Bridge Work and Letters to the Editor

The ole commute on the P508 was fine this morning. I think we were at South Station around 8:25 a.m.

Today's The Boston Globe published a short article about a MBCR announcement that was made earlier in the week. Train traffic on the inbound track between Haverhill and Lawrence has been halted so work crews can work on the Merrimack River Bridge. All trains will run on the outbound track. This started Tuesday, so The Globe was a bit late to the game.

Two "Letters to the Editor" were also published in today's Globe. "This is no time to take on more debt" is a letter in opposition to the Silver Line III expansion project. "Transit project is a legal obligation" is in support of the Silver Line III expansion project.

As always, Commute-a-holic and I will keep our eyes and ears open to news regarding the state's budget crisis. Yesterday Governor Deval Patrick announced that $1.4 billion will be trimmed from the state's budgets. It is estimated that 1,000 state jobs will be eliminated and I think that the cuts will be coming from throughout the state. I'm sure you're thinking what I'm thinking "enough with the bad economic news," but I fear that bad news will be the only news for a while.

Now a bit of a shameless plug before I go. The town of Grafton was selected as one of the finalists in this year's WEEI "Friday Night Lights 2008" contest. Ryan Vulter, a GHS football co-capitan and the the brother of Kevin J. Vulter (who passed away after a tragic auto accident in September), wrote the essay to WEEI requesting that Grafton be entered into the contest. I know the competition will be fierce - especially since there are a lot of other towns along both the Worcester and other commuter rail lines - competing to win. If you don't have a connection to one of the other towns, Grafton would certainly appreciate the vote.