The Case of the Missing Minutes

 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.  It was reduced so much that it ended up being 3' as reported by Michalak to the CPPC.  Ten feet minimum cover reduced to 3'?  Let's not forget that what should have been a pedestrian and bike underpass had ballooned to a 1-2 emergency vehicle underpass as per Michalak. So the RR underpass was to be a wide tunnel with only a 3' cover?! Of course, I am not an engineer but the idea makes me say "Yikes!".

 The minutes say that the cover was reduced in order to raise the underpass above the groundwater. We, abutters (specially P.C.), have been warning about the potential groundwater problem and I guess the engineers ended up agreeing with us.  But doesn't it sound dangerous to reduce the cover to 3' from 10'? Only 3' of dirt or concrete or whatever supporting the weight of the train tracks and the trains themselves over a span of 30'-40'?! Yikes again! 

Now, as to the mystery.  Tonight, in a googling exercise, I searched for the minutes in the belmont-ma.gov website and .... I couldn't find the document!  I searched using the entire title and ... nope! not there! I used the belmont-ma.gov engine and then the Google engine. Still nothing.

Huh! After the March 16th Nitsch-Town-MBTA meeting, the minutes of the previous scrapped meeting is now removed from the town's website. It's a mystery now but someday we may find the answer.  Meantime, here are the minutes for us to ponder on.


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