NEW YORK CITY-As the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey continues to reinforce its focus on the region’s core roads, bridges and buses, its board voted on June 30 to authorize an additional $3.2 million toward the $180-million overhaul of the 47-year-old George Washington Bridge Bus Terminal in Washington Heights. The redevelopment project--supported by $100 million in private-sector funds and $83.2 million from the Port Authority--will quadruple the terminal’s retail space, create approximately 746 new jobs and update the facility’s aging infrastructure. It is scheduled for completion by the end of 2013.
The authority is working with developer George Washington Bridge Development Venture LLC in a public-private joint venture to repurpose the regional transportation hub into a revitalized transit and retail destination. The developer has agreed to renovate the bus station to include 21 new gates, a modernized waiting area and 125,000 square feet of retail, up from the current 30,000 square feet allotted for shops and eateries. The plan also includes improved linkages and transfers to MTA subway stations at 181st Street.
While Port Authority officials were unavailable to GlobeSt.com due to holiday outages, chairman David Samson says in a statement that the new terminal “will help ease the commute” for travelers going to-and-from Northern New Jersey and New York City by reducing traffic and streamlining bus operations. “At the same time, we’ll be putting more than 700 people to work, providing a major boost to the regional economy,” he says.
And while the financing of the project has been finalized, the timing of the project is crucial, as more people are coming into the city by bus than by rail to Manhattan’s central business districts, Port Authority executive director Chris Ward previously stated at a New York Building Congress address in April. Citing a 42% rise in bus travel over the last 25 years between New York and New Jersey, bus ridership has gone from 131,000 daily riders to 191,000. Given this rise in volume, Ward says in a statement that the redevelopment work will have a transformative effect on real estate in the neighborhood. “This bus station is part of the fabric of the Washington Heights community and this project will help the transformation now taking place there with better transportation and retail options for local residents,” he says.
On the local level, Ebenezer Smith, district manager for Community Board 12 representing the neighborhoods of Washington Heights and Inwood, tells GlobeSt.com that the redevelopment project could spur retail development outside the facility as well, adding big-box stores like Target and Marshalls to the area. And while generating foot traffic in the terminal is seen as a positive development for the community, Smith says negative impacts such as increased traffic or noise must be mediated before construction work begins. “Right now it is already congested,” he says.
Opened in 1963, the current GWB Bus Terminal consists of two, three-level buildings directly above the Trans-Manhattan Expressway on the west and east sides of Broadway. It serves between 15,000 to 20,000 commuters daily. In an e-mail, New York City Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez (D-Washington Heights), tells GlobeSt.com that the terminal is the "gateway" to the Northern Manhattan community, and the economic impact will help create 450 direct jobs and 300 indirect jobs overall. "In an area with disproportionately high unemployment, the prospect of hundreds of new, good-paying jobs is no small matter," Rodriguez says, in a statement. "My colleagues representing Northern Manhattan and I believe in the singular importance of this project and we are committed to working to see the project through to fruition."
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