It’s still difficult to get rid of the image. Last February, firefighters in ice rescue suits pulled six passengers and the operator onto an inflatable sled after a Mattapan Line trolley became stuck in floodwater due to the Neponset River overflowing whatever line engineers had previously trusted. It appeared more like a scene from somewhere else—somewhere the T was never meant to resemble—than a transit incident. And yet, there it was in Milton on a Tuesday.
The MBTA’s new Resilience Roadmap, the organization’s first-ever systemwide climate plan, is likely motivated more by that image than by any policy document. The contents read like an admission, but it arrived on Thursday in the measured language that transit agencies typically prefer. Officials admitted that a large portion of the network was just not designed for the current weather conditions in Boston. The state’s energy and environmental secretary, Rebecca Tepper, put it simply: heat waves, more frequent storms, and heavier rainfall. circumstances that result in damage, flooding, and service interruptions, she said. Reading the plan gives the impression that the agency has finally stopped portraying extreme weather as the exception.
The specificity of the vulnerabilities listed is unsettling. In July, the nation’s oldest subway line, the Green Line tunnels, can transform into something akin to a sauna. The Orient Heights Yard in East Boston, North Station, and portions of the Blue Line tunnels have all been identified as potential flood hazards due to storm surge or rising sea levels. Access to the Long Wharf Ferry Terminal may be completely cut off. The list also includes North Shore bus facilities and RIDE paratransit garages. One of the reasons it is more difficult to solve is that it is not just a coastal issue. A commuter rail culvert far from the ocean was washed out by the 2023 storm that dumped 9.5 inches on Leominster in a 24-hour period.
Depending on how you count, about three-quarters of the thirty new strategies the MBTA identified are scheduled for the next five years, which is either ambitious or past due. The agency made it clear that the power system and tunnels are the top priorities, stating that any problems there would have the biggest impact.
The Blue Line’s Airport portal will soon have hinged portal doors. This type of unglamorous, physical infrastructure doesn’t make news until it malfunctions. Bus shelters designed to protect passengers from heat and rain have already received fifteen million dollars. Ten million will be used to upgrade the Blue Line pump room. The flood protection at that airport tunnel portal was designed with a million dollars from a ResilientMass grant. The plan repeatedly highlights the need for ongoing funding, which is a polite way of saying that nothing has been paid for yet.
It’s difficult to ignore how much of the document is speculative and forward-looking. According to the state’s 2022 Climate Change Assessment, Massachusetts summers will resemble those in New York by 2030, Maryland by 2050, and Georgia by 2090. By 2030, there may be four times as many ninety-degree days in Greater Boston. Tracks are warped by heat. Signals are jumbled by it. You can imagine engineers staring at a system built for a different century as the MBTA claims to install cooling equipment for signals and increase shade at high-exposure stops.
The MBTA’s general manager and acting state transportation secretary, Phillip Eng, described it as proactive work—a phrase used by officials to avoid sounding alarmed. The actual plan is more open. The statement, “This work will not be accomplished overnight,” strikes a different chord after witnessing a trolley operator being transported on an ice rescue sled from his own train. Open questions include whether the funding will continue, whether the political will endures beyond news cycles, and whether the next storm is just waiting for the doors to be installed. Infrastructure promises have been made in New England before. Whether the pace will coincide with the weather this time is still up in the air.
