Square pegs at a round table
Can state transit agencies put aside differences?
The recently signed Massachusetts Mobility Compact promises to improve the delivery of state transit services by enhancing communication and cooperation among nine separate state transportation agencies.
The drive for greater cooperation and more open communication was spearheaded by Massachusetts Transportation and Public Works Secretary Bernard Cohen.
Cohen is also the first to say the effort isn't good enough.
Efficiency is a point Cohen continually stressed. Finding better ways to achieve common goals through shared resources and best practices and streamlining equipment acquisition are a few of the efficiencies Cohen expects to come out of the compact.
So, will the money saved through these efficiencies be channeled back into real funding for actual projects statewide?
Not exactly.
"The intent isn't to generate projects and pay for them through efficiencies," Cohen said. "The intent is to create efficiency for efficiency's sake."
if the panel, then, doesn't have any specific funding outside of what each individual agency is allotted each year by the legislature, then surely they must at least have an agenda of projects and problems a mile long, right?"This is not a project-driven group at this point," Cohen said.
That's too bad for local planning agencies, which have wish lists of their own for infrastructure improvements and safety upgrades.
I-495 nightmare
Paul Matthews, executive director of the 495/MetroWest Corridor Partnership in Westborough, identified several intersections along I-495 that could benefit from immediate state attention, including the interstate's junction with Route 9 and with the Mass Pike.
Matthews also mentioned the downtown Framingham rail crossing as a pressing issue.
"The 495 corridor, due to its economic importance to the state, and to its increasing over-congestion, has real needs," Matthews said. "This area is a poster child for prudent growth and return on investment."
Matthews said he was encouraged by the promised regional equity in the new measure that might take the state's (indeed, the nation's) attention away from Boston and the Big Dig, despite the lack of a clearly articulated committee agenda.
"It's not enough, clearly," Cohen said of the effort. He acknowledged that truly fixing the state's multitude of transportation ills, from the maligned Central Artery project in Boston to the nightmare that is I-495, will take funding and decisive action.
But getting the agencies responsible for that action together in one room is an important first step, Cohen said.
The compact will bring together representatives from the Department of Conservation and Recreation, the Executive Office of Transportation and Public Works, MassHighway, the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority, the MBTA, Massport, the Massachusetts Aeronautics Commission, the Registry of Motor Vehicles and the Massachusetts Association of Regional Transit Authorities.
Under the terms of the compact, the agencies will meet once a month and establish working groups to find ways to improve transportation infrastructure needs.
Why it was necessary to finally prod the agencies into cooperation, after years of hiding out in their own separate "silos," with a not-so-subtle executive kick in the rear, is something Cohen admits he doesn't know.
Respecting the authorities
"It doesn't sound like it would be rocket science, but it actually was," Orsino said.
Jim Reger, chairman of the board of the Construction Industries of Massachusetts in Norwood and president of PJ Keating Co., a highway contractor based in Lunenburg, blamed past non-cooperation on political loyalties.
Reger said he agrees with Secretary Cohen's strategy of focusing on what responsibilities and resources can be shared, rather than on delegating project priority, if only to avoid angering some agencies whose projects might otherwise be placed on a state backburner.
"To have one of their projects put on the backburner won't go over well," Reger said of a proposal to create a prioritized list of projects, and its potential effects. "Instead, working on central themes will develop trust among the agencies as they work on solving common problems."
Cohen said the goal of the compact is not to take authority from any of the nine agencies it seeks to bring together, but rather to give each group an opportunity to learn from one another, to increase efficiency, and ultimately to improve transportation.
For now, Cohen said, he is content to keep all nine agencies at least talking to one another, something apparently inconceivable in previous administrations. Cohen said he hopes the inevitable jurisdictional squabbling between agencies will actually be productive, and not just provide another forum for finger-pointing and passing the buck.
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