Worceser, mdass., residents wary of CSX yard expansion

Written by jrood

Residents in the area of the CSX Transportation freight yard on Franklin Street in Worcester, Mass., made it clear at a meeting they are not looking to fight the company's plans to more than double the size of its facility, but they emphasized they want to have some say in those plans to mitigate potential negative impacts to their neighborhood, the Worcester Telegram reports.

In particular, the biggest
concerns they raised were with the planned closing of Putnam Lane, which
connects Franklin Street to Shrewsbury Street, and the construction of a
freight yard maintenance building at the end of Atlanta Street. Residents
contend those two actions would put more traffic on Plantation Street, which
already has traffic issues of its own.

"This is a great project
for the city and I hope it happens, but it is not a very good project for the
neighborhood it will impact," said Joseph Capone, a property owner on Franklin
Street. "The closing of Putnam Lane will have a major impact to our
neighborhood and the construction of the maintenance building will put a lot
more vehicles on Atlanta Street, which is strictly a residential neighborhood."

More than 50 people,
including eight of the 11 city councilors, attended last night’s public hearing
on the CSXT plans, held by the City Council Public Works and Public Service and
Transportation committees.

The $100-million project is
part of a private-public partnership between the state and CSXT to reposition
its freight operations in Massachusetts, so the rail line between Worcester and
Boston can be opened to more commuter trains, with a goal of adding 20 more
commuter trains between Worcester and Boston by 2012, according to Jamey L.
Tesler of the state Department of Transportation.

CSXT has long operated a
freight yard in the Franklin Street area, just east of Interstate 290. About
400 trucks per day enter and exit the 23-acre facility. But because CSXT will
be moving its main freight operations out of its Beacon Park yards in the
Allston section of Boston, the company needs to reposition its freight activity
at existing rail yards it has in Central and Western Massachusetts.

Maurice O’Connell, vice
president of government affairs for CSXT, said the company wants to expand its
freight facility in Worcester by another 28 acres, boosting it to 51 acres,
making the city its new freight hub for New England.

District 2 Councilor Philip
P. Palmieri, whose district includes the freight yard, said no project in
recent memory is as important as this one. He said he hopes it can be completed
in a way that makes everyone happy. But he pointed out that the proposed
closing of Putnam Lane is a "very big issue." With its closing, he said, there
will no longer be any roadway connection between Franklin and Shrewsbury streets,
from Union Station to Piccadilly Plaza on Shrewsbury Street.

O’Connell said the closing
of Putnam Lane is necessary so there can be additional track capacity to handle
the freight and commuter rail traffic coming into the terminal.

"If we’re not able to build
the additional capacity we need, the terminal doesn’t work and that would
affect the number of commuter trains that could run," he said.

But Leonard Ciuffredo,
president of the Brown Square Neighborhood Crime Watch, said the closure of Putnam
Lane would create another unwelcome "roadblock" in the East Side of the city.

"I support the project in
general because it will create much-needed jobs," Ciuffredo said. "It would
also be a better use than what exists there now. But we don’t want any more
roadblocks on the East Side. We’d like to see Putnam Lane kept open. We want to
work with you to keep that open."

Because the entrance/exit
of the freight yard would be shifted from Franklin Street to Grafton Street,
some residents of that area wanted assurances that trucks exiting the yard
would only be allowed to take a right turn so they could access Interstate 290
and not be allowed to take a left turn and travel on local streets.

CSXT officials said they
would be willing to go along with such a restriction.

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