$250,000 MBTA sound study of the area around Readville train yards concludes that nearby residents live near train yards

Frustrated residents from Readville, Dedham and Milton told the MBTA and state Rep. Rob Consalvo (D-Hyde Park) this evening they are fed up with the overnight vibrations, humming and train horns from Readville's two train yards that they say have especially bedeviled them since 2020.

No matter how many times an official from the MBTA insisted in a Zoom meeting this evening the T has not changed operations at its Readville commuter-rail maintenance yard in five years, residents insisted that something must have changed in 2020, because that's when they started having long periods overnight of the worst ever noise and vibrations - to the point where some can no longer get to sleep because the vibrations alone would not only set their beds to moving, but could be felt right through their bodies.

The T called the meeting to announce the results of a $250,000 sound study conducted last year by WSP, a global consultancy with an office in Boston. Erich Thalheimer, the company's lead US acoustical engineer, described how the company placed four sound monitoring and recording devices around the two Readville yards - one of which CSX also uses for its freight trains - in May and coupled that with online survey forms for residents and then, in July, nightly visits to the Readville area by company employees.

The results? WSP concluded what residents were hearing was "not unusual urban noise" for people living near train yards, he said. More specifically: "The noise profile of the area was consistent with that of a standard urban area adjacent to railroad service."

That was not what people who joined the session wanted to hear, however - they wanted to hear solutions.

"I don't even bother trying go sleep before 3:30 in the morning," Sasja Lucas said. The vibration, she said, "goes right through me - it vibrates my bed, it vibrates my pillows, it's amazing."

"You feel this vibration deep in your chest and your heart and you wonder if something terrible is happening," Eve Law said. Unlike other residents, Law could not say when the particularly intense vibration and noise started since she's only lived in Readville for two years. But she said before that, she lived in South Boston and Allston/Brighton, near all sorts of transit lines, none of which prepared her for Readville.

And then there are the horns late at night. Bad enough are the horns after 1 a.m., especially the ones by a specific driver who likes to use his horns to play a jingle around 1:15 a.m., they said. Tiffany Cook, who lives near the Stop & Shop on Truman Parkway, said one night last week, some train driver laid on the horn for 22 minutes straight.

Suzanne Scanlon of Dedham, who works at home, says that proves difficult sometimes because the trains that park in back of her house are sometimes so loud she has to get off Zoom calls.

Consalvo said there is good news in the long term: The T will be replacing Fairmount Line commuter trains with battery-operated electric units. He allowed that that is at least three years - and given the T's history, possibly five years or more - away.

"This could take years, this could take several years and in the meantime what happens?" Milton Select Board member Roxanne Musto, who lives near the yards, asked, adding she is also concerned about the health effects of diesel fumes from the idling locomotives.

Musto and other Milton residents spoke longingly of the days when Tom Menino, a Readville resident, was Boston mayor. "When Mayor Menino was alive, we never had this noise," one said.

Adam Kamoune, an MBTA manager on the call, promised to go back to his operations staff to see if there is anything that can be done before then about the noise and vibrations, and vowed that the meeting was only a start of trying to do something.

However, he said that there will continue to be noise from the diesel locomotives because, especially at night, they have to be kept on to avoid problems - especially in colder winter months. He also acknowledged that the T has no control over the CSX engines that use the yard along Prescott Street - the last freight yard left in Boston.

Residents suggested taking a look at the way Chicago plugs in its diesel trains to keep their engines warm overnight without actually running. One resident suggested moving diesels to Widett Circle; another said the T should consider sending trains as far away as Providence to idle overnight, to spread the pain.

But basically, the T has no money to do anything major at Readville, Kamoune and Sharon Cranston, project manager for the Readville maintenance facility, said, because no Readville sound projects are in the T's capital budget. And Widett Circle as a functioning MBTA facility is years away as well, they said, adding that in any case, it will be used as a place to store trains between the morning and evening rush hours, not to do repairs as is done at Readville.

Consalvo, who acknowledged he and other elected officials have actually been getting complaints about the facility for more than 25 years, if not to the extent they have in the past four, said the sound study is a good first step, in part because "your voice tonight is going to drive the next steps."