USPS Complex | Fort Point

F-Line to Dudley said:
Lynch doesn't even sit on the relevant committees for transportation funding, so he's not in a position to "kill" it...he's just being a general-purpose sourpuss to a hot mic, as is his wont. Now...the fact that few local pols have even been able to articulate NSRL's benefits in non- ham-fisted fashion over the last 2 decades is a much larger structural problem. But Lynch (age 69) won't be around in office too many years longer to hold things back when we finally get our act together.
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I hear ya, but 69 ain't the end these days for established congressmen - - Lynch isn't getting primaried anytime in the next decade and a half. He'll be there. And, yes, while he doesn't have the committees position, at this point he's probably the most important Southie pol regarding federal dollars - - and particularly the ONLY Boston pol who could conceivably get some of the ear of this incoming administration. I can't see another Boston pol taking him on at this point to turn the tide on that subject. Him saying "no" buries it for now.

And yes, the current local pols really haven't been even partly adequate communicators regarding the import and long-term potential benefits of the NSRL. Throw in the public's ptsd from the Big Dig (the best long-term development since the Back Bay infill) and I share the pessimism of NSRL ever getting done in our lifetimes.
 
shmessy said:
I hear ya, but 69 ain't the end these days for established congressmen - - Lynch isn't getting primaried anytime in the next decade and a half. He'll be there. And, yes, while he doesn't have the committees position, at this point he's probably the most important Southie pol regarding federal dollars - - and particularly the ONLY Boston pol who could conceivably get some of the ear of this incoming administration.
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Really? Lynch is disliked enough in his own caucus for his ostentatious across-the-aisle toadying to the last Trump Admin. that he'd be a prime candidate for getting a primary challenger. Whether it'd be anyone worth voting for is anybody's guess, but if a much more popular (and party-loyal) rank-and-file Mass. Dem like Mike Capuano can fall to a primary challenger then a way past-his-prime unlikeable stick-in-the-mud like Lynch certainly can. And no, toadying up again to another incoming Trump Admin. is not going to burnish his cred with anyone. Not with his caucus, not with his voters. And much like last time he tried, not even with Trump's people.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Really? Lynch is disliked enough in his own caucus for his ostentatious across-the-aisle toadying to the last Trump Admin. that he'd be a prime candidate for getting a primary challenger. Whether it'd be anyone worth voting for is anybody's guess, but if a much more popular (and party-loyal) rank-and-file Mass. Dem like Mike Capuano can fall to a primary challenger then a way past-his-prime unlikeable stick-in-the-mud like Lynch certainly can. And no, toadying up again to another incoming Trump Admin. is not going to burnish his cred with anyone. Not with his caucus, not with his voters. And much like last time he tried, not even with Trump's people.
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I'm certainly no fan of his, but the only way Lynch is leaving is "toes up".

Stephen Lynch

Ballotpedia: The Encyclopedia of American Politics
ballotpedia.org ballotpedia.org

Democratic primary for U.S. House Massachusetts District 8​

Incumbent Stephen Lynch advanced from the Democratic primary for U.S. House Massachusetts District 8 on September 3, 2024.

Candidate%Votes
✔
Image of Stephen Lynch
Stephen Lynch
98.7		64,761
Other/Write-in votes
1.3		861
Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. SourceTotal votes: 65,622
D

Not saying he will have much sway with the new administration but 5% chance is more than 0%. Lynch got DeJoy to come and dine and meet - - after DeJoy told Markey, Warren, Neal, Pressley, Auchinclos, Moulton, etc. to pound sand regarding getting even a written explanation for the late deliveries recently. The fact that DeJoy even ventured to Boston to meet about this is one of the "man bites dog" stories of 2024.

It's a very very low bar. Boston is screwed with this new admin. Lynch might have a whisper. No other local pol does. Which is why Lynch burying the NSRL seems conclusive for now. There's really no coming back from that.

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shmessy said:
I'm certainly no fan of his, but the only way Lynch is leaving is "toes up".
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Nobody ran against him, that's the point. Of course he got 98% running unopposed. I have never once voted for him in a primary, but generally speaking, there is no other name on the ballot. There are a lot of people like me in the district who would very strongly consider supporting a challenger.
 
HenryAlan said:
Nobody ran against him, that's the point. Of course he got 98% running unopposed. I have never once voted for him in a primary, but generally speaking, there is no other name on the ballot. There are a lot of people like me in the district who would very strongly consider supporting a challenger.
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Yeah. I live in his district, and I've thrown my hands up in disgust and written in "Inanimate Carbon Rod" for the 8th District the last 2 elections.
 
shmessy said:
Did he lose? I'm missing this groundswell of opposition.......
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Dude...it was explained to you 1 post up by @HenryAlan. Nobody's losing an election where they run unopposed. There's literally nothing else to do except the write-in or not voting at all. And nobody's going to lose a partisan election in a D +29 state when they run unopposed in the primary. He has to draw a primary challenger to find out what "groundswell" may or may not exist.

Capuano found out about groundswells. And Lynch has done way less for the state in his 23+ years in the seat than Capuano did.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Dude...it was explained to you 1 post up by @HenryAlan. Nobody's losing an election where they run unopposed. There's literally nothing else to do except the write-in or not voting at all. And nobody's going to lose a partisan election in a D +29 state when they run unopposed in the primary. He has to draw a primary challenger to find out what "groundswell" may or may not exist.

Capuano found out about groundswells. And Lynch has done way less for the state in his 23+ years in the seat than Capuano did.
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"Dude", you write that as if running unopposed is a sign of weakness. The ONLY thing that is weak is any opposition to the guy.

Yes, no one loses an unopposed election - -Kim Jung On hasn’t lost yet either. So WHY was Lynch unopposed (in the primary, in the general he won by over 43%)???? Did they run out of Democrats in Southie?

The point isn’t whether or not he’s done any good. I can’t stand him either. The point is he is not going anywhere. If you have ANY evidence to the contrary I’d be enthusiastic to see it. I’d love to see him go.

Unfortunately, It is what it is.
 
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Probably the “best” hope would be MA losing a seat and finally redrawing the Southie district to be a little less hospitable to the old townie caucus.
 
RandomWalk said:
Probably the “best” hope would be MA losing a seat and finally redrawing the Southie district to be a little less hospitable to the old townie caucus.
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I’m not a fan of MA losing any more seats (though it seems inevitable).
 
RandomWalk said:
Probably the “best” hope would be MA losing a seat and finally redrawing the Southie district to be a little less hospitable to the old townie caucus.
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I would much rather have Lynch in the delegation than for the delegation to shrink. He isn't great by our local sensibilities, but he's still far better than somebody from a red state taking the lost Massachusetts seat.
 
I think my toddlers will be fully grown adults, pushing me around in a wheelchair by the time anything is built and open for business on this site.
 
God damn -- imagine if Dukakis were governor right now, in this moment, when transit and urbanist movements are on the rise, as opposed to the 80s, when suburbs uber alles was still the order of the day. He would totally transform this city.
 
BronsonShore said:
God damn -- imagine if Dukakis were governor right now, in this moment, when transit and urbanist movements are on the rise, as opposed to the 80s, when suburbs uber alles was still the order of the day. He would totally transform this city.
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Dukakis' message on NSRL is "suburbs uber alles". He has no concept about remaking Commuter Rail into a Regional Rail that links entirely new kinds of trips. His talking points are all about dumping suburbanites in the CBD same as status quo...only to a different station in the CBD. That's why so much of his bleating on NSRL is about "One-mile gap!" between North and South Stations as if the whole northside is clamoring to get off at South Station and Back Bay and the whole southside is clamoring to get off at North Station.

We need WAY better spokespeople for NSRL if it's ever to gain traction. The fact that Duke & Co.'s talking points have been very nearly the only ones heard in advocacy for NSRL over the last 20 years is why it's still such an abstract and hard-to-grasp concept that's going nowhere in the public's mind. The longer he's the standard-bearer for the project, the more it's going to be absolutely stuck. The messaging and messengers need to change whole-cloth.


And just because the talks have resumed for the USPS relocation doesn't mean that SSX is necessarily rising from the dead. SSX has been moribund for 8 years now thanks to two gubenatorial administrations' indifference to it. The current developments only mean that the real estate project that should never have been wadded up with the transportation project is advancing on its own. As it ideally should, because what gets built on the provisioned Dot Ave.-facing acreage has nothing to do with what those extra South Station tracks are doing. It was a tankapalooza effort by the Baker Administration to lard up all the real estate kingmaking dealings with the transportation project to distort the cost and enflame the squabbling transpo advocacies into expending all their energy beating up on each other. Mission freaking accomplished.

Maybe now that the pieces are being formally decoupled we can get a rational project valuation for the SSX transportation piece and what parts of it are truly needed instead of all this shrill all-or-nothing tribal sloganeering from people like Dukakis.
 
^^ I'd beg to differ. A rail link btw S Station and N Station creates a mass-transit connection for rail commuters for whom important parts of Downtown now require a car to get to. Anyone in Metrowest who works near S Station is currently going to drive into Boston, or get off their train at N Station and take an Uber. And vice versa for people who live along the S Station-terminating rail lines. The rail link enables significantly more mass transit (and removes cars) in one of the most congested parts of the city.

Expansion of the S Station train station gives ... what? The theoretical ability to expand train service to NYC? (Is the station really the rate-limiter of that today?) The theoretical ability to enable lots of trips around New England / regionally that don't currently exist? There again the rate-limiter isn't S Station capacity but building rail lines that don't currently exist, setting up service that doesn't exist, etc etc. And how much demand is there really for rail trips to Albany or Bangor? Given the requirement for big-ticket things other than S Station expansion to happen, it feels much less likely to drive anywhere near as much conversion of current-day car trips to mass transit as the NSRL will.
 
itchy said:
^^ I'd beg to differ. A rail link btw S Station and N Station creates a mass-transit connection for rail commuters for whom important parts of Downtown now require a car to get to. Anyone in Metrowest who works near S Station is currently going to drive into Boston, or get off their train at N Station and take an Uber. And vice versa for people who live along the S Station-terminating rail lines. The rail link enables significantly more mass transit (and removes cars) in one of the most congested parts of the city.
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Anecdotally disagree. Having used Commuter Rail into the city for 20 years and worked with lots of others who do as well, no one hops in a car after getting off at NS, SS, or BB. You walk or hop on the subway. And anyone who is driving in now isn't going to be convinced to use the CR because there's a new stop somewhere deep under State Street. I've never really understood the part of the NSRL argument claiming to benefit Boston workers. It wouldn't reduce the commute time or the need to either hop on the subway or walk to your final destination. Not sure about the pros/cons of SSX or the impact of NSRL on the New Yorkers who want to go to Maine, but if I was choosing between 10-20 billion spent on NSRL or more Blue/Green/Red/Orange the latter wins my vote.
 
Wonk said:
Anecdotally disagree. Having used Commuter Rail into the city for 20 years and worked with lots of others who do as well, no one hops in a car after getting off at NS, SS, or BB. You walk or hop on the subway. And anyone who is driving in now isn't going to be convinced to use the CR because there's a new stop somewhere deep under State Street. I've never really understood the part of the NSRL argument claiming to benefit Boston workers. It wouldn't reduce the commute time or the need to either hop on the subway or walk to your final destination. Not sure about the pros/cons of SSX or the impact of NSRL on the New Yorkers who want to go to Maine, but if I was choosing between 10-20 billion spent on NSRL or more Blue/Green/Red/Orange the latter wins my vote.
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The NSRL stop deep under State is more about connectivity to the Blue line than shuffling workers into that area. (Although admittedly that vertical connection may be poor and not worth the cost.)

Remember, Regional Rail is about much different usage patterns than conventional Commuter Rail 9-5 in/out to the burbs. It is getting people to use rail for a host of other trips enabled by better, frequent connectivity.
 
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