THE NEW YORK STATE

LEGISLATURE

May 3, 2017
Mr. Charles Wick Moorman IV
Amtrak President and Chief Executive Officer
60 Massachusetts Ave, NE
Washington, D.C. 20002

Dear Mr. Moorman:

We write to express our concerns surrounding recent reports that Amtrak is planning to close rail
tracks this summer to Penn Station and that there will be at least six weeks of disruptions related
to the construction work in July and August.

To be clear, we appreciate and support the efforts to repair the infrastructure and understand the
importance of maintaining a safe system; however, we are requesting that a plan be put in place
to mitigate the service disruptions to the extent practicable and alleviate the burdens on travelers.

The Albany-Rensselaer Amtrak station is a central hub in the Northeast Corridor and has a
national rank of 9 and has 825,353 on/offs as of 2015, a number that has likely grown
exponentially since then. Albany-Rensselaer is the second busiest station in the state of New
York, only behind Penn Station. Many of our constituents travel by Amtrak from Rensselaer to
Penn Station to commute for work and to visit New York City for leisure, especially in the
summer.

In the interest of being solution oriented, we would suggest exploring the feasibility of re-routing
trains to Grand Central Station in the interim, especially in light of the fact that 20 years ago
most trains were routed to Grand Central rather than Penn Station.

Please feel free to contact us with any additional questions and we look forward to your
response.

Sincerely,

John McDonald Patricia Fahy Neil Breslin

Assemblymember, 108th District Assemblymember, 109th District Senator, 44th District

Cc: Hon. Jeffrey Dinowitz, Chairperson, NYS Assembly Corporations, Authorities &
Commissions Committee
Hon. Michael Ranzenhofer, Chairperson, NYS Senate Corporations Committee
Ms. Veronique Hakim, Interim Executive Director of the MTA
Mr. Joseph Giulietti, Metro-North President
Mr. Steven Santoro, NJ Transit Executive Director
Mr. Patrick A. Nowakowski, Long Island Railroad President