Following extensive problems on the MBTA during the recent winter storms, and advocacy group is calling on state government to commit more money to transportation. Governor Charlie Baker says he’s ready to start boosting that funding in his new budget.
Kristina Egan walked into Stanley Rosenberg’s office in the State House on Wednesday.
“I’m here to drop of a petition for the Senate President.”
Egan directs a broad coalition of organizations called Transportation for Massachusetts.
“It’s 12,000 very frustrated commuters. I’m sure you’re one as well. A they’re calling for safe and reliable transportation.”
Egan acknowledges that’s going to cost a lot of money.
“We learned that the T has a backlog of almost $7 billion just to maintain what we have, and we know we have about $4 billion worth of bridges that need to be upgraded. So we know it will literally take billions of dollars to fix this problem.”
Governor Charlie Baker has appointed an expert panel to look into the problems the MBTA ran into during the winter storms. But he’s not waiting for their recommendations to start providing more money. In his newly released budget, he’s proposing a 20 percent increase in overall transportation funding, including a $65 million boost for the MBTA. Baker says that’s not a blank check.
“That’s a place holder. And form our point of view we’re going to wait and see what comes out of our panel of experts’ recommendations. But we certainly didn’t want to go into that process without an adequately funded MBTA to begin with.”
Baker says his transportation panel should issue its reform plan for the T by the end of March.
