BOSTON — The Trump administration has rescinded a $327 million grant awarded in 2023 or the Allston Multimodal Project, which calls for realignment of Interstate 90 and a new Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority commuter rail station and layover facility, among other features.
The funding termination follows President Donald Trump’s signing of a bill that eliminated the Neighborhood Access and Equity Program, the Department of Transportation program that sought to address physical barriers that isolated communities and improve transportation in underserved communities. The DOT has deleted a program fact sheet from its website, but some information is available in this 2022 document explaining the then-new program.
The Massachusetts Department of Transportation received confirmation of the termination late last week, leading Gov. Maura Healey to call for its restoration.
“Why would any President of the United States oppose a project that will improve transportation for residents and visitors alike, create thousands of construction jobs, support local businesses and create space for new housing? We all benefit from that,” Healey said in a statement on Friday (June 18, 2025). “The people of Massachusetts deserve better from their federal government.” Healey said the state remained committed to do everything it can to continue the project. State Transportation Secretary Monica Tibbits-Nutt said the state would undertake a strategic review “both analyzing the project costs and consulting with an outside engineering firm to assess the project.”
The project would see creation of a new “West Station” on the MBTA’s Worcester/Framingham line in the neighborhood west of downtown Boston, bordered by the Charles River on the north and the Boston neighborhoods of Fenway, Kenmore, and Brighton. There would also be an adjacent layover facility, the nature of which was still subject of some debate earlier this year. Other roadway realignments and pedestrian and bike routes are also part of the plan.
A fact sheet on the Allston project is available here; this web page has additional information.
Maybe that freeway shouldn’t have been built in the first place, Mr. Landey. It’s not a secret that freeways were often build through poor neighborhoods populated by people of color. Claiming that wasn’t true is just white supremacy in action. Why did black people always have to pay the price for having their neighborhoods destroyed by freeways?
Europe has lots of super highways, but they don’t go into the centers of cities. We just decided that was A-OK because it was just poor people.
And once again, you’re commenting on something that you ADMIT you don’t know anything about. Maybe you should stop doing that. If you’re not sure or don’t have enough information, maybe not commenting is better.
It might work.
Project would have been well underway if the state didn’t drag their feet so long deciding that putting everything at ground level was the best solution. Also the absolute refusal to infringe a tiny bit into the Charles River at its widest part which would have resolved a lot of the width issues.
This is the former CSX Beacon Park Yard.
This project helps transit fluidity in Boston and in MA. I don’t see how it fixes much at the Federal level or interstate transit. So yes this should be a state project. Even more so, $300 million is well within the limits of state financing.
Sorry, but infrastructure week is over. Here’s what was in store earlier this year.
Infrastructure Week 2025 took place from May 12 to 16, focusing on the importance of investing in the nation’s infrastructure, including roads, bridges, and energy systems. The theme was “Stronger Infrastructure, Stronger Nation: Innovate, Secure, Compete,” highlighting the need for significant investment and reform in infrastructure projects across the country.
If the Allston project is worthy it should be funded under some other program. I can tell you why NEAP is political BS and needed to be 86’ed by the Republicans. NEAP is divisive political nonsense of the worst kind.
The lie has been told a hundred thousand times (I read it in a Detroit newspaper online as recently as yesterday) that Detroit’s I-375 Walter P. Chrysler Freeway is a racist abomination and needs to be removed to heal a racial wound from the 1960’s. In fact, I-375, routed along the former Hastings Street, is a freeway that like any other freeway had to be put somewhere and thus resulted in homes and businesses being demolished. Look at any map of Detroit and tell me where the Chrysler could have been built with a lower neighborhood impact if not along the former Hastings Street.
Going back to Boston, I’m not familiar with Allston Brighton and I don’t know the details of this project. I can’t say how necessary it is. If the people of Boston want it all that badly, find some other way to pay for it.
Is it because it benefits Harvard? Humm……..
Shenanigans