Construction of the 63rd Street Tunnel began in 1969, and the tunnel was holed through beneath Roosevelt Island in 1972. Completion of the tunnel and its connections was delayed by the 1975 New York City fiscal crisis and the upper level was not opened until 1989, twenty years after construction started. The lower level was never opened because of the cancellation of the LIRR route to Manhattan. The tunnel was initially referred to as the "tunnel to nowhere" because its Queens end did not connect to any other subway line until 2001. Construction on East Side Access, and the completion of the lower level, started in 2006.