- Target:
- Boston Region Metropolitan Planning Organization (Boston MPO)
- Region:
- United States of America
- Website:
- www.facebook.com
On May 26, the Boston Region Metropolitan Planning Organization (Boston MPO) endorsed a plan that programs $21,034,382 to fully construct Phase 1 of the Belmont Community Path! This decision is described in the final Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) for Federal Fiscal Years 2023-27 (PDF: https://www.ctps.org/data/pdf/plans/TIP/FFYs-2023-2027-TIP.pdf; HTML: https://www.ctps.org/data/html/plans/TIP/FFYs-2023-2027-TIP/FFYs-2023-2027-TIP.html). In archiving this petition we are happy to note how much your support made a difference and share a brief update on what comes next.
Community support really makes a difference in public planning and is well documented in the TIP. On May 23, we shared information from the Public Signature List (name, town, comment) with the Boston MPO for the 707 people who had signed to date. The Boston MPO used 16 pages of the final TIP document (Table C-2) to document your outpouring of support. By the May 26 Boston MPO endorsement, the signature count reached 738. Thank you for signing the petition and making a difference!
You may be wondering what this funding decision means for actual construction. The Belmont Community Path funding was programmed in the TIP for Federal Fiscal Year (FFY) 2026, which begins on October 1, 2025. Construction could begin at that point. Each year the TIP is updated for a rolling five-year horizon. As part of that process, the Boston MPO reviews the status of all budgeted projects and updates the funding allocation timing accordingly. It is common that some projects are delayed, thus opening up funding in earlier fiscal years. If such an opportunity arises for FFY 2025 and project readiness allows, then funding for the Belmont Community Path could potentially move up one year. This means that construction could start in October 2024. The Friends of the Belmont Community Path will continue to track readiness and alert you if such an opportunity arises in spring of 2023.
For further updates, you can join the email list for the Friends of the Belmont Community Path by sending a request to belmontpath@gmail.com. We only send key updates and engagement notifications, which have historically been 2-3 times per year. You can also look for more dynamic updates by following the group’s Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/belmontcommunitypath).
The Boston Region Metropolitan Planning Organization (Boston MPO) has initially programmed $21,034,382 in fiscal year 2026 to fully construct Phase 1 of the Belmont Community Path. This decision is captured in the Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) for Federal Fiscal Years (FFYs) 2023-27 Draft for Public Review. Public comments are due by 5pm on May 23. In signing this petition, you will join others in providing formal public input by the deadline to endorse their decision to fund this project and to accelerate funding as future opportunity allows.
For more information, see the following sections of the TIP draft for public review (https://www.ctps.org/data/pdf/plans/TIP/FFYs-2023-2027-Draft-TIP-Public-Review.pdf):
Project description on page 3-70
Project impact in Table A-2
Project benefits in the summary of support letters in Table C-1
We, the undersigned, support full funding for Phase 1 construction of the Belmont Community Path (Project ID 609204) that was newly programmed in the Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) for Federal Fiscal Years (FFYs) 2023-27 Draft for Public Review dated May 2, 2022. The town has made consistent progress on project readiness. The path offers significant benefits to regional mobility and safe routes to school along with many other benefits such as those summarized in Table C-1 of the Draft FFYs 2023-27 TIP. On behalf of the increasing number of people accessing the regional network of off-road paths, the high number of middle and high school students seeking safer access to the Belmont campus via the commuter rail underpass, and many other future users of the Belmont Community Path, we ask you to retain this programmed funding when endorsing the final FFYs 2023-27 TIP and to accelerate funding to an earlier fiscal year in future TIP development as opportunity allows.
The Support funding for the Belmont Community Path petition to Boston Region Metropolitan Planning Organization (Boston MPO) was written by FriendsBelmontCommunityPath and is in the category City & Town Planning at GoPetition.