Relocation Flight Delays Decision on MTA Yards

Opposition to the MTA's relocation plans my delay the sale of the Bennett the MTA, said yesterday. He said the Board of Trustees would make no decision on the Yards until it finds a site for the switching, storage, and repair facilities now located there.

The MTA's original plan--relocating the facilities to yards near Codman square in Dorchester--has met with violent local opposition. Almost five hundred residents of Dorchester jammed the Board's meeting Thursday to protest against the expansion of the Codman Yards.

State Senator George B. Kenneally, Jr. (D-Dorchester) last week introduced a bill to prevent the MTA from constructing a care repair shop within 2000 yards of a church or a hospital. The Codman Yards are less than 500 yards from City Hospital of Dorchester.

Kenneally charged yesterday that "everywhere the MTA has gone, it has brought blight into the neighborhood." Describing the Codman Square area as a "quiet residential area" of small homes, he claimed that the MTA could find other locations, even in Dorchester.

In talks with MTA officials, Kenneally said he had specifically directed their attention to land near the Savin the MTA was considering other locations for their facilities, but he declined to identify them.

Kenneally said the MTA General Manager Thomas J. McLernon had "intimated" that Kernneally might withdraw his bill, but had not explicitly requested that he do so. McLernon had also "intimated" that a compromise solution was possible, according to Kenneally, but the chance of reaching an agreement.

Dana Receptive

In another development bearing on the sale of the Bennett St. Yards, Gov. Endicott Peabody '42 decided over the weekend not to press for the appointment of Edward Dana to there MTA Board of Trustees. Dana, a former general manager of the MTA, is generally considered receptive to Harvard's bid for the Yards.

The predominantly Democratic Executive Council, which must approve all the Governor's appointment, last week refused to confirm Dana, who is a Republican.