Re: T construction news
The key to understanding the T is to always keep in mind that it's about the jobs, not the job. The #1 goal in these projects isn't to get people from A to B more efficiently, or to manage costs effectively - these are secondary goals. The primary goal is to employ people.
Every single T project that I can think of has missed its stated completion date by months, and in many cases, years. This is true of the Red Line station refurbishments, the Green Line re-do at North Station, even the simple (and silly) kiosks on the Silver Line bus route on Washington Street. Under Grabauskas, there seems to have been an effort to "manage" this process by projecting completion dates that are amazingly unambitious and also vague (they now refer to seasons rather than specific months). For example, the Arlington Street Station rehab was projected for completion in "Spring 2009" - meaning it will take two full years to rehab platforms, drop an elevator shaft, and re-do a station entrance that has been closed while the "construction" has been going on. Will they make even this laughable deadline? I doubt it. You'd need time lapse photography to measure any progress at that or any other T construction site, while huge buildings are completed left and right.
Any taxpayer with a project management bent can look at this and be infuriated - since we all know that costs and rework multiply as process times are needlessly extended in any "manufacturing" activity. But again, that's not the point.
The T's next "big project" is the $1 billion "Little Dig" to connect the Silver Line bus routes with a tunnel from South Station to Boylston Station and onward to a portal near Tremont Street and Marginal Road. Half of this tunnel will be at least marginally useful, if very expensive, by connecting the airport bus to the Orange and Green lines. But the portal to connect to Washington Street is of minimal/no use ... the T has admitted that travel times from Dudley Square to downtown won't decrease at all versus the current traffic-clogged ride, because the underground route is circuitous and bus speeds are highly constrained.
Unsurprisingly, there isn't much enthusiasm amongst the public for this project. But the construction trades love it.