Rusty Green Line Train

A rusty Green Line train idles at Lechmere Station in January 2014.

(Garrett Quinn, MassLive)

BOSTON -- The MBTA's troubled Green Line extension project needs to win back credibility from the federal agency that was set to deliver nearly half its funding before major cost overruns forced the city to scale back the work, project leader Jack Wright said Monday.

The Green Line extension was originally supposed to cost $1.99 billion. But after a new estimate found the budget ballooning to nearly $3 billion, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation approved a scaled-down, $2.29 billion proposal that reduced track extensions, simplified station plans and limited ambitions for proposed bike paths and pedestrian walkways.

The budget changes also appeared to catch the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Transportation Administration unawares, Wright told MassDOT Board of Directors during a meeting Monday.

"It's hard to speak for them, but they certainly expressed that they were caught by surprise when the project was headed as high as it was," Wright said in response to a question by MassDOT board member Joseph Sullivan. "They struggled with that issue."



The project had been approved for $996 million in FTA funding, but now has to go through a new submission process due to the cost-cutting redesign.

The FTA did not return a request for comment prior to publication.

Preliminary work is continuing on the project, though is largely limited to funding already allocated as the federal money needed to complete the extension will not start flowing until the FTA reconsiders this fall, Wright said.

Weston and Sampson, the engineering firm leading the project, has had its contract extended by a month until July 31. Design firms AECOM and HNTB will continue to be paid through $2 million already earmarked for the extension until federal funding comes through.

Wright said the project team has been in constant contact with the FTA, and is working with them to reach agreement on work timeline and staffing guidelines. His team is also working to implement stronger financial controls, he said.

The project includes 4.5 miles of new Green Line track in East Cambridge, Somerville and Medford.

The state committed to building the Green Line Extension as part of a mitigation agreement when the Big Dig was built 25 years ago. At a May meeting discussing the scaled-back plan, residents and officials from Cambridge and Somerville voiced support for expanded rail service in their neighborhoods.

Republican staff reporter Shira Schoenberg contributed to this story.