This was the speculation on Steve Kornacki's show this morning. There is no question in my mind that he has put his finger squarely on it.
It is indeed, as the Mayor vaguely intuited, about Fort Lee's big crown jewel: The billion dollar redevelopment project at the foot of the bridge.
Some either wants a piece of that project, or wants to ratfuck it. Screw with the project's bridge access, and the project is dead.
Here are the dots that Kornacki connected:
1) The timing. Bridgegate went down just before major financing for the next phase of the project was to be secured. That financing did not get back on track til Bridgegate was called off.
2) Christie's initial dickish press conference: I'd noticed this too, but did not see the trail: Not only did Christie go out of his way to mock Fort Lee's pain, he gratuitously volunteered that the real scandal he sees--once Fort Lee and its bridge access came on his radar screen--was how the heck did that little pissant town get 3 bridge lanes. Said Christie, "That's what gets me sauced."
3) Kornacki played that clip, and this leaps out like a red flare: Christie goes on to say: "I've talked to Samson [head of the Port Authority and Christie's appointee] about [the travesty of Fort Lee having 3 lanes]. I think that's something that should be looked at."
Neon lights, guys. That's absolutely what this is all about. The Samson connection is particularly telling--isn't he really juiced with major economic players? For him to control something as valuable and vital as access to the GWB, that's a gold mine.
So that is the motive. Stick a monkeywrench in the project, just in time to stall its financing. Make it clear that the Gov and his friends can take away your bridge access. Then someone gets something they want very much. Perhaps a piece of the project. Perhaps they want to kill the project, because it competes with another project.
And either way, I am sure Christie is in it up to his eyeballs.