Politics Across the Hudson: The Tappan Zee Megaproject

by Philip Mark Plotch

The State of New York is now building one of the world’s longest, widest, and most expensive bridges—the new Tappan Zee Bridge—stretching more than three miles across the Hudson River, approximately thirteen miles north of New York City. In Politics Across the Hudson , urban planner Philip Plotch offers a behind-the-scenes look at three decades of contentious planning and politics centered around this bridge, recently renamed for Governor Mario M. Cuomo, the state's governor from 1983 to 1994. He reveals valuable lessons for those trying to tackle complex public policies while also confirming our worst fears about government dysfunction.

 

Drawing on his extensive experience planning megaprojects, interviews with more than a hundred key figures—including governors, agency heads, engineers, civic advocates, and business leaders—and extraordinary access to internal government records, Plotch tells a compelling story of high-stakes battles between powerful players in the public, private, and civic sectors. He reveals how state officials abandoned viable options, squandered hundreds of millions of dollars, forfeited more than three billion dollars in federal funds, and missed out on important opportunities. Faced with the public’s unrealistic expectations, no one could identify a practical solution to a vexing problem, a dilemma that led three governors to study various alternatives rather than disappoint key constituencies. 

 

Politics Across the Hudson continues where Robert Caro’s The Power Broker left off and illuminates the power struggles involved in building New York’s first major new bridge since the Robert Moses era. Plotch describes how one governor, Andrew Cuomo, shrewdly overcame the seemingly insurmountable obstacles of onerous environmental regulations, vehement community opposition, insufficient funding, interagency battles, and overly optimistic expectations. 

 

 

Genres: Politics, New York, Nonfiction

272 pages, Hardcover

First published August 3, 2015

Reviews

[Troy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Politics Across the Hudson
By: Philip Mark Plotch

A small bridge near my hometown was under construction for close to two years. It was a two-lane bridge and was just wide enough to cross over a single set of rail tracks, let’s say 30 feet long. It was a small bridge, to say the least. After a few months of construction, the project came to a halt and created an inconvenient detour while it was under construction. While the details of the stoppage slowly came into the public purview, many in the area wondered how a seemingly small project could snowball into an implementation catastrophe. Thus, it sparked my desire to learn more about how public projects worked, from the decision making to the planning to the implementation. This inadvertently led me to Politics Across the Hudson which explores the Tappan Zee mega-project, another bridge not far from my hometown.

While the material can certainly be dry, Philip Plotch does an excellent job of keeping the narrative interesting and packed with information. No one page is overwhelming with the names one will forget once the book is on the shelf and Plotch does an excellent job switching between people, organizations, and government bodies which keeps the narrative moving and the reader’s interest. While the book is riddled with 30+ years of organizations and individuals who were involved in the decision-making processes, it is hard to imagine any author doing a better job keeping it concise and interesting enough for the average reader.

I found the last 50 pages of the book to be the highlight. Plotch gives great insight into the turf wars the various transportation organizations conducted, the government bullying campaigns to get support, money, and good press, and the dangerous state of the old bridge as repair funds were allocated for a new bridge that was continually delayed and pushed back. Philip Plotch has a few great passages that accurately describe the irony of the Tappan Zee mega project. One of my favorite passages is:

The Thruway Authority’s need to borrow billions of dollars to replace the Tappan Zee Bridge will lead to the greatest irony of this entire saga. The authority servers two powerful institutions with very different interests – the bond market and the governor’s office. To satisfy the bond market, the authority needs to maximize its revenues. Governors, however, exert the opposite pressure; they want the authority to minimize its toll increases. The only way the authority can satisfy them both is to encourage more vehicles to cross the bridge.

– Philip Mark Plotch (pg. 191)

An interesting resolution to a problem that started in the 1970s in order to reduce congestion actually ended in the critical need to intentionally congest the roads in order to pay for them.

My favorite quote from the book was chosen as it was the quote that shocked me the most:

They should take pride in their accomplishment building the new bridge…they don’t need a bouquet of roses. They had their part, and now it was time to move on."

– Stephen Morgan on why those who worked on the bridge should simply be grateful (pg. 197)

Anyone looking to pick up this book will be in for a short but insightful read on the dysfunction of government projects and the “luck” that was required to pay for a bridge that cost $4 billion but was originally intended to cost $20 billion. In the end, the Mario Cuomo bridge accomplishes little more than simply being a new bridge providing the same congested services through the I-287 corridor that every commuter wishes they could avoid.

[Kieran · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you grew up or live near the Tappan Zee Bridge (or Mario Cuomo if you decide to entertain that), this book may interest you. This book focuses on the entire planning, construction, and opening phases of the Tappan Zee, and it's the most detailed book on the intergovernmental affairs of downstate New York that I have ever read through the lens of the Tappan Zee.

NYS DOT, the NYS Thruway Authority, the NYS Bridge Authority, the MTA, the Governor, the Westchester County Executive, the FTA, and the FRA are just a sliver of the organizations involved in the planning and execution of this project. The complexity of the planning efforts may also interest someone interested in municipal politics and/or urban planning. I wouldn't recommend this book as a casual read due to its complexity.