NJ Transit Considers Bayonne Light Rail Extension After 1888 Studios Opens

NJ Transit is eyeing an expansion of the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail down to Bayonne’s southern tip. Money troubles stand in the way. Paul Wycoff leads Government and External Affairs at the agency. He said planners want this extension, but can’t build until 1888 Studios opens and proves people will use it.

“That’s a focus of attention that is in people’s minds. The planners are very interested in that,” Wycoff said in an interview with Hudson County View at the North Jersey Transit Forum in Jersey City on Saturday. “So that’s something that we’ve put in the hopper to look at. As you heard some of the panelists say, and the commissioner, the challenge is always funding. The challenge is always resources.”

What’s to Come

The light rail stops at 8th Street Station in Bayonne. An old Conrail line runs next to it and keeps going south along Route 440 before reaching the 58-acre 1888 Studios site at Avenue A and First Street. Local officials have watched these underused tracks for years, thinking they could carry trains to the base of the Bayonne Bridge.

Wycoff called the studio development part of a “growing potential economic machine” as film companies plan facilities across the state. Paramount signed a 10-year lease for space at the Bayonne spot. Netflix wants a studio in Fort Monmouth. Lionsgate picked Newark.

The agency is pushing hard on a Bergen County extension, which would add 10 miles of track from Tonnelle Avenue in North Bergen to Englewood Hospital. They’ve asked for proposals on a new environmental impact statement since the old one grew stale while waiting in Washington, D.C.

“The extension of the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail into Bergen County, after all these years, is a real strong focus of ours,” Wycoff said. “Right now, we have a request for proposal out, which is due back soon, to redo the environmental impact statement because it got so old sitting down in D.C., it has to be updated. Flood elevation levels have changed. Traffic patterns have changed. That’s a couple years effort.”

Any Bayonne extension would happen after 1888 Studios wraps up construction and Paramount starts working. Wycoff said the state will respond if ridership materializes, but tight budgets prevent building on speculation alone.

“Because of the way budgets are, we can’t afford to just say, ‘Okay, we’re going to build it, and they’ll come,’” Wycoff noted. The rail once ended at 22nd Street Station before stretching to 8th Street Station back in 2011.

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