It’s time for Long Island to pony up for MTA capital plan

Long Island should be the loudest supporter of the newest MTA capital investment plan. Over the last 25 years, far more has been invested in each Long Island Rail Road passenger than each Metro-North or New York City Transit rider, and you can tell. LIRR riders have hit the funding jackpot with Grand Central Madison, the third track expansion, new M9 railcars — and the wins keep coming.

With funding for transit threatened by Washington, New York is increasingly on its own to pay for services and infrastructure. As a big beneficiary of Metropolitan Transportation Authority capital spending and services, Long Island has a responsibility to LIRR riders to make sure investments continue — and that Long Islanders pay their fair share going forward of any new taxes or fees for the MTA 2025-2029 capital plan.

Fortunately, infrastructure spending is a win-win for Long Island, supporting both its local economy and transit riders.

The MTA’s 2025-2029 capital program includes $6 billion for the LIRR’s next batch of railcars, modernized signal systems, and new and refurbished substations, bridges, viaducts, and more. Beyond moving Long Islanders to work, school, shopping and to see friends and family, the MTA provides massive local economic benefits. The Partnership for New York City found that the $68.4 billion capital plan would create 10,420 well-paying jobs on Long Island, and provide a local economic boost worth $14 billion. Included in that bounty is the money earned by the many LI businesses that work with the MTA. Reinvent Albany looked back 10 years and identified MTA payments to companies worth $3.9 billion in Nassau and $2.2 billion in Suffolk.

There’s more. Reinvent Albany and transit experts at the NYU Marron Institute of Urban Management crunched the numbers on all five MTA capital plans from 2000 to 2024. The LIRR was the clear winner. After we adjusted all MTA spending to its equivalent in 2024 dollars to account for inflation, we found the LIRR got an average of $18.70 per rider each year. Metro-North was second at $10.15 per rider, and New York City Transit was last at $2.57 per rider. The two commuter railroads have about 3% each of MTA ridership, but have gotten a hugely disproportionate share of capital spending: LIRR received 19% of capital spending, and Metro-North 10%. New York City Transit received 72% of capital funding, though it has 93% of riders. This is not a surprise: Transit experts expect commuter railroads to cost more per rider because they take passengers on much longer trips.

Long Island has won big from MTA capital spending, but that winning streak is going to be broken unless Long Island elected officials start taking some responsibility and get on board with any new regional taxes and fees to pay for the new capital plan. Right now, Albany is talking about repeating in 2025 what it did in 2022: Make New York City employers alone pay for the whole gap in MTA capital funding. That’s not fair, sustainable, or likely to produce a plan that provides continued, generous investment to the LIRR.

Rarely is it so clear that a state investment will go directly back into the pockets of New Yorkers. Sometimes it takes money to make money, and Long Island taxpayers should fund their full share of the MTA 2025-2029 capital plan — not only for better service on the LIRR, but for the greater economic good of Long Island.

This guest essay reflects the views of Rachael Fauss, senior policy adviser at Reinvent Albany.