Three years and millions of dollars in planning essentially went out the window last Thursday, when Gov. Andrew Cuomo and his handpicked team of experts presented an alternative to the planned partial closure of the L train between Brooklyn and Manhattan.

Now, transit officials are scrambling to make sure they can implement it.

New York City Transit President Andy Byford appears to be fully on board with the change. Instead of a 15-month closure of the tube connecting Brooklyn and Manhattan, the tunnel would remain open, with reduced service on nights and weekends.

It's unclear yet if the MTA will hold any public hearings on the revised plan; and despite Cuomo's calls for an emergency MTA board meeting, there has been none scheduled.

"We're now working our way through to make sure, from both a safety perspective and a customer service perspective, that we can make this alternate plan work," Byford said. "I'm very confident on that regard."

The original plan called for demolishing and rebuilding the so-called benchwall damaged by Hurricane Sandy floodwaters. The new plan would abandon the electrical cables inside and rack new, fireproofed cables on the tunnel wall. The damaged concrete would essentially be patched, and sensors installed to detect any failures.

Byford said those ideas had been considered. "We did look at some of these individual elements. But the key thing is, they were looked at in isolation," he said. "The eureka moment really was adding all of these innovations together."

• Engineer: Rebuilding L Train Tunnel Completely Would Extend its Life Further Than New Plan

Meanwhile, Byford rejected any suggestion the new plan is a temporary fix.

"I'm not interested in patches, I'm not interested in band-aid jobs," the transit president said. "We have been assured that this is a protracted solution, and that in fact what is proposed will last 40 to 50 years, not dissimilar to what we'd been originally proposing."

-------

Looking for an easy way to learn about the issues affecting New York City and what local politicians are doing to solve them?

Listen to our "Off Topic/On Politics" podcast: Apple Podcasts | Google Play | Spotify | iHeartRadio | Stitcher | RSS