"Have you seen the new stairs at the train station? They are finally complete," Mayor Elizabeth Fagan said at the Common Council meeting on October 20, according to TAPinto Summit. The stairs reopened after more than a year and a half. But weekday riders who climb them right now are still headed to Hoboken, not Penn Station.
The stairs are finished, and the detour has about a week to go. The Hoboken detour is the second and final cutover onto the new Portal North Bridge over the Hackensack River. Once it's done, the swing bridge that has carried trains from Summit toward Manhattan for 116 years leaves service for good. The weekday trains that come back on November 15 will cross a different bridge.
The Stairs Took a Season Longer Than Promised
The staircase is a good measure of how long station work can run. In May, Patch reported that the replacement stairs were being built off-site. Mayor Fagan said demolition and installation would start after July 4, and the city hoped to finish by the end of summer. The stairs actually reopened in mid-October.
Fagan thanked New Jersey Transit for work "consistent with the historic nature of our train station." She also credited Assemblyman Andrew Macurdy, who represents Summit in the 21st Legislative District and sits on the transportation committee, with pushing the project forward. Macurdy was less generous about the timeline. "The project should not have taken as long as it did," he said in a statement to TAPinto Summit, adding that riders had told him delays like this erode their faith in the train system.
That frustration came after a hard few weeks. TAPinto Summit's October 6 report on the coming diversion opened with passengers on a September train carrying Summit-bound commuters, who said they were stranded without power or air conditioning. The bridge work is the one disruption this fall with a clear end date and a clear payoff.
Why Every Weekday Train Goes to Hoboken
Since Sunday, October 11, weekday Midtown Direct trains on the Morris & Essex lines, the Gladstone Branch and the Montclair-Boonton Line have been running to and from Hoboken. Weekend Midtown Direct trains still go to Penn Station. The reason is a track transfer. Crews are moving the last track and its Amtrak-owned wires and electrical systems off the old bridge and onto the new one.
This is the second cutover of 2026. According to NJ Transit's March release, the first cutover started February 13, regular schedules were set to resume Sunday, March 15, and the first track on the new bridge was to carry passengers starting Monday, March 16. The fall work finishes the move. In NJ Transit's September 17 announcement, Amtrak Interim President Byl Herrmann called it "this second and final Cutover."
Amtrak's October 29 progress post says crews had removed old track and overhead power lines and installed new track on the west side of the new bridge. They had also set three new bridge sections that will carry the new track alignment toward Secaucus Station. The same post says the 116-year-old Portal Bridge "has been handed over for demolition." In March, NJ Transit said the old bridge was scheduled to be dismantled in 2027.
The Rules for the Last Weekdays of the Detour
This Thursday is November 5. The temporary timetable runs through Saturday, November 14, so the last weekday commute on the Hoboken schedule is Friday, November 13. On weekdays, NJ Transit tells Midtown Direct riders to buy tickets and passes to Hoboken instead of New York. From Hoboken, the agency lists these options for getting into Midtown, as posted on its Portal Bridge cutover page:
Connection | Where it's cross-honored | Condition |
|---|---|---|
PATH | Hoboken and 33rd Street only | Other PATH stations need a regular PATH fare |
NY Waterway ferry | Hoboken Terminal to West 39th Street only | Extra ferry service at morning and evening peaks |
NJ Transit No. 126 bus | To and from Port Authority Bus Terminal | Includes Academy buses running the 126 route |
Other NJ Transit buses | Rail tickets and passes accepted | Going somewhere other than the destination on your ticket may cost extra |
Weekends work differently. Hoboken monthly passes, weekly passes and FLEXPASS are accepted on weekend trips to Penn Station. One-way riders have to buy a Penn Station ticket, though, because Hoboken one-way tickets aren't accepted for weekend travel to Penn.
Monthly pass holders have one more date to remember. NJ Transit told October and November monthly, weekly and FLEXPASS riders bound for New York to buy passes to and from Hoboken via Newark Broad Street. During November 15 through 30, those same passes work to and from Penn Station. If you bought a November pass for the detour, it should still work once regular service returns.
NJ Transit's general advice still holds for the last week. Expect crowding on the alternate routes into Manhattan, leave extra time, and stay away from the weekday peak if you can. The agency's release also points riders to the NJ Transit mobile app and the @NJTRANSIT_ME account on X for live service updates.
One More November 1 Change at the Station
The Hoboken detour isn't the only thing that changed for Summit's station parking this month. The City of Summit Parking Services Agency noted on October 6 that all resident parking permits expired October 31, 2026. The new permits run from November 1, 2026, through October 31, 2027. The city requires these permits for its long-term municipal lots and garages, and for the Municipal Transfer Station at 40 New Providence Avenue. The city lists these ways to renew:
- Renew online at cityofsummit.org/permitrenewal, with step-by-step instructions in the portal's Help section
- Call the Parking Services Agency at 908-522-5100 or email [email protected]
- Book an in-person renewal, offered Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
What November 15 Changes for Summit Riders
Regular schedules are expected to resume Sunday, November 15. NJ Transit has said every time that this is "subject to the completion of safety testing." Amtrak's dates are a little different. Its project page lists the construction outage as October 9 through November 13, while NJ Transit's service changes run October 11 through November 14. The NJ Transit dates are the ones that apply to riders.
After the restoration, every train to and from New York will use the new bridge, and the original one will be permanently retired. The new structure is a two-track, fixed-span bridge that rises 50 feet over the Hackensack River. That's double the old height clearance, so boats can pass underneath without stopping trains. NJ Transit's release calls the old swing bridge "the enduring source of major service disruptions" for NJ Transit and Amtrak riders on the Northeast Corridor. Amtrak says the fixed span gets rid of the moving parts and the risk that they break down.
NJ Transit President and CEO Kris Kolluri put it directly in the September release:
"Five weeks of adjusted schedules will deliver a modern, high-level bridge that ends a century of swing-bridge delays for customers traveling the Northeast Corridor to and from New York."
The project's cost shows how big a fix this was. In January 2021, a Full Funding Grant Agreement committed $766.5 million in Federal Transit Administration money to the project. That October, NJ Transit approved a construction contract of about $1.56 billion with the Skanska/Traylor Bros PNB Joint Venture, the largest construction award in the agency's history.
Under the Hudson, trains still share two tracks. The Gateway Development Commission's Hudson Tunnel Project page lists 2035 as the target opening for a new tunnel and 2038 for finishing the rehabilitation of the existing North River Tunnel. Those two projects together would give four modern tracks between New Jersey and New York. Those years are the targets as the commission's page states them. Portal North Bridge is part of that larger Gateway Program. NJ Transit describes the program's eventual goal as doubling rail capacity between Newark and New York.
Starting November 15, Summit's weekday Midtown Direct trains should be back on the Penn Station timetable, and they'll reach New York over the new fixed span instead of the swing bridge.
For many Summit households, a direct ride into Manhattan shapes everyday life as much as the house does. Richa Garg follows changes like this one closely, from the reopened stairs to the new bridge, and is glad to talk through how the Morris & Essex line fits your household's plans. If you are weighing homes for sale in Summit or the surrounding towns, book an Appointment whenever it's convenient.
Image courtesy: https://www.wheree.com/
