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Suzanne DeChillo/The New York Times

Anything weirder than turkeys found on the platform? We’ve hit horses; we’ve hit cows. It’s a normal day on the railroad. Use your imagination: Anything that can cross the tracks and get in the way will. We’ve had 16 trees down on one track in one night.

The daily conference call with bosses: We go through each delay, train by train. We’ve had 100 percent days, but don’t ask me when the last one was.

Earliest connection to the railroad: It was my first job. I’d wait at the Fanwood Station. At 4 and 5 p.m. I’d meet the trains delivering The Daily News and The New York Times. I’d pick them up and take them to the corner store. I got a dollar a week.

Favorite book near his desk: “Conquering Gotham,” by Jill Jonnes. It’s about the building of the original Penn Station, and what happened afterward. It’s a shame that something that magnificent was demolished and replaced by what we have here today. The station we have here today doesn’t do much for you.

Any Grand Central station envy? I wouldn’t mind running Grand Central for a while. In Grand Central, there are more station tracks than they’ll ever use. They have the luxury of boarding the same trains from the same tracks every day. Unlike Grand Central, Penn Station is used by three railroads, Long Island Rail Road, New Jersey Transit and Amtrak.

Career advice ignored: The old-timers were saying, “You don’t want to be here; we’re all going to be out of work.” In the 1960s and 1970s all the railroads were going bankrupt. We used to shovel coal to heat the towers, and chase rats out of the basement.

Worst part of the job: Handling bad days, and trying to explain to customers. They don’t always understand that if they’re having a bad day, we’re having a bad day. Tens of thousands of people are out there sitting on trains, and there’s little you can do for them other than update them.

Best part of job: Every day on a railroad is an adventure. One day you could be running a timetable railroad, and you could watch paint dry, and another day it could be 5 p.m. and you wonder where the day went.

Which trains go which way? Even numbers east, odd numbers west — it’s really easy to remember.

Highlights of the lost and found: Laptops, suitcases, luggage, a bass fiddle.

Any misplaced children? There have been two or three incidents where the parent got off at the airport and the kid went west on the train.

When he’s not working on the railroad: I’m renovating our old house in Old Bridge. I pretty much rebuilt it from the inside out. It’s a 60-year-old house, and it’s been 25-plus years we’ve been there.

Travel advice: My wife and I were in London in January, and went to St. Pancras, where the Eurostar departs for Paris. It was built in the late 1800s, and revamped, modernized. It’s just phenomenal.

His commute: I take the train from South Amboy. It’s terrific, and always on time. It’s about 45 minutes on the express.

The administration approved the final environmental impact statement that clears the way for Amtrak to spend $1.34 billion to build a three-track bridge just north of the Portal Bridge and a two-track span south of the bridge. The project is expected to be completed by 2014. Once the new bridges are finished, the Portal Bridge, built in 1910, will be dismantled.

Even the slightest slowdown can interfere with the daily routines of the approximately 150,000 New Jersey Transit passengers who cross the bridge each weekday. Nearly 400 New Jersey Transit trains and 103 Amtrak trains use the bridge daily. Because of its structure, trains can travel only 60 miles per hour on the bridge, compared with 90 miles per hour on tracks nearby.

The 961-foot Portal Bridge, which sits on a turntable, has only two tracks. And because its lowest beams are only 23 feet above the river, the bridge must swing open almost daily to allow commercial boats to pass. That delays trains traveling between Pennsylvania Station in Manhattan and all points west during nonpeak hours on average about 20 minutes.

Amtrak, which owns and operates the bridge, also spends millions of dollars each year to keep it working. In 2005, for instance, the railroad spent nearly $5 million to repair damage caused by a fire at the bridge, which connects Secaucus and Kearny, N.J., on the Northeast Corridor line.

Richard R. Sarles, executive director of New Jersey Transit, said the new northern bridge will be high enough that all maritime traffic will clear it, adding, “Maybe a handful of boats will necessitate the southern bridge to open a few times a year.”

Mr. Sarles said that the two bridges were designed to line up with tracks leading to the new rail tunnel under the Hudson River that New Jersey Transit and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey are planning. The tunnel is expected to cost nearly $9 billion, but the authority is still seeking about $3 billion in federal financing.

Once the new bridges and tunnel are completed, New Jersey Transit will be able to add more trains on the Morris and Essex, North Jersey Coast and Raritan Valley lines.

The projects will also mean that passengers on the Main Line, Bergen County Line, Pascack Valley Line and Port Jervis Line will no longer have to transfer at Secaucus Junction to get to Penn Station in Manhattan.