WNBC's Gabe Pressman, in a 6 July 2007 column, [Will Moynihan's Dream Come True?] joins with Senator Moynihan's widow, Liz, and daughter, Maura, in supporting the Vornado and Related Companies [unnamed in column] plan for development. He also dismisses unspecified criticisms from 'civic groups' in a manner that would probably not please the civic-minded senator.

Pressman acknowledges the contributions of Senator Moynihan:

The late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan had a dream to convert the old Farley Post Office on Eighth Avenue into a new Penn Station. Moynihan, a scholar, an intellectual and a man who never shirked a fight for a good cause, deplored the fact that the old Penn Station had been destroyed to make way for Madison Square Garden. Whenever he recalled how the wrecker's ball had destroyed the beautiful facade of the old Penn Station, it made him angry.

He continues:

Moynihan also deplored the seeming inability of New York to undertake grand projects. But now, after many stops and starts, the future of the station that will be named after the late senator seems assured. His widow, Liz Moynihan, told me: ''If it doesn't happen now, it never will. This is the best chance we'll ever have to rebuild the West Side."

He cites the support of Governor Spitzer and Mayor Bloomberg for this plan:

New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg are strongly behind this plan -- and, in celestial terms, they are two key stars that need to be aligned. But there are a few other problems that may hold things up. The developers have some reservations, but it appears that ultimately they'll go along with the grand plan. Also, some of the civic groups that deal with major changes in New York's landscape have been nitpicking on some minor details.

Finally, he offers his support and dismisses any criticism of the plan:

But it's time to brush aside all the naysayers and nitpickers. It's been 44 years since this architectural homicide took place.

It's good that Pressman finds this an exciting project and that he respects the contributions of Senator Moynihan and his family. Let's just be sure that his rejection of criticism does not impair the quality of this development. Open the review process to the sunlight of public review and ensure that the new Penn Station does not suffer from the assaults that buried the current Penn Station under Madison Square Garden.

The New York Times editorial [Senator Moynihan's Legacy] asks New York Governor Eliot Spitzer to respect the legacy of Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan and the history of the Farley Post Office. It starts with the recent good news:

For years now, plans and sometimes mere illusions about ways to replace New York City's dismal and disheartening Penn Station have been debated, mostly behind closed doors. Now comes the good news that developers Stephen Ross and Steven Roth will finally make public their proposal to revive the drab area around Penn Station and create a grand new terminal, named for the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

They then raise the critical question for all concerned about this development:

When the plan is revealed New Yorkers should focus on one concern: whether the historic public spaces are being shortchanged once again in favor of private developments.

They also point out the less than promising news that has been leaked so far:

With each bit of news that seeps out about these plans, it looks more and more as though the Garden will be allowed to take over most of the magnificent Farley building, including its dramatic stairway entrance and the elegant lobby that stretches along most of a city block. One main wall of the central terminal might also be used for Garden advertising.

Let's join the Times in opposing what could be a terrible fate for the New Penn Station:

One can only imagine Senator Moynihan's eloquent disappointment if he thought that the Farley building he worked so hard to protect would not be a soaring entrance for the trains and the city but a route through a public treasure to a privately owned coliseum.

Vornado Realty Trust and its partner The Related Companies LP hired Cassidy & Associates to lobby the federal government, according to a disclosure form, the AP reports.

The firm will help facilitate communication with Amtrak and congressional members, according to the form filed Tuesday.

It looks like it's time for supporters of a sane Penn Station development to communicate with Amtrak and members of congress as well. Let them know what the public seeks in this development.

In a July 4 article by Charles Bagli, New Grandeur for Penn Station in Latest Plan, the New York Times notes:

In the next three weeks, two of the city’s largest developers will unveil new plans for rebuilding the station, moving Madison Square Garden, replacing the Hotel Pennsylvania, and erecting a pair of skyscrapers, one of which would be taller than the Empire State Building, over the site of the existing station.

Though the new plan is broadly similar to a proposal offered a year ago, it is different in several important ways, starting with the cost: $14 billion, double that of the original plan, a real estate executive who has seen the plan said. It is also bigger than anticipated: the entire plan, involving buildings on six adjacent blocks, would create 10 million square feet of new office space off West 33rd Street, as much as in the old World Trade Center.

The developers, Stephen M. Ross and Steven Roth, have also burnished their vision for the station, which would be renamed after Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who championed the original idea. Civic groups and the head of the City Planning Commission, Amanda M. Burden, had complained that last year’s plan treated the underground station as an afterthought, without a grand public space worthy of the country’s busiest transit hub.

The new plan would try to recapture the imposing aura of the original station inside the James A. Farley Post Office across the street, with a vast, street-level waiting room under a glass canopy that would spill sunlight onto the concourse two levels below.

In the next three weeks, the public will get its first, albeit sketchy, look at the new plan when the Spitzer administration takes the first step in an environmental review of the project’s potential impact on the neighborhood.

"It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and I think the stars are aligned to do this," said Patrick J. Foye, co-chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation, the state authority overseeing the project.

Thus the story of the new Penn Station, Moynihan Station, begins again. The Times article presents some of the issues, but there are many more to come in a project this important. Among them are the cautions offered by community watchdogs including the Municipal Arts Society. Bagli notes:

But Kent L. Barwick, president of the Municipal Art Society, a civic group that has met with the developers, said that it was "inappropriate" for the state to put the project on the fast track and begin an environmental review before "the design, the financing and all the implications are on the table."

I hope that the Moynihan Station development is an example of New York City learning from its past mistakes and taking a wiser direction. A few years ago Grand Central Terminal was threatened by unwise development. Wiser heads prevailed and we now have a restored train hub that is vital with retail shops and restaurants and is a ceremonial gate at the south end of Park Avenue. Let's use this chance to make Moynihan Station a place where New York cleans up the embarrassment that is the current Penn Station and makes some restitution for the destruction of the original Penn Station forty years ago.