Time was, building a subway line in New York City was a relatively easy, if terribly dangerous, task. Workers simply cut holes in the middle of streets then covered them up. These days, Gotham’s underground is a mess of fiber optics, century-old steam pipes and electrical lines, some mapped, some not. It’s the job of MTA Capital Construction President Michael Horodniceanu to scoop out yet more space for additional projects, notably: the East Side Access tunnel, which will connect the Long Island Rail Road to Grand Central Station; a western expansion of the 7 line; and the long-awaited Second Avenue Subway.

Horodniceanu, whose resume includes stints in academia and as a co-owner of the transportation consultancy Urbitran, is a man on an endless charm offensive. His job is to negotiate crises that would reduce lesser mortals to tears – shoring up buildings with shaky foundations that delay tunneling, haggling for infrastructure funding with various government agencies, allaying the concerns of Second Avenue residents who must live through the blasting campaigns. In November, a construction accident in a tunnel underneath Park Avenue killed a worker. It was an incident notable for its rarity but no less tragic on this account. We talked to Horodniceanu recently about the challenges of the job. This interview was edited for length and clarity.

Txchnologist: Digging the subways used to be a much more dangerous business.

Michael Horodniceanu: Digging the subway was terribly dangerous. The number I heard was seven people per mile died. For us, this is the first time [there’s been a fatality] and we’ve dug lots of miles of tunnels.

Txch: Does that speak the pressures that are attendant with capital construction projects?

MH: People expect, I call it, “Immaculate Construction.” We’re doing better, we’re more responsive, we’re no longer cowboys. We no longer build in open fields. When the IND was built in Queens, you put that in an open field with no interference. That doesn’t happen anymore.

The Second Avenue subway is an example. It’s being built in the most-dense urban area in the U.S. – over 100,000 residents per square mile. The fact is, there are inconveniences. We are there for a long, long time. I come in and I set up in front of your house and I’m there for two or four years. That’s a long time to be in someone’s face. And as much as you want to make sure that nothing happens, it does happen. Bad things happen in construction.

Txch: You came most recently from the consulting world. How does this job compare?

MH: [Before that] I was commissioner of all of the infrastructure work on roads for all of the City of New York. It was about $4 billion of work. Nothing compares with this because here the diversity and complexity of the work is incredible. You have, in one place, tunneling, utility work, buildings that you need to support, underpinning. You name it, you have it. When all of these things intersect with each other, the problem gets magnified.

Txch: In addition to crisis management you have the daily blasting of Second Avenue. So you’re on a constant charm offensive. Where are you with neighborhood relations right now?

MH: Look, you can always do better. I’m also realizing that you can never please everyone. I cannot stay and wait for this to stretch longer. I think what’s important is to show people that you are a human being and that you relate to their pain. We had this town hall workshop a few weeks ago and it went very well.

Txch: Some of your projects have been going on since the 1920s. Have you had time to think of what you’d like to do for 2050?

MH: Right now the challenge is to build what we have. The challenge is also to complete Second Avenue [phase one]. Second Avenue, to complete it [from 125th Street to the Financial District in Lower Manhattan], will cost more than all of these projects I’ve done right now. I’m not sure right now that the funding will be available for that for the short term. I think that from my perspective my legacy ends with this project. Other people will have to take the torch and run with it after that.

I believe that it’s possible to continue to build Second Avenue and that’s probably the biggest two challenges that exist right now, to complete Second Avenue and create a new connection to New Jersey. How they can get resolved, I don’t know.

Txch: What happens if Second Avenue isn’t completed?

MH: It will be a train that starts at 96th and services the East Side between 96th and 63rd streets. It resolves some of the issues that existed on the Upper East Side. I think that, to go further north would be easy. We have tail tracks that go all the way to 105th street. Then we have a five-block gap. Then from 110th to 120th streets we have a tunnel. If you build a station at 105th to 110th streets you now will have another station. So you can come from 110th Street all the way down. We will also provide the ability to go south from 63rd street.

It’s going to be the political will, the people’s will. The same way that No. 7 could go further south. Right now it stops at 34th but we have tail tracks down to 26th street. There are opportunities to expand the system to make it better. It’s just a matter of people’s desire to do that.

Txch: The Bloomberg Administration, particularly Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, has pushed to make the city livable, and pedestrian friendly and tourist friendly. Does transit have an identity in the same way?

MH: It is unfortunate that the MTA has not gotten the recognition that we deserve for the services that we provide. If you walk on the street and say MTA, people say, “Ugh. The MTA.” They’ll tell you about it. The fact is New York would not be what it is without this incredible underground transportation system that services 8.5 million people.
So when you start looking at it and you start thinking MTA provides a service that is by far not perfect but is incredible. When you take the fact that we are linking rides and the aggregate discount, in constant 1996 dollars, the average fare fell from $1.38 to $1.10 in 2011. Everybody is criticizing us, but they don’t look at the positive side.

Txch: What vision of the future can you offer people?

MH: The vision of the future is to enable people to travel reliably and conveniently. Not only for work but also for trips that are entertainment, shopping and so forth. And many people do not do that.

You want to start relying more on transit and less on cars. We are in Manhattan. As you move out to the boroughs, we are not doing that. If you want to go from Queens to the Bronx, it’s challenging. If you want to go from Queens to Brooklyn it’s challenging because we have a Manhattan-centric system. So the future ought to allow people to travel interborough without going first to Manhattan. Staten Island is probably better connected right now to New Jersey than to New York. We need to provide those connections in a better way.

It is imperative that as the population grows that we do what I call TOD – transit-oriented development – that allows people to live in one place close to mass transit so they would not necessitate the utilization of cars. My view of it is, if we are going to compete and survive we must do it by improving our mass transit.

Top image: A rendering of the completed Second Avenue Subway. Courtesy MTA

Subscribe to Txchnologist’s daily email.

Matthew Van Dusen is the editor of Txchnologist.