Congress pulls the plug on $327 million for Allston megaproject. So what's next?

Boston Globe

5 days ago

This funding cut wasn't much of a surprise. The Trump administration is on the warpath to clear out any 'equity' related programs left over from President Biden. And Republicans in Congress were eager for savings to help make a bevy of tax cuts permanent in their 'Big Beautiful Bill.' So a target had been on this funding source, known as the Neighborhood Access and Equity Grant Program, for months.
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It still hurt to see what's left of this infrastructure program — nearly $2.5 billion awarded but still unspent, per national nonprofit Smart Growth America's accounting — now zeroed out entirely.
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The MassDOT brass already had to make do with two-thirds of the federal grant funds they had initially hoped for — a shortfall that Governor Maura Healey highlighted in January. Now, there will be more scrambling at Ten Park Plaza.
So now, it's time for a backup plan. MassDOT will take two important steps to readjust. They'll embark on an in-depth cost analysis, in part to understand recent impacts from tariffs and inflation such as steel costs. That study would be paired with an independent engineering analysis about how to maximize the project's transportation benefits with the remaining available funding sources.
These are logical next steps, and now they're likely necessary for the project's survival.
So what kind of funding gap are we talking about? That's still not entirely clear.
When asked for a breakdown of where the $2 billion would come from, state officials offered elements from the original federal grant application, including $200 million in toll revenue and $100 million from the city of Boston. Harvard University, which owns most of the old Beacon Park Yard land that would be opened up, would kick in $90 million, while Boston University, whose campus is next door, would contribute $10 million. Harvard and the city of Boston would also provide another $100 million, to be collected from future development there.
In January, Healey said she would ask the Legislature for approval to use $615 million in borrowed funds, collected through bonds based on the better-than-expected money flow from the so-called millionaires tax, also known as Fair Share funds.
That only gets MassDOT halfway there. In its federal grant application, the state agency signaled it would borrow another $470 million from a federal highway loan program known as TIFIA. It's unclear, though, exactly how much would be available, though US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has pledged to increase the maximum amount in financing available to many projects.
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Project advocates hope the Healey administration can pick up more of the slack — maybe through a TIFIA loan, for example, or more Fair Share funds. State officials aren't entertaining this idea right now, at least not openly. Instead, the word is out that it might be time to get more frugal.
Tensions have simmered in Allston for years around just how long it's taken MassDOT to get this far in the planning. It was Governor Deval Patrick, after all, who first promised this new transit hub, dubbed West Station, alongside the turnpike realignment, 11 years ago. Back then, both projects' price tags were a fraction of what they are today.
Plans got waylaid during Governor Charlie Baker's administration over the so-called 'Throat' area, a narrow band of land between the train tracks and the Charles River. MassDOT finally settled on keeping all highway lanes on the ground through the area, in part to make it easier to develop on decks above them.
By the time MassDOT landed the $335 million federal grant in March of last year, Healey was governor and Joe Biden was in the White House. Healey said then that she hoped for a 2027 groundbreaking; her transportation secretary Monica Tibbits-Nutt hoped environmental permitting could be done within a year.
The former goal just became much tougher to achieve. The latter, now impossible.
Healey hired transportation veteran Luisa Paiewonsky last year, to shepherd the Allston project (along with the hoped-for new bridges over the Cape Cod Canal). Toward that end, Paiewonsky has held monthly task force meetings to update the community and solicit feedback.
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Lately, the big debate has been over layover. The plans call for four tracks to park trains at West Station, to accommodate future cross-state service, despite a promise there wouldn't be any. Allston neighbors prefer trains to be parked elsewhere, as does Mayor Michelle Wu. Harvard doesn't want layover, either, and has drawn up preliminary designs for housing to show how its land could be put to better use.
All eyes are on Widett Circle, a 24-acre industrial area just south of downtown that the MBTA acquired two years ago. However, the T says it needs all the space for its own layover tracks, as soon as possible, because of an existing shortage and plans to expand the commuter rail fleet. The T plans to build the first six tracks by 2028, to support electric trains coming to the Fairmount line, and the other 20 would go in over the following seven years.
MassDOT is working with the Wu administration to find a new spot that could work for layover —the public works yard next to Widett, perhaps? For now, it remains a disliked part of the state's Allston plans.
Other issues remain up in the air: what to do about a temporary closing of the train bridge over the Charles, for example, and how to lessen the project's impact on the river itself.
And when the task force reconvenes next week, everyone involved faces the most important of unresolved issues: how to pay for it all.
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Jon Chesto can be reached at