Date/Time
Date(s) – 09/29/2025
6:45 pm – 9:00 pm
Location
Summit Free Public Library
Categories
We continue our meetings at the Summit Free Public Library. Please note the special 5th-Monday date to avoid a conflict with Rosh Hoshana.
This month, guest speaker Liam Blank joins us from to discuss The Lost Compact: How a Forgotten 1958 Plan to Unify Commuter Railroads Holds the Key to Penn Station’s Future.
In 1958, New York and New Jersey came tantalizingly close to creating a unified, modern transit authority that transcended the Hudson River and featured a leadership structure democratically elected by citizens residing within 10 North Jersey counties and 3 New York counties. The failure of that bi-state compact set the stage for 60 years of the institutional fragmentation and operational dysfunction that cripples Penn Station and the Northeast Corridor today. This presentation unearths this forgotten chapter of our region’s history, connecting the dots from its collapse to the governance challenges we are still fighting to overcome.
Liam Blank is an urban mobility consultant and chairperson of the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee for The City Club of New York, where he leads the advocacy campaign for a through-running Penn Station. He has previously worked as associate director of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA (PCAC) and as policy & communications manager for the Tri-State Transportation Campaign (TSTC).
We hope that you’ll join us at the Summit library (75 Maple Street; downstairs). As has become our usual practice, we’ll also be using Zoom for online participation. To join us by phone or computer, e-mail us at info@lackawannacoalition.org to get the Zoom registration information.
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