Belmont Community Path

 In my previous post about tunnel jacking , I expressed skepticism as to the truth of the MBTA demanding jacking for all underpasses because, from an engineering viewpoint, it did not make sense. Then, by chance, I found in the belmont-ma.gov website a March 9, 2020 document titled " Belmont Com Path Nitsch-MBTA Coordination Minutes "  that surprisingly stated that very fact.   In the recent March 17th, 2021 CPPC meeting, Clancy mentioned that Coholan had been the head person representing the MBTA at the March 2020 meeting with Nitsch.    He added that what Coholan had said had not held up.  Clancy explained that MBTA's Ray made very different demands at a March 16th meeting and that Nitsch's 25% design plan was now back to the drawing board. Ray had much to undo.  Besides demanding jacking, another odd point  that came out of the March 2020 Nitsch-MBTA meeting is the reduction of the 10' cover  [over the underpass] requirement.  I...

My husband and I moved to Belmont in June, 2015.   When we bought the house, we knew and approved of the plan to build a bike path;  being environmentalists who had commuted by bike to work for decades, it seemed reasonable to build the standard 10' wide asphalt strip to reduce cars' environmental impacts.  It was around 2017 that I became aware that the plan was not to build a modest bike path. Instead, it was a behemoth project that threatened the narrow strip of mature woodland running in back of Channing Rd. homes.   It also threatened our maple, pine and hemlocks trees which were one reason we purchased the house. We have already taken 75% of the planet's land for our use and have created a climate crisis that is driving us and other species into a mass extinction.  Yet, we continue to voraciously consume the land and now we are expected to let this narrow forest, part of a fragmented suburban habitat be crushed to build more recreational space; onl...

 Generally, CPPC meetings are tedious, disorganized affairs.  Last Wednesday's meeting was entertaining.   At this meeting, we heard of future project cost increases flying out the window; we saw Michalak and Clancy raked over the coals; we smelled the stench of hubris when Bowen wanted to order around the MBTA and MassDOT and both Bowen and Lawrence wanted ways to muzzle abutters.  1.    Belmont-Nitsch vs MBTA: Clancy reports At a previous MPO meeting, Chair Mohler ordered to have Belmont come and explain its park/path 25% design plan, an unusual order triggered by our letters to the MPO.    On Monday (March 15th): Clancy, Garvin, Michalak appeared before the MBTA’s Deputy Administrator John Ray.  Chief Railroad Officer Ryan Coholan and MassDOT’s Michael Trepanier were also there.   Clancy was stunned that they had to go through a thorough review of the 25% design plans with Ray who made comments and gave directions. ...

    After the PARE feasibility study was concluded in 2017, it recommended a South-North route that was endorsed by the BOS and approved by the CPIAC.  MBTA's Assistant General Manager John Ray sent the town a No vember 16, 2018 letter raising safety concerns at the Brighton Rd RR crossing.  As a result, the BOS considered whether to revisit its decision to endorse the PARE feasibility study's recommended route  ( MBTA's Ray and MassDOT's Trepanier attended this meeting) . Similarly, the CPIAC considered whether to vote to abandon the South-North route in favor of a North-only path.  From the view point that raising safety concerns is not the same as opposing or threatening the path's funding, these relevant points were extracted from the minutes. October 4, 2018 -  CPIAC minute s Leino insisted that the MBTA was against the South side crossing. 1.  he stated that the MBTA expressed safety concern about the Path crossing Brighton St from the ...

  Dear Sir, .....   My issue here is the beautiful steel picket fence that starts in Belmont and extends into Cambridge for an approximately equal distance. This fence must be less than 10 years old and already it has 6 damaged sections. There are 3 consecutive sections in Belmont and 3 separate sections in Cambridge. This fence separates the BIKE ROUTE from the MBTA RR.   The current CPPC plan is to place the BIKE ROUTE north of the tracks in Belmont and add a fence in between. They have not specified the type. Trespassers have been cutting holes into the existing fences for all my memory, 72 years. If you allow the CPPC to extend the BIKE ROUTE the way they want, the same thing will happen. Fences did not stop the WW1 and WW2 POWs from escaping, nor did it stop the east Berliners from escaping into the West. For all my life, the MBTA has been warning us to stay away from the tracks. Now the CPPC people are calling it a park, implying that it is a safe place, that it is...

As you may know, the Belmont Community Path is currently in its 25% design plan phase.  The CPPC has announced its intention of submitting the plans to the MPO in early to mid March although now that seems doubtful. The MPO will provide $16.7M for this project and most of that money (80%) will be Federal funds. The CPPC has successfully inflated that project budget up to at least $25M but have covered the difference via a $7.5M  earmark in the recent pork barrel bill H5248 pushed through by Sen. Brownsberger and Rep. Barrett.  However, the budget is really a moving target.  Those involved in this project can pocket a bit of money by generating "cost overruns" that  the Boston MPO - unlike other MPOs - has covered up to now.  So these project becomes a potentially  endless source of money limited only by the spending imagination of those involved.  (As an example, the MPO in the last two months have been discussing the cost overruns of 30% and 140%...

  What is the process leading to the 25% design plan?    A kind staffer in the MassDOT District 4 office explained it to  me.  His name I won't reveal because maybe he will be fired for explaining *anything* to a Channing Rd abutter.  After all, keeping us in the dark seems to be the objective of both town and state officials* so as to be able to carry out this project with a minimum of disturbance.  This project is so important to someone who is very important and powerful that - an engineer told me with awe - it was assigned a temporary project manager !! Gasp!  That temp project manager is MassDOT's Michael Trepanier. The very important and powerful person is ... anyone's guess.  But I digress. * Exception: MPO's very professional and responsive Matt Genova. To become a state project and receive federal funds, it must progress through the following steps : 1.  Feasibility Study (FS) 2.  The FS is presented to a MassDOT Proj...

  The Covid pandemic and the opioid crisis have increased the level of homelessness throughout the nation.  The economy has faltered and economists don't expect to recover for a decade so this will be a persistent, heartbreaking problem for years to come. The health care system is also failing those addicted to opioids. Homeless camps have appeared in the Fitchburg Cutoff bike trail that links Alewife to Brighton Road.  The Belmont Community Path will extend this path to Waltham bringing the problem of homeless camps to the back of abutters' homes.   Addressing his concerns to the Boston Metropolitan Planning Organization (Boston MPO) since town officials won't hear our concerns, a fellow abutter wrote as a follow up to a previous letter: RE: continuing tent village and trash problem on the Fitchburg cutoff path.   Hi Matt,  Thank you for your response dated 2/27/2021. It provided more information than we have received from the bike path committee in i...

  A few years ago, I spoke with Stephan, a botanist  who has spent over 25 years volunteering his time for the planning and maintenance of Arlington's Minuteman Bikeway. Do you think the planned landscaping will succeed? As someone involved for over 2 decades in forest conservation work, I was very concerned about Belmont's plans to remove ALL of the mature trees growing along the embankment that is part of the ~1 mile land strip known as 101A (BCF) and how that removal of front line trees and construction would affect the trees growing in our private properties.   Knowing that disturbed soil is an invitation to invasive plants, I was concerned also about how construction would spread and enhance the growth of the more harmful invasives already growing there such as Japanese knotweed which would quickly engulf any new plantings.   Hence, my first question to Stephan was what he, as a botanist, thought of Belmont's plans for landscaping the "Community Path"....

Pictured: CPPC Chair Leino, Vice-Chair Friedman an Nitsch Engineer Michalak going over 25% design plan slides July, 2020. Also present (besides members of the public) CPPC's Phil Lawrence and CPPC and BCF member Vincent Stanton. Project #609204 aka "Belmont Community Path" was budgeted at $16.7M by the Boston MPO in 2018.  However, observe that in this slide, Michalak has the cost up to $20M.  This was before he added the $4M worth of lighting requested by the CPPC bringing the cost to $24M and before telling the CPPC that the tunnel had been widened to allow for emergency vehicles which in turn necessitated lengthening the tunnel.  He did not mention by how many million dollars those tunnel jacking changes had inflated the budget. The budget's steady inflation must have made a CPPC member particularly happy.  For several years, I have observed him arrive in several occasions as an anxious messenger conveying that "the budget has to be increased!".  Seeking ...