MBTA to restore subway, bus service as quickly as possible, GM says
The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, which has been heavily criticized for service cuts even as it received federal aid, now says it will look to restore subway and bus service to pre-pandemic levels as quickly as possible. WBUR reports MBTA General Manager Steve Poftak announced that intention at Monday’s meeting of the Fiscal and Management Control Board, which oversees the transit agency. Poftak said the agency is in “a much different landscape” with at least $845 million in federal stimulus funds expected on top of $1.1 billion received earlier, but that there is not yet any timeline for restoring service. Poftak also proposed restoring weeking commuter rail service on the seven lines where it was eliminated, possibly in mid-May.
MBTA’s new Red, Orange cars remain sidelined after derailment
The MBTA’s new Red and Orange line railcars will remain out of service indefinitely as anaylsis continues to determine if the cars played a part in a March 16 derailment in Medford, Mass. State House News Service reports the workers are disassembling components of the cars, built in Springfield, Mass., by an affiliate of China’s CRRC, and shipping them out for additional analysis. MBTA Deputy General Manager Jeff Gonnevillle said the agency will “hold all of the CRRC cars out of revenue service until we get to that point where we truly can identify and say comfortably that every piece of this vehicle is functioning the way it was designed to function.” Rail service on the Orange Line remains replaced by shuttle buses on a section around the site of the derailment at Wellington station, where work continues on an ongoing infrastructure project, and to replace damaged track.
North County Transit District asks STB for more time to continue talks with Del Mar, coastal commission
The San Diego-area North County Transit District has asked the Surface Transportation Board to continue to hold off on its request for an order allowing it to continue bluff stabilization work and to install a fence to deter trespassers in Del Mar, Calif. In a filing Monday, the district asked that the STB, which had previously granted a request to hold the matter in abeyance through the end of March, to allow talks with the city of Del Mar and California Coastal Commission, to extend that delay through Dec. 31, 2021. “The three key parties … have been engaged in promising discussions regarding this dispute and believe further talks are warranted,” the district says in its filing.
