With the city's population expected to grow dramatically in the next two to three decades, government planners are trying to figure out what to do about it. Now, mass transit agencies are stepping up with some of ideas of their own. NY1 Transit reporter Bobby Cuza explains in the following report.

If you think congestion in the city is bad now, just wait until 2030, when a million more people are expected to live in the city, and millions more in surrounding areas.

"We're going to have exploding growth in population and employment, and if we do nothing, this will be considered the good old days," said Joel Ettinger of the New York Metropolitan Transportation Council.

To absorb all those people, mass transit will have to play an important role. At least, that's the thinking behind a plan presented Thursday by the New York Metropolitan Transportation Council, a coalition of government agencies and major transportation providers, including the MTA, Port Authority and city and state DOTs. The plan identifies 10 areas in the region where growth is most desirable, including five in the city:

Hudson Yards on Manhattan's far West Side;

Lower Manhattan;

Downtown Brooklyn;

Long Island City;

Jamaica.

"We are hoping that as we encourage growth and receive growth, that the growth can be served in significant part by transit," said State Transportation Commissioner Astrid Glynn.

The group also repeated its commitment to four major transit projects already underway: the Second Avenue Subway; East Side Access, that's the Long Island Rail Road link to Grand Central; the 7 line extension to Manhattan's Far West Side; and a project known as Access to the Region's Core, a new Hudson River tunnel that will accommodate New Jersey Transit trains.

The Metropolitan Transportation Council is also looking at what future projects might be necessary in the coming decades and will present some of those ideas later this year.

— Bobby Cuza