Station name game: Follow the leader
Yawkey T stop could be renamed if street changes
The state Department of Transportation will “follow the lead” of the city and rename the Yawkey commuter rail station — as some lawmakers have advocated — if Boston officials ultimately rebrand nearby Yawkey Way, a MassDOT spokeswoman said.
State transportation officials say they aren’t “actively exploring or considering” renaming Yawkey Station amid a debate over its controversial namesake, former Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey.
Current Red Sox owner John Henry said last month he’d support renaming the street outside Fenway Park, going as far to say he’s “haunted” by Yawkey’s racist legacy. A bill also surfaced in the Legislature this summer that would create a committee to explore renaming the 3-yearold station, just 500 feet from the ballpark.
That may be unnecessary if a petition to rebrand Yawkey Way ultimately passes, state officials indicated.
“MassDOT would follow the lead of the City of Boston in the renaming of Yawkey Station as Yawkey Station is named after the street,” Jacquelyn Goddard, a spokeswoman for Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack, said in a statement yesterday.
Her office noted that any name change would have to go through a “comprehensive engagement process,” and stressed that state officials have had no formal internal discussions about doing so.
The bill, sponsored by state Reps. Byron Rushing and Ruth Balser, would create a special commission to look at renaming the station. The legislation is currently sitting in the committee on transportation.
“My focus as a state legislator is on the railroad station,” Balser told the Herald late last month. The Newton Democrat added that dubbing the new stop Yawkey Station “struck me as unnecessary. There already was a controversy about the street. This railroad is new.”
Mayor Martin J. Walsh has said he’s “supportive” of a movement to rename Yawkey Way, which, beyond city approval, also needs to be cleared by the street’s abutters. The parties — Henry’s Red Sox and the D’Angelo family, owners of the merchandise shops across from Fenway — have both said they’d support the renaming.
The Red Sox have said they’re focused on petitioning the city, though they did not directly address whether they’d also remove a cryptic tribute to Yawkey on the left field scoreboard, which features both his and his wife’s initials in Morse code.