So where did that three-bay facility come from?

The original plan for the Amtrak layover facility was for a 40,000 square foot building that would house two sets of trains. If you recall, the April 2011 Zoning Board of Appeals approved a variance that doubled the size of permissible buildings on the Church Street-Stanwood Drive lot.

You may also recall that at some point in the summer that two-bay facility turned into a 60,000 square foot, three-bay facility. Patricia Quinn of NNEPRA has told Brunswick repeatedly that the three-bay facility was added to the plan in order to appease abutters, who were concerned about the facility’s negative impacts on their quality of living and home values. For example, the November 10 Times Record quotes her as saying: “If we ran three trains or had extra equipment, that meant it would idle outside and neighbors were concerned about that, so we changed the scope and found a way for all three trains could be inside.” So NNEPRA enlarged the facility to address neighbors’ concerns, right?

Wrong.

Recall that the original plan for the Downeaster envisioned two trips to Brunswick per day. As Patricia Quinn detailed before the Zoning Board of Appeals hearing in April, the Downeaster currently operates with two trainsets (4:50).

So where did the expansion from two trainsets to three come from -- a genuine concern for Brunswick neighbors? Doubtful. NNEPRA never bothered to contact anyone in the neighborhood about the matter. And as NNEPRA is not known for its largess, neighbors were justifiably confused. The move to a three-bay facility was about moving to a three-trainset operation, which would permit more trips to Brunswick. As Quinn testified before the ZBA in April, a third set of equipment would provide Brunswick with the potential to run all five trains in and out of Brunswick (13:30).

So a three-bay facility was not about mitigation at all. It was about promising more trains to Brunswick.

Now NNEPRA can’t build it, because it can’t find the money. And who is at fault? The neighbors, because – at least according to Quinn – they are the ones who demanded mitigation. This is all nonsense. For one, neighbors never asked for a three-bay facility, and certainly they were never consulted before one was introduced into the plan.

More importantly, though, NNEPRA had no business promising five trains per day to Brunswick. It had insufficient committed funds, and had not even conducted a rigorous site location study. Yet it had no problem letting Brunswick know that more and more trains might be coming. The town lapped it up.

So when Patricia Quinn and others tell the town and press that the neighbors are to blame for increasing costs of the facility, raise your eyebrows. Not only did the neighbors never ask for a three-bay facility, they were never even told about it.

This is Quinn-spin at its best. Enlarge the project without doing your homework or securing funds, and then when it fails, pin it on neighbors.

The neighbors are not to blame. Blame NNEPRA, for putting the cart before the horse, and making promises before it had done its homework. Blame Quinn, for enlarging this project on the sly, and in the midst of a series of public hearings specifically designed to allay neighbors’ fears. Blame those in Brunswick who bought the NNEPRA line hook, line, and sinker, without even asking NNEPRA where its funds were coming from.