MBTA leader promises commuters will have a better winter
MBTA General Manager Frank DePaola said he guarantees the transit system will perform better this coming winter.
“I guarantee. Otherwise, he fires me,’’ DePaola said Wednesday afternoon, referring to Gov. Charlie Baker.
Baker and DePaola, along with MBTA Chief Administrator Brian Shortsleeve, were on site at a T property in Dorchester to provide an update on winter weather preparation. The MBTA earlier this year began implementing an $83 million plan to better outfit the system for snow and below-freezing weather. The plan includes new third rail installation on the Red Line, new heating on the Orange Line, new snow removal equipment, and more. (Read more about the prep work and its progress here.)
Snowstorms last winter threw the MBTA into chaos, causing widespread delays and cancellations, severely disrupting commutes, and resulting in the resignation of DePaola’s predecessor, Beverly Scott.
Last winter brought historic snowfall—Baker said the odds of it happening again are lower than one in 25,000—but DePaola said the preparations for the coming season are based on the assumption that the conditions will be replicated.
“We’re preparing for a winter just like last winter,’’ he said. The agency will be put to the test next month, he said, when it simulates snow emergencies for practice.
Baker said that the T’s winter preparation work needed to happen regardless of the amount of snow in the forecast.
“I think a lot of the work that’s being done here is work that we should be doing anyway,’’ he said. “Fixing the third rail … it wasn’t in good condition, and it needed to be replaced, and I’m glad we’re replacing it. With respect to the plows and some of the other equipment we’re purchasing, I think that sort of stuff, we should have.’’
Baker said the T should be able to survive snowfall like Greater Boston saw in early 2015, and that the new work reflects that perspective.
“Nobody sat around at the end of [last winter] and said, ‘It was the winter’s fault,’’’ he said. “People sat around and said, ‘Jeez, we should have been able to handle this a lot better than we did. What do we need to do to make sure we don’t have another winter like this one?’’’
The prep work has been ongoing while the MBTA’s Fiscal and Management Control Board, created earlier this year at Baker’s urging to tackle the system’s issues, has been in diagnostic mode. On Tuesday, the board issued a report summarizing the MBTA’s tough fiscal outlook. The report was produced 60 days into the control board’s existence, and is light on solutions, serving primarily to describe where things stand right now.
Baker said the report will serve as a guide to dealing with the T’s problems.
“We’re obviously going to work very hard with the folks on the board and the folks at the T to put together a plan and a program to deal with that problem,’’ Baker said. “I think one of the things that’s important to remember here is, you can’t solve a problem if you don’t know you have one.’’
Baker and his administration have mostly spoken about getting the T back on stable footing by cutting costs and finding new revenue in-house, such as through advertising and ensuring fare collection. The governor on Wednesday reiterated that he did not foresee new tax revenue assisting the T any time soon.
“I’m not talking taxes, period,’’ he said. “Not talking taxes. Because as far as I’m concerned, we have a long way to go to demonstrate to the public, to each other, and to everybody else that this is a grade-A, super-functioning machine that’s doing all the things it should be doing.’’
Remember last winter?
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