Transportation
Gateway Awards $1.29B Final Hudson River Tunnel Boring Contract
Traylor/Walsh/Skanska JV to build 7,250-ft twin tubes, completing core tunneling scope on $16B megaproject
A rendering shows the planned Hudson River Tunnel alignment linking the Hudson County access shaft from Manhattan’s West Side to Weehawken, N.J., as part of the $16-billion Gateway Program expansion.
The Gateway Development Commission has awarded a $1.29-billion contract for the central Hudson River segment of the $16-billion Hudson Tunnel Project, filling the last major gap in the project’s heavy civil tunneling program. The award also completes procurement of what officials describe as the crossing’s “core and shell.”
Approved April 27, the contract for Package 1C: The Hudson River Tunnel Section was awarded to a joint venture of Traylor Bros. Inc., Walsh Construction Co. II LLC and Skanska USA Civil.
The work covers construction of two parallel tunnel tubes, each approximately 7,250 ft long, extending beneath the Hudson River from the Hudson County access shaft in Weehawken, N.J., to the 12th Avenue shaft on Manhattan’s West Side.
Early construction activities, including jet grouting near the Hudson County access shaft, utility relocation and ground improvement beneath the Hudson Bergen Light Rail corridor, and preparatory work for underpinning the Willow Avenue Bridge, are expected to begin this year, while tunnel boring is still years out, a Gateway Development Commission spokesperson said.
Gateway Development Commission CEO Tom Prendergast said the award means “more than half of the construction packages that make up the project are now in progress or completed and we have now awarded contracts for all the tunnel boring needed to build the new tunnel tubes.”
With this latest award, six of the project’s 10 construction packages are now underway or completed, marking a transition from early works to full-scale tunneling across the program.
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Hudson River Tunnel Links NJ and Manhattan Sections
Package 1C fills the central gap between two advancing segments, linking tunnel work already underway on either bank of the Hudson.
On the New Jersey side, Schiavone Dragados Lane JV holds a $465.6-million contract to bore approximately 5,100 ft of twin tunnels through the Palisades Sill, with two Herrenknecht tunnel boring machines being readied for planned launch at the Tonnelle Avenue site in North Bergen.
On the Manhattan side, a contract valued at more than $1.2 billion was awarded to Frontier-Kemper Constructors/Tutor Perini Corp. JV, which covers the construction of twin tunnels connecting the future river crossing to the Hudson Yards casing and a permanent ventilation shaft at 12th Avenue.
Together, the three segments form a continuous two-track rail tunnel between New Jersey and Manhattan, the centerpiece of a broader effort to expand capacity on the Northeast Corridor.
The river segment introduces the most complex geotechnical conditions on the project. Unlike the hard rock excavation underway in the Palisades, the Hudson River crossing will pass through a combination of soft soils, rock and previously treated ground, requiring purpose-built, mixed-face tunnel boring machines.
Diagram shows the Hudson River Tunnel Section profile, where twin tubes pass from the Palisades in New Jersey beneath the river to Manhattan, crossing mixed soils and rock and a stabilized riverbed zone, with nine cross passages connecting the tunnels.
Diagram courtesy of Gateway Development Commission
The contractor will also bore through a reinforced block of riverbed created under the Hudson River Ground Stabilization project. In addition to the twin tubes, the contract includes construction of nine cross passages, ground stabilization beneath Hudson Bergen Light Rail infrastructure and installation of a permanent underground support system beneath the Willow Avenue Bridge corridor.
Separately, Gateway's board also approved an owner-controlled insurance program covering the current award and two future construction packages—the New Jersey Surface Alignment and an additional Manhattan-side segment—consolidating risk coverage across upcoming work rather than requiring each contractor to procure insurance independently.
The New Jersey Surface Alignment contract, which will build elevated and surface track connections linking the new tunnel to the Northeast Corridor in New Jersey, remains the one major civil package tied to tunnel approaches not yet awarded.
The Package 1C award follows a months-long federal funding dispute that halted reimbursements, idled contractors and delayed procurement of major packages, including the river segment.
More than $254 million in overdue federal payments was released through litigation brought by New York and New Jersey, restoring cash flow and allowing Gateway to resume full construction and advance pending procurements.
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New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill said the award “makes it clear that the Gateway Tunnel is back on track,” adding that it advances “the most urgent infrastructure project in the nation for both the tens of thousands of workers who will build it and the hundreds of thousands of riders who rely on this connection every day.”
Across the river, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said the contract will help deliver “faster commutes and thousands of good-paying jobs” while advancing one of the nation’s most critical infrastructure investments.
The Hudson Tunnel Project is the centerpiece of the broader Gateway Program, which aims to expand and modernize the busiest section of the Northeast Corridor, carrying roughly 800,000 passenger trips daily.
The new tunnel will supplement the existing North River Tunnel, a 1910-era crossing damaged during Superstorm Sandy, allowing it to be taken out of service for full rehabilitation once the new tubes enter service by the project’s 2035 target date without disrupting corridor traffic.
Bryan Gottlieb is the online editor at Engineering News-Record (ENR).
Gottlieb is a five-time Society of Professional Journalists Excellence in Journalism award winner with more than a decade of experience covering business, construction and community issues, including finance, law and real estate. He has reported for Adweek and the San Diego Daily Transcript and led a community newsroom in Santa Monica, Calif. He served as editor-in-chief of the Detroit Metro Times and as managing editor at Roofing Contractor, where he helped shape national industry coverage. At Engineering News-Record, Gottlieb covers breaking news, large-scale infrastructure and megaprojects, regulatory developments and business trends across the U.S. and global construction sectors.
email: gottliebb@enr.com | office: (248) 786-1591
