Since 2008, officials from the Boston Transportation Department have been hosting community meetings, trying to reach a consensus on how to make Rutherford Avenue and Sullivan Square a more pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly intersection. Earlier this year, officials settled on a preliminary design, one that the Charlestown Neighborhood Council had a hand in creating. 

But just before the Transportation Department could move to the next phase of the project, Congressman Michael Capuano, D-Somerville, has stepped in with concerns about the plan.

The city's preliminary design for the project would eliminate the rotary and underpass at Sullivan Square and replace it with a surface street grid. Officials say it would effectively reduce car traffic by improving the intersection of Cambridge and Alford streets with Maffa Way. But this is precisely what Capuano is worried about.

In an e-mail to Patch, a Capuano staffer said the congressman is "specifically concerned about the removal of underpasses and the inevitable diversion of traffic into Charlestown neighborhoods it will cause. Such removal would also lead to even longer backups into and out of Charlestown."

Reaction from local leaders, city officials

Capuano's position seemed to come as a surprise to officials in the Transportation Department, and likewise to members of the Charlestown Neighborhood Council — who heard the news, not from Capuano but from Vineet Gupta, the director for policy and planning at the Transportation Department, at a recent council meeting.

"I just want a clarification," said Judy Brennan, the Neighborhood Council secretary, after Gupta told the council of Capuano's objection. "You're talking about our congressman, the person who we just re-elected to congress. He's the one not listening to us about what we want?"

Tom Cunha, who heads the council, asked Gupta for a copy of documents the city sent to Capuano for review.

In a statement to Patch, a Transportation Department spokesperson said the city spent18 months, held eight public meetings, and gave a approximately 20 additional presentations to neighborhood groups, elected officials, regional organizations, and advocacy groups in affected areas on the Rutherford Avenue/Sullivan Square project.

"The current design represents a broad consensus amongst these groups and was ratified by the Charlestown Neighborhood Council. Inter-agency coordination meetings were held with the MBTA / MassDOT," the statement reads.

Next steps

The goal of the project, according to the department, is to transform the intersection "from a 1950's automobile-oriented highway-like roadway, to a neighborhood-friendly urban boulevard with adequate traffic capacity, bicycle lanes and a green linear corridor."

In addition to the traffic backups, Capuano is concerned that at the intersection of Austin Street and Rutherford Avenue, all traffic would now be forced to compete for time at a traffic light, rather than east-west traffic passing under the north-south traffic as it does now. 

A spokesperson in Capuano's office said, "It makes no sense to force all traffic to pass through the same clogged intersection. At Sullivan, it makes no sense to close the underpass and force Everett traffic to use the already overcrowded rotary/intersection."

But Transportation Department officials insist traffic congestion at Sullivan Square is not due to inadequate lanes of traffic, but rather a badly designed rotary and intersection where Cambridge Street, Maffa Way and Alford Street converge at one traffic light. 

They argue that the new design will eliminate that problem. Additionally, officials say that their preliminary plan leaves enough lanes on Rutherford Avenue to provide for smooth traffic flow to Everett. It also reorients Main Street to eliminate any neighborhood cut-through traffic.

When asked about how and if the city will respond to Capuano's concerns, the Transportation Department responded by saying, it will "continue to work with Charlestown residents, elected officials, surrounding municipalities and state agencies to develop a final design based on the concept approved by the community."

Kristi Ceccarossi contributed to this report.