Senator Frank Lautenberg, Friend to Transit, Dies at 89

"U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg's final tweet was about a proposed train tunnel under the Hudson River," notes Hinds. "It was a fitting coda to a career driving transportation policy -- transforming everything from smoking on airplanes to instituting stricter blood alcohol standards for drivers. On train travel in particular, Lautenberg never flagged, securing $6 billion in federal funding for a transit tunnel under the Hudson River and feuding with Governor Chris Christie almost until the end of his life after Christie pulled the plug on the project." 

“Every transit rider – not just in New Jersey but in America – owes a huge debt of gratitude to the efforts of Senator Frank Lautenberg,” said Peter Rogoff, the head of the Federal Transit Administration, at a transit conference in Philadelphia Monday.