Well, at least when it comes to rail transportation. The T&G reports today that as CSX winds down operations in its Beacon Park yard in Allston, it's planning to shift its operations to the west. And according to Transportation Secretary Jeff Mullan, the new set-up promises to "make Worcester the freight rail hub for all six New England states with east-west and north-south rail connections with access to highways."

The Supreme Judicial Court today reversed an attempted-rape conviction for a man who agreed to pay an undercover Worcester cop $200 for sex with her supposed foster child, because police arrested him before he could get near the girl.

The court upheld Kerry van Bell's conviction on a charge of soliciting sex for a fee, because he agreed to hand over the money to the cop. But the court said it could not uphold his conviction on a charge of attempted rape of a child because the legal definition of "attempted" means police would have had to stop him in the moments just before he actually raped a child:

Spatch is tweeting the Worcester warehouse fire, using Worcester Fire Department records.

The Worcester PD really, really didn't like a story in the Worcester Telegram about possibly bogus master's degrees held by members of the local constabulary. Daily Worcesteria reprints a police statement, which not only says the department will give first dibs on news to local TV and radio stations but adds:

... Unfortunately, the dark, dirty, and poorly lit newsroom is affecting their neutrality, professionalism, and integrity. Because of this, the media policy of the Worcester Police Department must use all relevant media to get the message out to the community and remain transparent as an organization. ...

If you have followed the decline in the standards at the T & G you recognize their new standard operating procedure. This adopted SOP is based on a dysfunctional hat-trick: hyperbole, fiction, and innuendo. ...

It must be true. Forbes wouldn't get that wrong, would it? Who doesn't recognize that Worcester has better culture than Cambridge (or, for that matter, that Baltimore is a better place to live than Boston)?

Via Maureen Rogers, who admits: My first thought was: what were the criteria?

Clearly, availability of interesting places to shop; number of steep hills impossible to drive on during icy weather; and percentage of high school seniors who agree with the statement "I don't care where I go to college, as long as it's somewhere other than Worcester" weren't part of the statistical mix that went into this pick.

Last call would remain 2 a.m., but the tipsy could sit around for another hour to get ready for the ride home.

Worcester Beetle Battle Reaches Destructive Phase.

I've probably been following the whole beetle thing more closely than somebody living nowhere near Worcester should, but I must admit I'm linking to that story mainly because, like pretty much every other account today, the headline uses the phrase "Beetle battle" and I can't stop repeating that: Beetle battle. Beetle battle. Beetle battle.

Paulo Lopes photographed
cleanup efforts in Worcester.

Out in Leominster, Jody took this photo of her neighbor's two-month old car. She also reports a soul-crushing amount of ice in Sterling.

Lance grows weary of livin' like a refugee:

... We've moved out of my parents' place in Clinton and into my brother-in-law's home in Leominster. While half to three-quarters of Clinton are still out of power--including my parents' neighborhood--the southern part of Leominster is back on power and on-line. It was nice to take a warm shower...it was nicer to take a warm shower and have the room also be warm, instead of stepping out of the shower and into the cold.

Jackson has been holding up pretty well. He woke up in the night during the storm and was pretty worried while he laid with Michelle and I--every time another tree would snap or ice would fall he ask "What was that noise, Daddy?" Still, he was OK until we awoke Friday morning. He was very upset after he woke up...when I asked if he was afraid, he said "I'm afraid of the ice on the house." ..

Kelly tweets that her power in Littleton came back on early Sunday afternoon - just in time for her BlackBerry to die.

Channel 4 reports: Power Outages Continue As New England Slowly Thaws.

Paul Levy reports his brother-in-law temporarily moved into his parents' Worcester apartment, which, unlike his home, has power and heat:

My wife called Florida to report about her brother's activities and to generate some sympathy for his state. Their mother had one response, "Tell him: Don't forget to clean out the lint trap."

The Boston Business Journal reports the juvenile, known as Dshocker, pleaded guilty today to running a vast "botnet" of "zombie" computers (PCs infected with trojans he controlled) to break into corporate networks and run a campaign of virtual terror against competing hackers. The Register has more details. He'll do 11 months in a federal juvenile detention center.