WESTERN MASS. – The state senator who has led the effort to establish East-West passenger rail believes the now $300 million in a bond bill is “a down payment to keep the momentum on the project.”

State Sen. Eric Lesser, currently campaigning for lieutenant governor, told Reminder Publishing the $300 million being considering by the House is “not the final number” for the state’s contribution towards the development and construction of the rail project.

The $300 million would signal the federal government about the state’s intentions toward the project, he added.

He emphasized this amount is not a line item in the state budget.
“Generally, I consider this as positive news,” he said.
Chris Lisinski of the State House News Service reported the following about the house action:

Combined with the $50 million the Legislature included for East-West Rail in a 2020 transportation bond bill, that language would put $300 million on the table for a long-sought project whose prospects improved this spring when Baker and the state’s congressional delegation announced they had agreed to a “path forward” using a new federal infrastructure law as a springboard.

But the House bill stops short of fulfilling Congressman Richard Neal’s call for the Legislature to create a brand-new public agency to oversee rail service in Western Massachusetts.

Instead, the legislation proposes creating a new commission to examine whether Massachusetts actually needs a new rail authority or could task an existing entity – perhaps the MBTA (Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority) – with building and operating the rail expansion.

The bill would give one seat on the panel to the transportation secretary, three each to be filled by the House speaker and Senate president, one for the MBTA general manager or a designee, one for UMass Amherst’s chancellor or a representative and one to be selected by the chair of the Western Mass. Economic Development Council. The commission would face a Dec. 31 deadline to file a report.

House Speaker Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka said in their joint statement they are still working through questions about “the oversight structure, capital and operational funding and the preferred route alternatives needed for the success of East-West rail.”

“None of this has ever been really discussed,” Spilka later told reporters. “We need to know what is going to be a real part of that rail, how would it work, and what do we need to do to support it.”

A Department of Transportation study in 2020 forecast that extending passenger rail from its current endpoint in Worcester to Palmer, Springfield, Chester and Pittsfield would cost between $2.4 billion and $4.6 billion while attracting hundreds of thousands of riders per year.