After weeks of sharp criticism from city councilors and transit advocates over a slowdown in street infrastructure projects during her second term, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu is defending her approach, saying she wants more community input and consensus.
from city councilors and transit advocates over a slowdown in street infrastructure projects during her second term, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu is defending her approach, saying she wants more community input and consensus.
City councilors have questioned the mayor’s approach to street infrastructure in her second term and raised alarms about an estimated $200 million in state and federal funding that's on the line. In an interview with WBUR on Friday, Wu said her office is “well aware” of the timelines for projects that rely on state and federal funding. “We intend to use those dollars well, but it's not a tradeoff that we're willing to make, to prioritize speed instead of getting to the right design,” she said. Wu touted a project in the Seaport’s Fort Point neighborhood that she said is moving ahead. Work began earlier this year on aalong part of Congress Street, which has been updated to include features like protected bike lanes, elevated crosswalks and widened sidewalks. Initially proposed after the completion of the Big Dig, Wu said the project"has been a long time coming." "The bids have gone out, design is done, and now we are going to start seeing some of that on the street,” Wu said. But City Councilor Enrique Pepén, whose district includes Hyde Park, Mattapan, Readville and Roslindale, said he's been unable to get answers for constituents who want to know if their street is getting speed humps. Or what the timeline is for an overhaul slated for a portion of Hyde Park Avenue. “There’s been no clarity” from Wu or the city’s transportation department about street project plans, Pepén said in an interview."What can we expect so that we can give residents answers? And so that we don't lose funding for projects that are meant to be completed.” At a meeting Wednesday, City Council President Liz Breadon expressed concern over projects that have been"indefinitely paused," and her office warned the city could miss out on the estimated $200 million in state and federal grants if the city fails to meet project deadlines. Wu said her team is aware of the funding timeline for city projects, and has asked for extensions ahead of some deadlines as they seek more community feedback. And federal pandemic recovery funds awarded to the city “are all on track and on schedule to be spent." “We're always going to prioritize getting to the place that we need to be for all of our road users and then figure out the funding and how we make that happen,” she said.“We've seen with some of our recent projects and how we've been moving forward, that there's much more consensus that can be reached and also much better projects that result from it,” Wu said, acknowledging there won’t ever be a “perfect” project that makes all residents are happy. Boston installed miles of new bus and bike lanes, and hundreds of speed humps during Wu's first term. But that momentum waned during her reelection campaign after some residents and her chief rival, Josh Kraft, criticized the projects. Wu paused projects for a Reggie Ramos, executive director of the transit coalition Transportation for Massachusetts, said she's been frustrated by a lack of advancement for more than a dozen projects. “ It's a clear abandonment of the entire transportation agenda that the mayor ran on,” Ramos said. “Unfortunately we're stuck here, where we don't know where things are going.” Wu said she's committed to providing more options for residents to get around the city, whether by car, bike or public transit, "and we're going to do it in a way that prioritizes getting to streets that are calm, safe and beautiful and not chaotic and stressful.” Pepén said that for him, transportation safety is his"biggest priority” and he’d like to see a more detailed approach from the mayor’s office on her long-term vision for the city’s street infrastructure.Bike lanes are a hot topic in the race for Boston’s top office
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