By Philip Newman
U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) asked the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey to take over the project.Gov. David Paterson said the money must be found for the $14 billion project to transform the Farley Post Office into a new Pennsylvania Station, which would be accompanied by several skyscrapers in a new center of commerce on Manhattan's West Side.Under the plan, the present Madison Square Garden would be demolished and a new Garden built across the street.But Barry Watkins, a spokesman for the Garden, said that MSG, which opened in 1968, would not move but instead spend an estimated $350 million renovating the present arena.Paterson said the Moynihan station complex “remains a top priority.””This project will have a lasting economic impact on our state as a whole,” Paterson said. “The immediate task we have in front of us is to secure the necessary funding and complete the environmental process.”But Paterson said New York State could not do it alone and would need “commitments from the developers, New York City and the federal government to make this project a reality.”The mayor's office said it “remained committed to… completion of a new world-class train station and development of the area.”The Moynihan Station project was to be named for the late U.S. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, whose idea it was to convert the stately post office into a new rail station, replacing the present terminal which Mayor Michael Bloomberg once called a “dismal subterranean failure.”Plan replaced plan over the past decade until the original $1 billion price tag for the station conversion rose to $14 billion through the addition of a new Madison Square Garden, a complex of high-rise office towers and other features.Schumer last week suggested to Paterson that the Port Authority could use $2 billion in un-earmarked funds to get the original station conversion part of the project going.City Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan), who called Madison Square Garden's withdrawal from the project “callous,” later appealed to officials of the arena to return and help “get this project going.”Reach contributing writer Philip Newman via e-mail at news@imesledger.com or by phone at 718-229-0300, Ext. 136.
