sen. chuck schumer speaks outside democratic presidential candidate hillary clinton's rally at the jacob javits center in new york. | ap photo/craig ruttle by dana rubinstein 11/09/16 06:02 pm est the day after donald trump was elected president, the democrat running the most important transportation project in the new york metropolitan region, if not the country, struck an optimistic tone when asked what trump's presidency might portend for the project's fate. "the gateway program partners are pleased that president-elect trump has identified infrastructure investment as one of his top policy priorities," said john porcari, interim executive director of the gateway development corporation, the federal and state group spearheading the more than $20 billion project that is supposed to, among other things, string a new rail tunnel between new jersey and new york city. story continued below porcari, president obama's former deputy transportation secretary, said in a statement that he and his colleagues "look forward to working with [trump] and his administration to help build the world-class transportation network america needs for the future." the existing tunnel connecting new york's penn station to new jersey is more than a century old and was falling apart even before hurricane sandy inundated it with brackish water. state and federal officials are scrambling to build a new tunnel before the old one no longer works, hobbling the region and perhaps prompting a recession. back in the heady days of october , when many believed chuck schumer was poised to run the u.s. senate in partnership with a democratic president, the senior senator from new york set an ultimatum: he would not approve a transportation secretary who didn't support building the new rail tunnel <u+2014> a project identified by the obama administration as one of this country's most vital. "as long as i have a position in the senate, the next secretary of transportation won't get confirmed unless they're as enthusiastic about this project as you," he told outgoing transportation secretary anthony foxx at a press conference in new york's penn station. as it turns out, schumer will not be the senate majority leader, hillary clinton will not be president, and as far as anyone knows, trump has yet to elucidate a position on building the tunnel. yet, infrastructure is one of the few spheres where trump has <u+2014> not entirely vaguely <u+2014> promised to do big things. he's said he wants to catalyze $1 trillion in infrastructure investment in the next decade and has promised, within his first 100 days, introduce a bill enabling that spending. on wednesday, house democratic leader nancy pelosi said she thinks it might be possible to craft an infrastructure deal with trump. asked if trump had any thoughts on gateway in particular, a spokeswoman didn't respond. but there is a perhaps-naively optimistic political argument to be made that trump's administration might not be all that bad for gateway. new jersey gov. chris christie, an early trump backer who appears poised to join his administration, has been supportive of gateway <u+2014> a stance seemingly designed to repair the political damage he suffered when he unilaterally killed gateway's predecessor project, known as arc. richard bagger, a christie ally and the executive director of trump's transition team, is a commissioner on the board of the port authority, which is playing a major role in the project. "efforts to advance urgently needed repairs to the superstorm sandy-damaged hudson river tunnel and replace the century-old portal bridge have accelerated in recent months and must continue apace," porcari said. "addressing these and other single points of failure in a corridor that contributes 20 percent of the nation<u+2019>s gross domestic product is of utmost importance to america's economy." matt friedman's must-read briefing on the garden state's important news of the day our morning email about new jersey health care policy and politics a morning email with must-read analysis and breaking news on new jersey politics and policy. matt friedman's must-read briefing on the garden state's important news of the day
gateway tunnel builder expresses hope for trump administration
dana rubinstein