Tracking Transportation

Keeping track of transportation

T capital funding sources projected to fall off cliff

Taxpayers Foundation lays out gloomy future at T board hearing

By Bruce Mohl MBTA, Transportation 0 Comments Nov 9, 2020

THE MBTA is preparing to cut service levels to deal with a budget shortfall looming over next year, but the Massachusetts Taxpayer Foundation warned members of the Fiscal and Management Control Board on Monday that even bigger problems are just around the corner. Andy Bagley, a vice president at the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, said MBTA(...)

T proposes $128m in service cuts across system

Ferries eliminated, commuter rail shut down weeknights, weekends

By Bruce Mohl MBTA 0 Comments Nov 9, 2020

THE MBTA on Monday proposed a series of major service cuts starting next spring and summer to right-size an agency that has lost roughly three-quarters of its ridership during the pandemic and to help address a projected $579 million budget shortfall in the fiscal year that begins next July. The T is proposing to eliminate(...)

Poftak: ‘Together we will persevere’

Appeals for input from riders and the public

By Steve Poftak MBTA, Transportation 0 Comments Nov 9, 2020

The following is a letter from MBTA General Manager Steve Poftak to the transit authority’s customers. I hope this letter finds you healthy and safe. I would like to take this opportunity to briefly update you on the MBTA’s Forging Ahead initiative. As we all navigate the many challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the(...)

Walsh calls at-grade throat ‘right thing to do’

Mayor asks to participate in decisions on I-90 Allston project

By Bruce Mohl MBTA, Transportation 0 Comments Nov 2, 2020

IN A LETTER to state and federal transportation officials, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh said he strongly favors rebuilding the elevated section of the Massachusetts Turnpike and other infrastructure located in the narrow area between Boston University and the Charles River at ground level. While the Walsh administration has previously indicated it supports the at-grade option(...)

T budget and service cuts are unwise

Let’s tap wealthy, big corporations for needed revenue

By Mike Vartabedian and Olivia Nichols MBTA, Transportation 0 Comments Nov 1, 2020

FOR DECADES, the MBTA has suffered from a chronic lack of investment. The bottom fell out during the record-breaking winter storms of 2015. Since then, the MBTA has carried out layoffs, service cuts, fare hikes, and misguided privatization and “public private partnership” schemes that have not solved our region’s transit problems. We have seen train(...)

T faces $850,000 judgment in ‘grudge’ case

Appeals Court upholds whistleblower complaint

By Bruce Mohl MBTA, Transportation 0 Comments Oct 26, 2020

THE STATE APPEALS COURT on Monday upheld a judgment of more than $850,000 against the MBTA for allowing a manager with a 10-year-old grudge against a fellow employee to use his connections at the agency to force the worker into retirement. According to the decision, the employee, Thomas Tryon, learned about the scheme from the(...)

Are we changed forever by the pandemic?

Some impacts, only glimpsed now, could have long-term effects

By Shira Schoenberg COVID-19, Transportation 0 Comments Oct 22, 2020

WHAT IF our lives are never the same again? It took a blunt cabinet secretary at a dry state budget hearing to voice the fears of millions. For Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack, the issue was, unsurprisingly, transportation. “The COVID pandemic may well have changed travel and transportation forever,” Pollack said at a hearing before the(...)

T notes: Allston I-90 throat consensus seems very iffy

Huge outpouring of opposition to service cuts at the MBTA

By Bruce Mohl MBTA, Transportation 0 Comments Oct 19, 2020

TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY Stephanie Pollack has warned that the $1 billion I-90 Allston interchange could be scaled back dramatically if stakeholders are unable to reach consensus on how to rebuild the infrastructure in the narrow throat section of the project. On Monday, it seemed like that’s where the project was headed. At a meeting of the(...)

T revising ridership projections downward

Assuming telecommuting will become ‘standard practice’

By Bruce Mohl MBTA, Transportation 0 Comments Oct 19, 2020

This story has been updated. MBTA OFFICIALS are revising downward their ridership and revenue projections based on scenario planning that envisions telecommuting becoming “standard practice for the foreseeable future.” State transportations officials on Monday unveiled three ridership scenarios, each with a gradual increase in ridership but different expectations about telecommuting – one with only a slight(...)

Pollack urged to open up I-90 throat review process

Dimino letter cites bias, inaccuracies in spreadsheet

By Richard Dimino Transportation 0 Comments Oct 17, 2020

Below is a letter sent by Rick Dimino, president and CEO of the business group A Better City, to state Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack on October 14 concerning the so-called throat of the I-90 Allston interchange project. Dear Secretary Pollack: Please accept my sincere appreciation for advancing a version of the city of Boston/A Better(...)