Funding for path in danger
Published on August 6th, 2003
STONEHAM, MA - The future funding for the 6.5 mile Tri-Community recreation trail that will run through Stoneham, Woburn, and Winchester could be in jeopardy.
According to Stoneham resident Cameron Bain, who sits on the Town’s Bike-Path Committee, the Commonwealth will now decide the fate of nearly 60 trail projects across the state.
“The funding has been restored but they’re [the US House of Representatives] allowing the states to determine how to spend it. I’m confident we can keep the money coming into our coffers,” remarked Bain.
According to a New England representative for Rails to Trails Conservancy, a national non-profit organization that lobbies for recreation trails along preexisting rail-road right of ways, a July 11 vote by the Transportation and Treasury Subcommittee of the US House Appropriations Committee eliminated all federal funding for Rail-Trail projects in the United States.
“What happened in Congress is Ernest Istook [Oklahoma’s Republican Chairman of the Subcommittee] zeroed out the account known as transportation enhancements. One of the uses of that account is rail-trail uses,” explained Craig Della Penna.
“However after a huge public outcry across the nation...instead they made it flexible to allow the states to opt in or opt out of whether they want to spend the money for the program,” Della Penna added.
In a July 24 attempt to force US states to spend their transportation enhancement appropriations on the rail-trail projects, US House Democrat John Olver of Amherst, MA attempted to pass an amendment to restore the funding.
“Congressman Olver put in an amendment that restored funding to the historic levels it had been before and tried to force [the states] to not opt out of it. That amendment was narrowly defeated this last couple of weeks,” remarked Della Penna, who added that Olver will again attempt to pass the amendment after Congress’ August recess.
However, while Della Penna insists that the Tri-Community trail won’t be built if the State chooses not to fund the project, Bain disagrees.
“We’d just have to find other sources of funding. We started with this so we’d like to continue with it. But if it goes south, we’ll find other sources,” explained Bain, who still remains optimistic that the State will fund the project.
Thus far, nearly $1.2 million has been committed for the construction of the trail. $180,000 has also been set aside for the preliminary design of the trail as well, says Bain. However, the Town can’t receive the money until all lands for the project have been purchased
“We don’t have any money right now because we haven’t acquired all the land. I’d say we’d be able to get the $1.2 million and the $180,000 once we have the land,” predicted Bain, referring to 900 feet of land near Maple Street’s railroad tracks.
While the Tri-Community project is often depicted as a bike-path, Bain stated that pedestrians, rollerbladers, and joggers would all utilize the trail.
“There’s a lot to this. It’s not just a bike trail. There’s been a lot of study done to cater to health, safety, and transportation needs. About 35 percent of the use on these trails are mothers with strollers, rollerbladers and just plain walkers...It’s a way to get people out of their car seats and into a daily 30-minute exercise routine,” explained Bain.
Perhaps the most difficult aspect of the path’s construction, sections of the Winchester portion of the trail will be tunnelled underneath active railroad tracks. To accomplish this feat, developers will utlize the same methods employed to create Boston’s Big Dig.
“It’s going to be very nice in Winchester in particular. Winchester will be using a process known as jacking to chew a tunnel underneath the rail road tracks that are still in operation,” boasted Bain.
According to Della Penna, because Massachusetts will annually receive nearly $400 million in federal funding for highway and transportation projects regardless of the State’s fiscal climate, officials should appropriate the money for the rail-trail projects.
“There’s always going to be $400 million committed to Massachusetts. It doesn’t have anything to do with the fiscal climate. It’s not like they’re going to say, ‘oh the budget’s bad, so we’re not going to fix the roads.’ It has no bearing whatsoever on the State’s yearly budget,” remarked Della Penna.
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