In addition to announcing more delays in the Green Line extension, the state Department of Transportation wants to make sure the dormant proposal to extend the Blue Line to Charles/MGH stays dead.
In a filing with state environmental officials, MassDOT says spending another $49 million to study finishing what is now a $748 million project it has no intentions to build is pretty damn stupid, so it wants to be released from any obligations to do more studies.
As a matter of policy, MassDOT believes that it is irresponsible to spend precious public funds to design and permit transportation projects for which there are no identified construction funds, particularly given the need to continually refresh planning and permitting materials for major projects. To pursue final design of the Red Line/Blue Line Connector project at this point would be to squander resources that could otherwise be spent on projects for which construction funds are already committed.
Therefore, MassDOT is initiating a process to amend the [State Implementation Plan] to permanently and completely remove the obligation to perform final design of the Red Line/Blue Line Connector.
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