able for a given purpose the availability of that money can be conditioned when given. This is true, for example, even in zoning where housing money is not made available except on a regional or local plan. Those are some suggestions. You bring us very close to the grassroots which is good for us, as we live in this astroregion we call the U.S. Senate and I promise you I will give it attention directly, and will explore some of these possibilities. I will also help with the Governor and the legislative leaders, but I think the citizen activity should essentially zero in on the State because that's where the most action can be gotten, at least to seal in what has already been gained which as you say is imperfect. WHY THESE HEARINGS WERE TAKEN TO THE PEOPLE Senator RIBICOFF. This is one of the reasons why these hearings have gone to the people, both in Connecticut and New York, because I have always felt that when you have hearings in Washington you get technical and you get experts who come and testify but you don't have the thinking and experience of the people back home; and it would probably be to the advantage of the Congress if they would have more hearings back home giving the people an opportunity to be heard, because there is a great reservoir of intelligence in these hearings which we don't use, and it's well and good to deal with all of the big problems of international and national society; basically you can't solve them until you solve the problems back home first, and this is what is closest to the people and they are considered. Representative WOLFF. One comment, Mr. Chairman, the fact that I am very happy Mrs. Stern delineated the flow from the west to the east because of the fact that it seemed someone forgot that when they gave the authority for the compact in trying to set up some imaginary line of where the sound ends and where New York City waters begin. Senator RIBICOFF. Thank you very much. A SPECTATOR. I would like to ask one question of Senator Javits. Senator RIBICOFF. May I ask who you are, sir? Commissioner WORTHINGTON. Commissioner Worthington, Great Neck Sewer District. Senator Javits asked a very interesting question to this young lady when he asked what happens to the sewage when it's received by the marina. I'm very sorry to have to state to you, up to this date, I know of no sewer disposal plant on the north shore that has ever been approached to ask to treat the sewage. Now, I think that's a pretty important matter for your whole setup here. Senator RIBICOFF. It certainly is. Commissioner WORTHINGTON. Because the type of sewage that comes from boats is the type of sewage that the average sewer plants all along the north shore can treat properly and very easily. Senator RIBICOFF. The legislature should have had some hearings out in the field, too. Commissioner WORTHINGTON. I think we weren't even asked to come to this meeting. Senator RIBICOFF. I am sure this is something Senator Javits will also bring to the attention of the Governor; it's a very practical commonsense suggestion; it's a question nobody bothered to ask. Commissioner WORTHINGTON. We will do our part to help. Senator RIBICOFF. Thank you very much. Senator JAVITS. I would like to express my thanks, too. Mr. MARINO. C. J. Marino from Westbrook, Conn. We had a meeting the other night about pollution. We have a very serious condition similar to the young lady that just read her article and just one little phrase I wanted to say, I am 62, and in 1917 my mother used to go out and get the salt water from the ocean to cook her spaghetti; I got to say the salt was so clean; the other night my daughter went swimming, she said: "Oh, dad, how dirty the water is." In answer to this question here, they have a piece of equipment now, it cost about $60,000. All these boats coming into the pumping stations could empty into it and you don't need a lot of land or anything, it's worked by air and it keeps stirring and stirring-I'm not an engineer, but this engineer explained it-and at a certain time just the water and chlorine go into the streams and it's about a $60,000 item where several towns could go into one of them because I know the towns are going to say where are we going to dump the sewage. There is a way of doing it when you have a will. Senator RIBICOFF. Thank you. Mr. MARINO. Another thing, Senator, New York State spends a good many hours and days on this, on the New York State navigation law. If the U.S. Government would only adopt this for the whole country we could eliminate 90 percent of it when, instead of waiting 3 years for an investigation, the only thing we need is to adopt it, pass it through Congress, and then have it enforced and a lot of our problems will be over. Senator RIBICOFF. Thank you very much, Mr. Marino. Edmond Grainger. STATEMENT OF EDMOND C. GRAINGER, JR., MAYOR, RYE, N.Y., ACCOMPANIED BY BRONSON B. T. EDEN, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, NON-PARTISAN CIVIC ASSOCIATION Mr. GRAINGER. Senator Ribicoff, Senator Javits, Congressman Wolff, my name is Edmond C. Grainger, Jr. I am mayor of the city of Rye, N.Y., and my colleague is Bronson B. T. Eden, executive secretary of the Non-Partisan Civic Association of Locust Valley and vicinity representing some 15 villages in Long Island. We are testifying on behalf of the Committee To Save Long Island Sound, of which I am cochairman and Mr. Eden is a director. I should add that the Committee To Save Long Island Sound was organized recently to unify activities of communities, citizens, and civic organizations in Westchester and Long Island in their efforts to persuade the State of New York to abandon the planned 812-mile causewaybridge over the sound between Rye, N.Y., in Westchester County and Oyster Bay in Nassau County. 51-566-70-pt. 3—3 S. 2472 ENDORSED At the outset, let me say that the Committee to Save Long Island Sound endorses S. 2472 calling for the creation of a 15-man commission to conduct a 3-year study to formulate a comprehensive program for the development and preservation of Long Island Sound, but we urge you, Mr. Chairman, to include in that legislation a mandatory moratorium on such projects as the proposed Long Island Sound crossing until the comprehensive program is formulated by the commission. What we seek here with regard to the Long Island Sound bridge is not a project only affecting the shores of Long Island and Westchester County; it affects a navigable body of water which is the legitimate and proper concern of the Congress of the United States, and the Congress of the United States has so indicated in legislation that it had passed in 1946, and of which Congressman Wolff is familiar, and I might also say that the Federal courts in New York City have determined that the Congress has legitimate concern in projects of this kind when it took steps to halt activity on the Hudson River, a body of water quite a bit smaller than Long Island Sound under the reserve Federal powers. Senator RIBICOFF. May I interpolate, I doubt whether the State of New York or any city or any county could possibly get permission with or without a study to construct a bridge or causeway over navigable waters without getting some congressional action for its internal approval. Mr. GRAINGER. The approval would rest with the Coast Guard. Some previous witness has mentioned the Army Corps of Engineers; actually that function has been transferred to the Coast Guard. In 1946 Congress passed the Bridge Act of 1946 which granted a blanket consent to the construction of bridges across navigable waterways reserving to it the specific authority to disapprove of single projects, and it is the disapproval that Congressman Wolff has sought to have Congress do by the introduction of a bill jointly with Congressman Reid from my district. As it now stands on the books, there is congressional power for the construction of a bridge without anything further except, as I say, the approval of the Coast Guard. Senator JAVITS. Would you like me to state-Congressman Reid has asked me to state he is necessarily absent. LEGISLATION FILED TO AMEND THE BRIDGE ACT Representative WOLFF. On that point, the fact is we do have in the Congress the power to object to a specific bridge and we would have to do that if we felt that Congress objected to a specific bridge and that's why I have filed legislation in concurrence with Congressman Reid to amend the Bridge Act of 1946; to prohibit construction of a highway bridge across Long Island Sound. There are many people who have objected to this bridge and basically it is in abeyance now. Perhaps after election, but it is in abeyance now pending further study. Mr. GRAINGER. Thank you. Indeed, Mr. Chairman, unless such a moratorium is included in S. 2472, the Governor of the State of New York, already enabled by legislation to build the causeway bridge between Rye and Oyster Bay may proceed with that massive project, and complete it before the proposed 3-year study is accomplished, and thereby, in our view, virtually nullify the aims and objectives of S. 2472. The compre hensive plan for the preservation of Long Island Sound must be drawn up before the existing environment of the sound is violated or altered in any major way, which in fact is precisely what the 82-mile crossing will do. Mr. Chairman, we go a step further than our urgent request for a moratorium pending the formulation of the proposed regional plan. We strongly urge that S. 2472 be further amended to include a prohibition against any crossing over the sound without authority granted by the Congress. This great body of water must be viewed as a national resource and not one over which a single State has hegemony. In fact, this is recognized in S. 2472 which states, and we quote: The Congress finds that action to develop and preserve the natural resources of Long Island Sound and adjacent areas is of the utmost importance to the United States, and that as a matter of national policy, these resources should be developed in a manner consistent with the greatest public benefits. RYE-OYSTER BAY CAUSEWAY BRIDGE We have for long insisted that the Rye-Oyster Bay causeway bridge does not respond to the greater public interest, but is in fact a parochial enterprise sponsored by special interests, and authorized in a piece of omnibus legislation, which was passed by the New York State Legislature and signed by Governor Rockefeller without prior public hearings and without in any way reflecting the will and feelings of the population at large. The history of that mischievous piece of State legislation is worth recalling because it reveals how a project of such magnitude can be authorized without regard to its long-term environmental consequences, or without taking into account the best thinking with regard to regional planning and ecological balance. It must be stated that the idea for a Rye-Oyster Bay causeway bridge originated not with Governor Rockefeller, but with Robert Moses who first wanted it as a project of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority. His rationalization was based on the so-called Madigan-Hyland report of July 1965. Essentially this report argues that the primary benefit of the bridge would be its aid to the industrial development of Long Island, and that it would provide access to the recreational areas of Long Island's north and south shores. Mr. Moses said: The Madigan-Hyland report presents the only practical means of diverting highway traffic not bound for the City, out of the City, a continuous stretching from Jones Beach in Nassau to Playland in Westchester by way of the WantaghOyster Bay Expressway, already well-advanced and partly open, including new incidental bordering parks, stopping places, marinas and beaches. The Sound Crossing and the Wantagh-Oyster Bay Expressway will supplement other approaches and invite more and more visitors to Jones Beach and the westerly five miles of Fire Island. Thus the originator of the plan, Mr. Chairman, and its strongest proponent conceived of it not as a major transportation artery to serve the entire metropolitan region but as a link across the sound to the south shore beaches, which are now so overcrowded, that any further crowding will destroy whatever remaining enjoyment they offer. The Madigan-Hyland report, and whatever agreements were reached between Mr. Moses and Governor Rockefeller, were the bases of including the proposed causeway bridge in the Omnibus Act which in 1967 created the Metropolitan Transit Authority and at the same time authorized the bridge. COST ESCALATION OF BUILDING A BRIDGE The assumption of the Madigan-Hyland report is that the project will cost $130 million. That was the figure in 1965. The enabling legislation states the cost at $164 million in 1967. Even at the time these costs were estimated they were fantasies. To reflect the escalation of price rises for materials and increases in labor costs, the 1970 figure for the crossing alone, without road linkages, must certainly exceed $300 million. TOLL BRIDGE PROBLEM Another assumption on which this project is based is that it can be financed by a toll bond bearing interest of 4 percent. Mr. Chairman, who will buy such bonds? And if the interest on them is adjusted to realistic rates, think of the cost increments to the taxpayer. Also, we should note, Mr. Chairman, that the Chesapeake Bay Bridge is now in default of interest payments on its bonds. This is a lesson for those who think a toll bridge over Long Island Sound can earn its keep. The claim is made by the sponsors of the project that it can be built at no cost to the taxpayer. This, too, belongs in the realm of fantasy. The cost of construction of approach roads and interchanges, reconstruction and expansion of existing roads and highways, the initial outlay for engineering and administration, the loss of tax revenues through the destruction and devaluation of property, all will amount to untold millions of dollars to be financed entirely by local, State, and Federal taxes. Mr. Chairman, without further analyzing the Madigan-Hyland report, we have a copy with us and ask that it be included in the record. Since the entire justification for the sound crossing was this report, the city of Rye and the nonpartisan civic association engaged four different consulting firms of national repute to analyze the feasibility and consequences of the project. In December 1964, we released the report of Lawrence S. Waterbury, a traffic expert who by then had 45 years experience in the preparation of engineering traffic, and earnings reports affecting toll bridges, roads, tunnels, causeways, and highways. We submit for the record a copy of the Waterbury report, pointing out that it made clear and convincing proof that the Rye-Oyster Bay Bridge cannot be self-supporting and consequently is not financially feasible. After the enabling legislation was passed, we engaged the services of three nationally known consulting firms to prepare reports in the areas |