Thursday, May 14, 2009

DCR Presentation; BU Bridge “Repairs”, Bridges to be Removed from them?

Bob reports.

On Wednesday afternoon, May 13, I attended a meeting of the “Regional Transportation Advisory Council” at the Transportation Building in Park Square, Boston.

Representatives of the Department of Conservation and Recreation made a presentation on their Parkway and Bridge Program.

They stated that the BU Bridge repair contract is anticipated to be awarded by June 3 for work starting July 4.

They showed a map of the project which included the irresponsibly located staging as previously reported. The most important part of the map from an environmental perspective was that the portion of the goose meadow which they did not intend to further destroy this time is marked something like “Geese Protection Area.”

This is the department which goes out of its way to destroy as much wildlife as it can get away with on the Charles River between the Harbor and the Watertown Dam.

This is the department which has spent nearly ten years promising no intent to harm the Charles River White Geese and then explaining that starving them is not harming them, followed by bragging about starving them.

This is the department which has timed the work around the BU Bridge to maximize harm to the Charles River White Geese.

This is the department which has, starting in 2004, destroyed all ground vegetation between the BU Bridge and the BU Boathouse except for the vegetation which they propose to destroy as part of this project.

The “Geese Protection Area” is a DCR created mudpit, with all previously undestroyed ground vegetation destroyed as part of this project, half of the destruction for staging which is unnecessary in that location and highly appropriate for under the nearby Memorial Drive overpass.

Featured very prominently in their presentation was a photo of the EMPTY but very beautiful Ebersol Fields near Massachusetts General Hospital. Ebersol Fields is the prototype of the outrage going on on Magazine Beach. Ebersol Fields, as a byproduct, has created poisoning of the Charles River with annually recurrent algae infestation. The DCR tossed on Tartan when their beloved poisons were not sufficiently destructive to pests at Ebersol Field. The DCR, like the City of Cambridge, is offended by GREEN maintenance which has existed on the Charles River for the better part of the last century.

The DCR also commented on pending legislation to destroy responsibilities of the DCR.

Based on their presentation, it would appear that all of the actors in the State House support taking away bridge responsibilities from the DCR. The DCR hopes that they will be allowed to finish the Bridge Repair projects.

Based on their presentation, there appears to be a difference of opinion as to whether parkways should be taken away from the DCR. One of the projects the DCR continued to push in their presentation would needlessly destroy hundreds of healthy trees between the Longfellow Bridge and Magazine Beach.

The DCR’s sycophants brag that Memorial Drive will look terrific in 40 years.

This entity fits very well with the City of Cambridge.

Reprehensible is an excellent word.

*************

The above report has been posted for the governor.