Ed. Note: This post was originally titled “Gov. Cuomo to order MTA to lengthen L train work, inconveniencing everyone for longer.” I’ve updated the title to reflect the comments from the governor’s press conference. More updates are coming.

After an impromptu tour of the L train tunnel last month and three weeks of consultations with engineering academics from Columbia and Cornell Universities, Gov. Andrew Cuomo ordered the MTA to cancel the impending 15-month shutdown of the L train tunnel between Brooklyn and Manhattan. Instead, the necessary repairs will proceed on a 15-20 month schedule that maintains regular weekday service and relies on single-tracking during nights and weekends. Instead of a full benchwall chip-out and rebuild, the MTA will use what Cuomo and his experts referred to as a rackwall to run new cabling and other required systems through the Canarsie Tunnel. It’s a very Cuomo-ian roll of the dice as this technology is unproven as to its application in subway tunnels but has been implemented in other contexts successfully, but for now, it seems the scope of L train work is posed to change significantly, raising more questions and concerns.

Updates to follow. The original post follows below.

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Exercising his control over the MTA last month, Gov. Andrew Cuomo dragged a bunch of academics who aren’t really experts in MTA construction project management into the L train tunnel for a last-minute inspection stunt to see if the upcoming shutdown could be shortened. It wasn’t immediately clear why Cuomo got the bug, three years into extensively planning for the project and four months before the shutdown, to intervene. In various iterations of a story, he claimed people on the street were coming up to him on the street to urge him to do something. And now he has done something that is going to make the required Sandy repairs on the L train worse and longer, against the wishes of the overwhelming majority of L train riders.

News of Cuomo’s meddling first broke when Transit Center tweeted out some rumblings this morning, and the development has been confirmed by The New York Times. We do not yet know the shape of the new project, but the full 24/7 shutdown will not begin in April and will not last 15 months.

According to a report on Gothamist, Cuomo may force the MTA to change the 15-month plan to a three-year project with more work shifted to nights and weekends and shorter 24/7 shutdowns scheduled throughout. It’s worth noting again that when presented with these options throughout 2016 and 2017, Brooklyn and Manhattan residents voted overwhelmingly against them, in favor of a shorter work schedule with proper mitigation. According to my MTA sources, Cuomo has been pushing the agency for weeks to avoid a shutdown even as he has indicated the work is still required. It’s not quite clear why he wants to avoid a 15-month shutdown, but this will make the impact worse for everyone involved.

Cuomo will address the public at 12:45, and we should learn more then. I will update this post with news as it develops. This is not a move that should be praised.