In 2014, the R.I. Department of Transportation produced a video promising a state-of-the-art transit hub to replace the “overcrowded” Kennedy Plaza in downtown Providence, part of a multistage vision to overhaul the state’s public transportation system.
“It’s time for a new era of mobility,” the narrator said. “It’s all on the horizon.”
A decade later, the department that created the video is no longer involved in the vision, and the horizon seems more like a mirage.
The debate over the fate of Kennedy Plaza as a central transit center and where a new R.I. Public Transit Authority hub would be located in Providence – and how it will be paid for – has spanned three successive administrations in City Hall, a fact not lost on Mayor Brett P. Smiley, whose involvement goes back to the very beginning when he was chief of staff to former Gov. Gina M. Raimondo.
“I feel like I have been working on this for a long time,” he said recently.
While RIPTA’s bus operations are centered in Kennedy Plaza – where as many as 15,000 passengers pass through daily – Smiley supports moving the central transit node to another spot, to a place where there will be an intermodal connection to trains.
He acknowledges that he’s been frustrated by the slow pace of the project’s progress, but
a new analysis of eight sites by a private-sector partner with RIPTA has identified two parcels next to the Providence train station as the most promising locations for a transit center.
Smiley doesn’t have a preference between the two spots, both of which have their strengths and weaknesses. He says he just wants to see “shovels in the ground.”
“It’s time to move the bus hub,” he said. “And I will continue to be a cheerleader for relocation. And continue to push, gently, to get it moving.”
But there have been countless pushes, stops and starts in this long and winding saga. And plenty of decision-makers have been involved in the process, too.
Is this narrowed focus on two sites next to the train station going to be any different than previous proposals? And who will make the final determination on which direction to take?
Much like with other proposals, the opposition – mostly people who don’t want to see the transit center moved out of Kennedy Plaza – is already forming.
“Ironically, [a recent RIPTA assessment] says they want to move out of Kennedy Plaza because it’s crowded,” said Randall Rose, a member of the community group Kennedy Plaza Resilience Coalition. “But the new sites are even smaller.”
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THEN THERE WERE 2
Next Wave Rhode Island Partners LLC analyzed seven sites as potential spots for a transit center, from 8 acres on Eddy Street ❶ to the parking garage attached to the Garrahy Judicial Complex ❷ to a proposed underground development below the Statehouse lawn ❸.
Next Wave recommended two sites: an empty 1½-acre parcel ❹
and 2½-acre park ❺ that was not initially under consideration.[/caption]
SETTING SITES
Planning for a new transit center started in earnest in 2014 when 6 in 10 voters statewide approved a $35 million bond issue for public-transit improvements.
But over the years, there have been 10 sites considered for a state-of-the-art public transit hub to replace Kennedy Plaza – ambitious proposals that have produced nothing but a pile of shelved recommendations, third-party reports and disgruntled transit riders.
The abandoned ideas include a tunnel under Kennedy Plaza, a multihub bus system in concert with RIDOT; a mixed-use building on Dorrance Street; and a look at placing a transit center on an empty 2-acre plot on the west end of the I-195 Redevelopment District, half a mile from the heart of downtown.
The problem: Observers say it’s been challenging to get all the stakeholders – riders, taxpayers, the public and the business community – to arrive at a unified vision. While advocates for RIPTA users argue that the bus hub should remain in Kennedy Plaza, others such as some downtown property owners cite safety and aesthetic concerns at the heart of the city with thousands of people waiting for buses in the 7-acre outdoor plaza.
At the same time, those calling the shots on the project appear to have shifted over the years. At one point, RIDOT Director Peter Alviti Jr. championed the multihub plan. At another point, Gov. Daniel J. McKee wanted to investigate the parcel in the I-195 district.
Now the McKee administration says RIPTA’s board of directors, which is overseeing an agency facing a $32 million deficit next fiscal year, will be the ultimate decider of the location of the bus hub, which last had an estimated price tag of more than $220 million.
In 2024, RIPTA entered a public-private partnership with Next Wave RI Partners LLC, which is led by Gilbane Development Co. and Marsella Development Corp., and awarded Next Wave a $16.9 million contract to plan, and potentially promote, design, finance and build a transit center with potential housing and retail components, too.
As part of that contract, Next Wave submitted a report in March that whittled the potential locations for the transit center from seven to two: a 4.4-acre grass field on Francis Street across the road from Providence Place mall and next to the train station; and a 1.5-acre empty plot wedged between the train station and the Park Row West apartment complex.
In terms of location, the transit center saga had come nearly full circle. The new spots are situated close to the location of the original failed plan years ago to build an underground bus hub below the Statehouse lawn.
The newly identified locations each have their own issues: the Francis Street property stands partially over underground railroad tracks owned by Amtrak, and the property next to Park Row West is owned by Capital Properties Inc., which issues long-term ground leases of its real estate instead of selling it.
Rose has been arguing for years that the quasi-public agency is in no position to take on such a massive project, which had a cost estimate of $77 million before ballooning in 2022 to between $200 million and $250 million.
“This process has been flawed from the beginning,” he said. “And we still don’t even have a decision on whether to build the hub or not.”
A 2024 survey of more than 1,250 respondents conducted online and in person during a public hearing at Amica Mutual Pavilion by Next Wave showed a breakdown of rider preference. While not listed as a choice, the survey noted that among “other responses,” keeping the bus hub right where it is “was frequently mentioned.”
Rose says the entire project was a solution in search of a problem being pushed by public officials and real estate interests that want the big bus terminal in Kennedy Plaza gone.
There is also the question of who is choosing the proposed locations.
In a statement, McKee insisted RIPTA’s board of directors – Alviti is the chairperson – “will ultimately make the final decision on where the transit center is located.”
That said, McKee has been a vocal supporter of establishing the transit center at one of the two sites next to the train station, “a location that makes strong strategic sense,” McKee said, adding that such a significant transportation project requires “careful, thorough vetting of potential sites.”
As far as the long-term delays, McKee contends that the project has advanced significantly under his administration and says state officials have been working with the congressional delegation and RIPTA to ensure it stays on track.
It’s important to move quickly “to address long-standing public safety concerns at Kennedy Plaza,” McKee said.
But for transit advocates such as Rose, the process has lacked transparency, feasibility and the considerations of current transit riders, which they argue has led to the pattern of proposals being met with opposition.
“This process has never been about what is going to make a better transit system. And it hasn’t been about what’s good for the taxpayers,” Rose said. “It’s been about how can we get out of Kennedy Plaza and satisfy the commercial real estate owners who are right next door.”
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UNDER CONSIDERATION: R.I. Public Transit Authority CEO Christopher Durand stands in a field in front of the Providence train station, one of two parcels being considered for a new central transit hub.
PBN PHOTO/TRACY JENKINS[/caption]
PARING DOWN?
RIPTA CEO Christopher Durand acknowledges the optics surrounding the effort to relocate the bus hub have been anything but ideal. This time around, RIPTA has Next Wave to help guide the project, he says.
So far, $4 million of Next Wave’s $16.9 million contract has been spent on planning. Much is still up in the air.
Durand, who took the job last year in the wake of Scott Avedisian’s resignation following his involvement in a hit-and-run incident, says the many starts and stops have threatened what was initially envisioned.
With RIPTA dealing with budget woes and estimated construction costs growing, Durand says plans for the new facility may need to be pared down – at least initially – from earlier versions, which included mixed-use elements such as apartments, dining and retail to make it financially viable for a private developer.
As for how construction would be funded, “those aren’t decisions we have to make now,” Durand said. “But it will attract private investment. The private sector can come in and do multi-use, frankly, better and cheaper than we can. But it’s going to take some more public investment.”
Indeed, Durand doesn’t think any future revenue stream will be big enough to offset the total cost, and he’s floating the idea of pulling out of the “transit-oriented development” and shrinking the scope of work “to the bare bones of what needs to get done,” he said.
Either way, Durand said, “something at Kennedy Plaza needs to change for our ridership and for downtown development. But there are so many competing interests. Instead of saying, ‘Hey, this is what it is,’ we have the right team to help us figure this out.”
John Flaherty, deputy director of Grow Smart Rhode Island, who has been intimately involved in the transit hub debate, says the original aim of the $35 million bond issue passed in 2014 was linking train and bus transit service, a plan that always needed a partnership with the private sector.
But as the years pass, the costs will continue to increase, he said, “and will go up considerably,” making it less practical in the long run.
And Flaherty says spending money on a new hub is pointless without assurances that state leaders will adequately fund the basic RIPTA services riders rely on.
In its report in March, Next Wave identified four grants that the bus hub would most likely be eligible for, as well as loan programs created through the Transportation Infrastructure Financing and Innovation Act and the Railroad Rehabilitation Infrastructure Act.
But with a new administration in Washington, D.C., “there is a lot of questioning of whether the funding they are relying on is going to be available,” Flaherty said. “So, we have an interesting set of dynamics.”
With about $20 million left of the original bond, Grow Smart supports pumping the brakes until there is a commitment from state leaders to adequately fund RIPTA.
“Because without the service, the hub is of little consequence to anyone who uses transit,” Flaherty said. “It can’t just be, ‘We are moving it because some people want us to move it.’ ”
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ALL ABOARD: Riders wait to board buses at the R.I. Public Transit Authority bus hub in Kennedy Plaza in Providence. The matter of moving the bus hub to a new location away from Kennedy Plaza has been debated for more than a decade, with as many as 10 proposals considered, but the options have now been narrowed down to two parcels.
PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO[/caption]
ECONOMIC IMPACT
But David Salvatore, executive director of the business-backed Providence Foundation, insists that a new transit hub near the train station would benefit all the disparate stakeholders.
“Not only does linking bus and rail provide an economic impact that we can use as leverage when thinking about recruiting new businesses to our state,” he said. “Transit shouldn’t be only for a certain segment of the population. These are services that all people are looking for.”
A RIPTA rider himself, Salvatore says there should no longer be any debate about the necessity of moving toward intermodal sites.
“This is an issue that has been studied for more than a decade. And funding was approved by the voters,” he said. “We should be beyond having conversations about this. Other cities implemented this model 10 years ago. And we need to get on this train. It is overdue.”
Arnold B. “Buff” Chace Jr., founder and managing partner of Cornish Associates LP, isn’t hiding his frustration.
He says the cause of the failed proposals and abandoned plans is “not in my backyard” attitudes. There has not been a single site publicly proposed that has not drawn the ire of at least one special interest group, says Chace, whose firm controls numerous downtown properties.
“It’s all politics. Instead of looking at the economic benefits, it’s ‘I don’t want that to close to me,’ he said. “It is the same as the ‘Superman’ building. The largest building in the state remains empty because people have been squabbling over it. It is frustrating.”
Action needs to be taken soon to help give Providence a boost, Chace says.
“The cities that are revitalizing successfully, transit is a big part of it,” he said. “This isn’t a unique idea. It is a copycat. We want to attract companies and retain companies while respecting the people that use transit. It’s not a social program. It’s as simple as that. It is about being in the 21st century and looking at the cities that have been successful.
“But unfortunately,” Chace said, “the conversation is still going.”
