MBCR gets another THREE years?!?

I don't think either the MBTA or the passengers want the MBTA running the commuter rail. Bus replacement service from Worcester to downtown all summer, anyone?

Ron, this is a great idea, as it would cut out the large administrative fee (profit) that any middle man contractor is paid, which in light of MBCR's contract price is probably very large and could be used for other things. On the other hand, I imagin that there is a reason that the T started putting the commuter rail operation out for bid. Its either because they tried themselves and failed or because they looked at the difficulties of even trying and recognized that they were not up to the job. This is always the double edged sword of government contracting when it comes to services. Can the public (or quasi public) employees perform as well as they could if they were private employees? Its hard to say. I will say this, however: the logic of out-sourcing a government service is typically that, at the very least, the contractor will be able to act more efficiently by elimenating red tape, quickly implementing solutions to problems and being able to easily terminate bad employees while operating at the same or lower cost. I'm not sure that the MBCR has been able to accomplish any of these things because of the way their contract is set up, the ownership of the rails and trains by the MBTA, and the strength of the MBTA employees union. It would interesting for Deval's new State transportation board to do a study of how much the MCBR is behaving like a public entity versus a private contractor. That way, you could at least tell if MCBR was adding the kind of value typically sought from outsourcing.