Former Massachusetts Secretary of Transportation Jim Aloisi and Stacy Thompson, the executive director of LivableStreets Alliance, joined Talking Politics host Adam Reilly to talk about what the federal oversight of the MBTA could mean for the agency's future and what it says about Gov. Charlie Baker's stewardship of the T up to now.

Jim Aloisi and Stacy Thompson shared their thoughts on the Federal Transit Administration inspecting the MBTA after numerous safety incidents, and the potential for an East-West rail system. 

“I do think that if the FTA comes in and says, here are 100 things you have to do on this timeline, and the T has to shift capacity to deal with those issues that are urgent, it could impact things like bus network redesign and fare equity work,” said Thompson. 

“I think there is a lot to learn from this moment,” Thompson said via e-mail. “It illustrates the real, and in this case, incredibly tragic consequences of chronically under investing in the T.”

“We need a systemwide approach, and we need to do it this session,” said LivableStreets Alliance Executive Director Stacy Thompson.

It’s a move that is also being supported by transportation advocacy groups like LivableStreets Alliance. Executive Director Stacy Thompson argued these improvements will help avoid some hiccups down the ‘track’

"We believe that a pilot to kick this off could be less than $10 million, and we're looking at less than $100 million annually to pay for a system wide fare that would also include the commuter rail," Stacy Thompson, the executive director of LivableStreets Alliance said.

“It’s unacceptable,” said Stacy Thompson, executive director of LivableStreets Alliance, a public transportation advocacy group. “What’s the point of the board? Someone died, there should be an immediate response. I would have liked to see the board ask for what the public can reasonably expect. It goes beyond a dereliction of duty. Someone died in a horrible way.”

"Even if this is a one-off incident, it is alarming that we don't have more information at this point," said Stacy Thompson, executive director of the transportation advocacy group LivableStreets Alliance. "Many things had to go wrong for something this tragic to occur, and so I want to understand every step that went wrong, and I want to understand what the T is doing to make sure this never happens again."

Kristiana Lachiusa is with the advocacy group LivableStreets. “So we spoke with a couple hundred riders back in December and overwhelmingly everyone we spoke to was like this is the greatest thing the MBTA has done,” Lachiusa said.