Statement from Representative Driscoll on MassDOT's Route 28/Chickatawbut Rd Public Information

MILTON, JUL. 25 - Thank you to all of the neighbors, community members, town officials and electeds who attended the MassDOT presentation this week regarding Route 28 (Randolph Ave) and Chickatawbut Rd. I appreciate MassDOT's efforts to design a safer intersection and for holding a public meeting ahead of bringing a formal 25% design to the table. However, I have serious concerns that this once 'expedited project' now has a start date that is suddenly and paradoxically being pushed years into the future.

There is an undisputed urgent need for action at this dangerous intersection. I can accept that design changes take time to refine with our community and should. I can accept that a construction project will take time to complete, a year or more. What is unacceptable is that MassDOT has continued to push out the project start date by years each time we have met with them in recent months.

During this week's meeting, I was surprised to hear of MassDOT's opinion that this project will move further out on the calendar to perhaps 2023. This news comes when last year it was 'expedited and programmed' for 2020. In 2017 I worked with Select Board members and our town administrator to successfully make the case for a 2019 start date. There ended up being a reasonable excuse to delay until 2020 and we accepted MassDOT's explanation. Fast forward to this week and to even hint at further change in timeline is in my book unacceptable, and I will hold MassDOT accountable for keeping this as an expedited project. It is from their own account the seventh worst intersection in Massachusetts and deserving of millions of dollars worth of fixes in order to improve safety and save lives.

I will continue to support MassDOT and the town of Milton in any way I can, so that this intersection and the rest of the problematic Route 28/Randolph Ave corridor gets the attention and resources it deserves to keep our neighbors and neighborhoods safe.