Former Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis. | AP Photo/Steven Senne Backers, including Dukakis, worried about future of North-South rail link Former governor doubts DOT's commitment to project

BOSTON -—The North-South rail link remains in limbo with no set timeline to study the proposal, leading backers to wonder if the Department of Transportation is trying to kill the project.

Members of the North-South Rail Link working group, which is calling for the construction of a rail link connecting Boston’s North and South stations, continue to push for action from Gov. Charlie Baker's administration. The administration says more details are needed to undertake a key study necessary to move the project forward.


“We’re going to do an environmental impact review and then see what it tells us,” Baker said recently following remarks at a Massachusetts Taxpayer Foundation forum on transportation.

This winter, MassDOT agreed to a $2 million feasibility study for the rail proposal, but so far, things have remained stalled until backers and MassDOT agree on the project’s scope, according to transportation secretary Stephanie Pollack, who also presented at the transit forum. Once that scope is determined, MassDOT will use it to hire a consultant to look into the proposal.

When asked about a timeline, Pollack was opaque.

“We’re meeting with [former] Governor Dukakis and other folks who are advocates for it and as soon as we can agree on the most important questions that the folks want answered, we’ll get back," she said.

“I think the challenge for this feasibility study is that we have the $2 million that were authorized and honestly people have probably given us 20 million or 50 million dollars worth of ideas,” Pollack continued.

Many of those ideas have come from the North-South Rail Link Working Group, led by a pair of former governors, Dukakis and Bill Weld, as it continues its push to keep the proposal at the forefront of the Baker administration’s agenda — and a battle against what U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton and others assert is a push by MassDOT to kill the project.

“We’re concerned about the quality of the study. We want an impartial study,” Moulton told POLITICO Massachusetts. “We heard from sources inside MassDOT that they’re trying to scuttle it. What we’ve been told is that there are some people who for no explainable reason seem to be ideologically opposed.”

Monday's monthly rail link working group meeting will convene what Moulton bills as a gathering of the world’s top tunneling experts at the State House.

The hope, backers say, is for Baker and MassDOT to realize that despite what they call overblown project cost estimates, this will not be another Big Dig.

“I think the governor is getting bad advice at MassDOT, who have never been enthusiastic about this project,” said Dukakis. “I think a lot of this has to do with what happened with the Big Dig. This is a very different project.”

“There has been a lot of misinformation,” which has “definitely” included “some inflated costs," Moulton said. Initial estimates put an $8 billion price tag on the rail link. Moulton and Dukakis estimate that number is closer to $2 billion.

Moulton and Dukakis declined to go into detail about MassDOT’s supposesd opposition to the project.

Asked to comment on statements by Moulton and Dukakis, Pollack said in a statement that she is "looking forward to meeting with former Governor Dukakis soon on the scope of this issue."

Backers are warily watching a proposal to expand South Station by seven rail lines. Based on the limited real estate, they say, the projects cannot coexist. Baker has expressed support for the $1.6 billion proposal. Backers of the rail link project, including Dukakis, say the work is made more urgent by a planned expansion of South Station, which they argue would kill the possibility of the rail link project. Baker has said he's not convinced by that particular argument.

Since its creation in September, the working group has continued monthly meetings at the State House, connecting interested legislators, local mayors, and business groups with further details about the project.

“We’re looking for an administration that understands how important this is,” Dukakis said. “We’ve got to go to work, complete that study, and, I hope, proceed with the project.”

