Press Release
After more than a year of negotiations, the City of New Bedford has reached a $3.5 million settlement agreement with the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) for land the agency acquired by eminent domain for the Downtown passenger rail station.
The agreement comes four years after the MBTA executed the first of five land-takings to obtain space to build a passenger rail station, train layover site, and an additional parking area in the Whale’s Tooth parking lot on Acushnet Avenue.
In five separate transactions between April 2020 and October 2021, the MBTA paid the City and three related entities — Housing 70 Corporation (a municipal nonprofit organized in 1970 for the purpose of eliminating blight), the New Bedford Port Authority, and the New Bedford Redevelopment Authority — a total of $486,627 for eight acres of land next to the train station.
Mayor Jon Mitchell conveyed to the MBTA his belief that the payment did not reflect the fair market value of the property, and that the City was prepared to take legal action to be made whole. Four other lawsuits have been brought by private landowners — two in New Bedford near the Church Street train station and two others in Fall River — against the MBTA alleging unfair compen-sation for land-takings in connection with the South Coast Rail Project.
“Our position all along has been simple: New Bedford taxpayers deserve to be fairly compensated for the land taken by the MBTA,” Mayor Mitchell said. “This settlement achieves that goal, and I am grateful for the efforts of Governor Healey and the MBTA to make it happen.”
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