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Stephanie Pollack

Stephanie Pollack

Former Secretary of the Massachusetts Department of Transportation

Jul 22, 2026

17:40
[laughs]
17:40
We really wanna give flexibility.
17:42
That's number one.
17:44
Number two is that the best project delivery is iterative.
17:48
You do some work, you buy some land, you get some permits, maybe you do some early, uh, construction.
17:54
If there's a highway crossing a rail line, you fix that crossing.
17:58
Um, highway does it that way all the time.

41 MINS LATER

59:29
Just a reading how realistic you think these things are and, and, and how much momentum you think there is here.
21:26
Also on the Highway Teardown Tour?
21:28
Also on the Highway Teardown Tour in a place that I have a child who lives, so we've been out there.
21:33
The parks are amazing, but they have way more what would be called active uses, right? There's an aquarium and there's a Ferris wheel and there's retail shops and there's restaurants and there's multiple playgrounds.
21:46
There's just a lot of stuff to do.
21:48
And so for me, the issue with the buildings and why Chris and I respectfully can disagree on the buildings is...
21:56
The Big Dig was built with money that came from not only all over the United States, but ultimately all over Massachusetts.
22:04
And it is a great 15 acres for people who live and work and are nearby or are visiting Boston.
26:09
top of the
28:48
Mm-hmm
28:49
... their goal is to get through as fast as they can.
28:51
To them, the highway is a piece of infrastructure.
28:53
But if you are in the city, the highway is your neighbor.
28:57
And the truth is, the way we built them, they were okay as infrastructure.
29:01
They could all stand some improvement, but, like, you could rebuild them exactly the way they were and they would work as infrastructure.
29:08
They are terrible neighbors.
speaker_9UNKNOWN
31:59
Mm-hmm.

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