Transportation

Legislative action to launch a long-sought passenger rail extension into western Massachusetts "certainly is being considered" among a growing to-do list, Senate President Karen Spilka said Monday, though the exact steps Beacon Hill will take remain unclear with less than eight weeks left for formal lawmaking business.

House and Senate leaders have ruled out a suspension of the state's gas tax, but House Speaker Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka both said Monday that their chambers are busy crafting relief packages that will aim to help residents feeling the pain of inflation and/or COVID-19.

Webster Plaza, a two-building, 70,600-square-foot retail strip in Webster, sold for $5.3 million, according to a Thursday press release from NAI Glickman Kovago & Jacobs, the Worcester real estate agency which brokered the sale.

C&R Tire, a family-owned tire dealer and auto repair shop based in Worcester and Sturbridge, was acquired by Sullivan Tire and Auto Service, the companies announced May 2.

The MBTA Commuter Rail’s express train from Worcester to Boston will begin running again after being closed for roughly two years due to the coronavirus pandemic, the MBTA announced Tuesday.

A New York-based rail system construction company has been fined $220,000 to resolve allegations it failed to pay proper overtime rates to workers on public works projects in Framingham, Cape Cod, and the Berkshires, the Massachusetts Office of the Attorney General announced Tuesday.

Massachusetts’ average gas price hit a new record high after rising 18 cents in a week to $4.39 per gallon of regular unleaded, according to a Monday press release from travel association AAA Northeast.

Durham School Services, an Illinois-based bus-driving company which previously worked with the Worcester Public Schools, will see 181 layoffs in June due to WPS’s vote last year to end its partnership with the firm.

Worcester Business Journal began listing the most influential people in the Central Massachusetts economy in 2013, using various iterations of the concept to arrive at the Power 50, which started in 2018.

The Power 50 may not necessarily hold the most power in the region, but they are the people who most effectively wielded their power to have an outsized influence on the economy and the community within the last year.