Board of Directors Meeting

1. Call to order at 6:08 p.m.

2. Minutes of the previous meeting (11 Aug. 2004) were approved as written.

3. Officers’ Reports .

A. Fred R. Moore, President.

(1) Fred was quoted at length in the North Shore Sunday newspaper about rail trails.

(2) Regional Transportation Advisory Council (RTAC) re the Transportation Improvement Program (TIP): One of the three major Big Dig mitigation projects, there was a complaint that the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) wasn’t pushing it. They are shirking their responsibilities. A motion was passed by them to that effect. (Comment by Barry Andelman that we should publicize this.)

Fred brought up at the RTAC meeting the recent news item that the wider the roads, the more the traffic congestion.

B. Barry D. Andelman, T Liaison.

Barry A. met with Gov. Michael Dukakis. Regarding the Silver Line, he doesn’t believe there is not enough room in the Subway for LRV’s. About this whole bus thing, he wants to see information to bring to his people, who are still very much involved in it. He wants to talk to the bus people and we would love to find out about the number of car lines that used to feed into the Boylston St. subway. Barry is going to try to get data from Steve Kaiser and from Bob Terrell. The T feels that in a two-year time frame, Park St. (Green Line) will be saturated.

Discussion: A Red-Blue connection would alleviate a lot of the downtown congestion.

Fred: The T has cooked their findings by postulating a Boylston St. subway crossing that would have Washington St. streetcars crossing the Green Line tracks to terminate at [the loop at] Park St., rather than continuing [on a straight line] to Lechmere, where a lot of the Washington St. residents would like to get to for reaching jobs anyway, rather than to the Airport.

Fred: We want a submittal to Barry A. about chronic T operational issues for him to submit to important T officials. [Note: This is NOT to tell them that my bus was late this past Wednesday. On the other hand, if my bus is late on a continuing basis under similar circumstances, this should be the subject of discussion.]

C. Romin Koebel, Vice President.

John Businger announced that on 18 Sep, there is going to be a federal meeting on transit strategy in New Brunswick, NJ. Gov. Dukakis is the featured speaker.

The National Corridors Initiative web site is the proper channel.

There has been further discussion at RTAC about the North-South Streetcar. The MPO principals received it with mixed results, but this proposal is going further than it has gone in the past.

We have discussed the idea about a streetcar to Saugus.

4. Old Business.

A. Framework for Advocacy. We reviewed the schematic diagram.

B. Automatic Fare Collection. Barry A. and John Hostage: What about thinking about the new automatic fare collection system for a method to apply it to commuter rail?

C. The Annual Meeting (Fred):

We have to have a more attractive annual meeting. One thought is that it is a dinner time meeting, but yet we have nothing to eat. Barry A: Instead of the food, we have to have an attractive speaker or issue.

We have to improve the promotion of the event.

Ernest: We have to attract a larger proportion of our members.

D. The APT Web Site.

Ernest advised economy on the development of the web site. Fred: The reliability of our list serve has improved remarkably. Fred will contact Rick Arena.

5. New Business.

The paper, APT Tactical Method. Fred: This should be placed on the "Outreach" branch of the Framework for Advocacy.

6. The meeting adjourned 7:59 p.m.