in recent weeks prior to the schedule adjustments and provided the new schedule.”
Based on past statements by Port Authority officials, Zimmer and other elected representatives in Hoboken would appear to have good cause to expect a more robust public process than the mere presentation of a new schedule.
In the January letter in which he confirmed that any elimination of overnight PATH service would be tabled indefinitely, Port Authority Chairman John Degnan promised that “any proposed reduction of PATH service would first require detailed study, consultation with local public officials and other interested parties, and of course a series of public hearings to be attended by commissioners, including me.”
Coleman, the Port Authority spokesman, was unable to confirm Thursday that the recent schedule change amounted to such a “reduction of PATH service,” saying he could not interpret Degnan’s words without asking him directly.
Carlo Davis may be reached at cdavis@hudsonreporter.com.