You probably also underestimate the amount of infrastructure under the street - not just power, water, sewerage but also network, fibre, etc. It is not remotel

You probably also underestimate the amount of infrastructure under the street - not just power, water, sewerage but also network, fibre, etc. It is not remotely a small job to do such a thing. Not to say that it can't work out (or that some of those services don't have to be moved for tunnels) -- but cut and cover was a lot easier when we had less infrastructure. These problems are obviously 10x in such a dense city as NYC.