Last Library Hurdle Falls

An agreement reached December 19 between the City of Boston and the MBTA has apparently removed the final obstacle to the construction of the Kennedy Library.

The Kennedy Foundation had previously purchased the MBTA yards on Mount Auburn Street to use as a site for the library. The storage barns presently located there were to have been moved to the Penn-Central yards at South Station.

Mayor Kevin White announced his opposition to the switch last November. The city was concerned that the transfer would result in the loss of $200,000 each year in taxes.

The new agreement allows the MBTA to buy the South Station property but stipulates that the agency must make available to the city any land which it owns and which is not necessary for transportation.

The compromise between the city and the MBTA also quelled rumors that Harvard might raze an apartment building near the train yard and donate the land to the Kennedy Foundation.

After a four year delay, construction can begin as soon as the MBTA has vacated the site. Officials estimate that it will take about two years to clear the twelve acre yard before erection of the three-story building complex will start. Fifteen million pages of literature and documents concerning President Kennedy and his administration have been collected for the Library.

The documents are currently located at the Federal Records Center in Waltham, Mass., where a staff of four men is sorting them out.