The Codcast

The Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway Conservancy gained a measure of stability this week as the state, the city of Boston, and park abutters agreed to provide $2 million a year to help cover the organization’s operational expenses.

The Codcast provides two interesting views on the deal. James Aloisi, the former secretary of transportation who played a hand in the formation of the Conservancy, said he has a hard time understanding why the state was playing hardball in the first place. He likened the situation to a homeowner who buys a piece of property and builds a house on it -- and then goes to his neighbors to ask them to share in the cost of upkeep. (Gov. Charlie Baker should know all about this situation; he used to serve on the board of the Conservancy.)

The Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway Conservancy gained a measure of stability this week as the state, the city of Boston, and park abutters agreed to provide $2 million a year to help cover the organization’s operational expenses.

The Codcast provides two interesting views on the deal. James Aloisi, the former secretary of transportation who played a hand in the formation of the Conservancy, said he has a hard time understanding why the state was playing hardball in the first place. He likened the situation to a homeowner who buys a piece of property and builds a house on it -- and then goes to his neighbors to ask them to share in the cost of upkeep. (Gov. Charlie Baker should know all about this situation; he used to serve on the board of the Conservancy.)

Jay Gonzalez and Bob Massie grabbed some badly needed media attention this week when the two candidates for the Democratic nomination for governor issued a joint press statement attacking Gov. Charlie Baker for refusing to take a stand on the millionaire’s tax.

Today’s Codcast features the TransitMatters guys who put the brakes on an $11 million MBTA redesign of the Auburndale commuter rail station that was going to improve handicap accessibility but result in poorer service on the Framingham-Worcester Line.

Add parking, cut emissions by CommonWealth Beacon

Ride-sharing regs redux by CommonWealth Beacon

It’s boom time in Dorchester. That’s what Bill Forry of the Dorchester Reporter told Bruce Mohl and me when we sat down to talk with him about what’s going on in Boston’s largest neighborhood.

Dorchester is Boston’s grand melting pot -- or at least its polyglot point of convergence. It is home to more than 120,000 people with roots that span the globe, who, these days, mostly get along well.

Plotting the future at DOT by CommonWealth Beacon

Probation, patronage, and power struggles by CommonWealth Beacon

It was just two years ago that the Greater Boston region was in the thick of a high-stakes showdown over whether to proceed with a bid to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. In January 2015, Boston was designated the US entry in the global competition for the 2024 Games.

It was all downhill from there.

The bid’s boosters seemed to do just about everything wrong, from adopting a secretive approach to bid documents in a city that demanded everything be put on the table to the mayor disparaging residents with the nerve to ask tough questions as a tiny group of naysaying cranks -- “10 people on Twitter.”

By July, it was over and the bid was withdrawn. It was an astonishing fall given the set of Boston political and business power brokers lined up behind the effort. In the end, the public was widely skeptical of the idea, which would have put the city and possibly the state on the hook for any cost overruns. No one did more to plant those doubts than No Boston Olympics, a small group of 30-something-year-old Bostonians who became convinced of the folly of the Olympic pursuit.

One of the group’s co-founders, Chris Dempsey, has now authored an account of the drama together with Smith College economist Andrew Zimbalist. No Boston Olympics: How and Why Smart Cities Are Passing on The Torch is a great telling of a still-fresh piece of Boston history. They came in to talk about the book for this week’s Codcast.