Push is on to expand commuter rail service in this overcrowded part of NJ

Fresh off the success of a campaign that won more frequent service on all PATH rail lines, Hudson County Complete Streets is turning its attention to improving NJ Transit’s light rail service.

The better light rail campaign contains some short-term and long-term goals for NJ Transit’s largest light rail line, said Emmanuelle Morgan, executive director of Hudson County Complete Streets.

Hudson Bergen Light Rail has the highest ridership of all of NJ Transit’s three light rail lines, with 11.6 million annual passengers and 1.26 million daily riders.

In the short term, the advocacy group would like to see more frequent Hudson Bergen Light rail service to keep up with Hudson County’s rapid growth. This can be achieved by increasing service to 10-minute intervals, 24 hours a day. including nights and weekends, she said.

Similar to the group’s successful campaign for more frequent PATH service, Hudson County Complete Streets is circulating petitions seeking support of its goals.

“Right now we’re at 700 signatures, but we’ve only been at it a short while,” said Jack McKee, Hudson County Complete Streets campaign manager. “The next step is getting letters of support from elected officials, which we’ll pursue at 1,000 signatures.”

Petition letters are also going out to local elected officials at municipal, county, and state levels, in addition to NJ Transit officials, including CEO Kris Kolluri, Greg Woods, light rail operations chief, and Lance Norman, chief of bus and surface transportation.

NJ Transit’s Capital Planning team will begin a study of Hudson Bergen Light Rail operations and scheduling this fall, said Franck Beaumin, agency customer advocate, in response to Hudson County Complete Streets’ letter.

“I have asked to be involved in this initiative to ensure your voice is represented. I fully support enhancing off‑peak service, including weekends,” he said. “But I also want to be transparent that financial constraints remain one of the main challenges when it comes to expanding service.”

That echoed what NJ Transit officials said earlier this year at a North Jersey Transit Forum sponsored by the organization.

But Morgan said she also has an eye toward light rail expansion to Bergen County and other places she’d like included when NJ Transit drafts its second 10-year strategic plan in 2030.

“What kind of an opportunity does that present for both of these concepts, both the more frequent 24-hour service and for the larger expansions?” Morgan said. “It’s an opportunity to catch up.”

Finally expanding the light rail line to Bergen County has been unrealized for 25-years. A blow was dealt to that effort in August 2023, when the Federal Transit Administration required NJ Transit to refresh data in a 2007 Environmental Impact Statement study.

The Federal Transit Administration contended that environmental conditions and impacts had changed. NJ Transit submitted a third supplemental draft of the study in 2018.

NJ Transit issued a request for proposals last November to prepare the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the planned 10-mile extension of the Light Rail into Bergen, with a study to start in 2026.

That start has been delayed after the agency re-advertised a request for proposals this summer to hire a consultant to do the study.

Morgan said the Route 440 light rail extension in Jersey City to serve the new Bayfront development on the Hackensack River in Jersey City is also in a seeming holding pattern. Both a federally-required environmental study and alternative analysis have been done on the Route 440 extension.

That project would extend the line that terminate at West Side Avenue. Both the Bergen and Bayfront extensions are mentioned in the strategic plan, but have no timeline.

A ceremonial start of construction was held in March 2020. Since then, the project has been held up by the proposed Westview development which the light rail line would pass through.

Westview was rejected by Jersey City’s planning board in 2023 because the developer didn’t have a formal agreement with NJ Transit. A lawsuit brought by the developer challenging that decision by the was dismissed in 2024.

The Complete Streets group sees a future expansion of that line from Bayfront to Newark as a way to augment PATH service and provide redundancy, Morgan said.

“Jersey City and Newark are the state’s two largest cities, the region is five million people,” she said. “There’s just a huge amount of economic development opportunity, as we heard a transit forum, for connecting those, our two cities, by mass transit, in more ways than just one.”

That would require building a new rail bridge across the Hackensack River. The proposed replacement for the New Jersey Turnpike Newark Bay bridge has no provisions for light rail. The bridge is too steep a grade for trains to climb, she said.

A nearby ConRail Shared Assets freight rail bridge is too busy to add light rail trains.

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