Tiny sliver of land puts abbey, MBTA at odds

HINGHAM -- Twenty-six square feet is not a lot of land, considering that it is about the floor space of a confessional.

But a sliver of real estate of just that size is the key to a long-running dispute that ended up in Plymouth Superior Court last month and pits the normally peaceable monks of Glastonbury Abbey in Hingham against the MBTA, the powerful but cash-strapped transit agency that has fought numerous battles over the Greenbush commuter rail project on the South Shore.

The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority took the long, thin slice of land from the abbey by eminent domain in 2004. It needed the land -- located about 20 to 30 yards from the abbey's monastery building, guest house, and church -- for a small section of rail tracks in Hingham, and says it is compensating the abbey, up to a point.

The monks say the T has not done enough. The strip edging the train tracks is minuscule, everyone agrees, especially when compared with the abbey's 60 acres. The area in question is no bigger than an office cubicle, a good-size closet, or a small area rug.

It was 0.000009ths of the abbey's land, and if the T had not coveted it for the Greenbush Line, there probably would have been no case. But to the monks, its value is in the loss of their peace and quiet when the trains come this summer.

The T offered the abbey $1,700 for the parcel and has spent $123,000 on a sound- and vibration-dampening mat it says will absorb much of the impact of the trains. The T has offered $55,000 more for more sound mitigation, according to a T official, who contends the agency has gone above and beyond what is necessary in the situation.

But the Rev. Nicholas Morcone, Glastonbury's abbot, maintains that the transit agency must do more to protect monastery buildings from noise, vibration, and the view of trains rumbling down the tracks. The two sides have been arguing over mitigation for about five years; the monks filed suit seeking unspecified damages only recently because legal deadlines were nearing.

Morcone said the noise is a major problem for the nine monks who live in the monastery. They pray together five times a day, including two periods of quiet prayer. Their church, which overlooks the tracks from a small slope, is the center of the monastery.

"Quiet is part of our way of life," Morcone said about the abbey, known for its retreat facilities that host about 2,000 people a year.

He worried about readings at supper in the monastery. "What will happen when we are here eating and listening to readings? Will we be drowned out?" he asked.

Morcone said he has no problem with the rail line itself, which he says might benefit the monastery. But he is upset, he said, because the MBTA has not bargained about mitigation in good faith. Every time there is a meeting with the agency, different people attend, so there is no continuity, he said.

And trying to reach anyone at the MBTA? Don't get him started.

"They say they'll get back to you, but they never get back to you, unless you hound them into another meeting," he said.

Morcone said the cost for everything the abbey's engineers and architects have suggested to protect its three buildings from vibration and noise would cost about $1 million, but he realizes it is impossible to expect the MBTA to foot the entire bill.

Instead, he would like the T to pay for double-glazed windows for the windows facing the tracks and to provide good fencing. He said he appreciates that the MBTA put in the soundproofing mats.

"We don't want to milk the MBTA," said Morcone, adding that the abbey is prepared to spend its own money, as well. The monastery has already spent about $900,000 in renovations on its chapel, which included sound-proofing, he said.

The T, on the other hand, is also unhappy with the situation, having already fought off numerous challenges to the Greenbush project from unhappy neighbors and spending millions more in mitigation for several South Shore towns and property owners. In part because of the fierce opposition, the price tag of the railroad has soared to $508 million since planning began in the late 1970s for restoration of Greenbush and the other two branches of the Old Colony Line. The other branches, to Kingston and to Middleborough-Lakeville, opened in 1997.

MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo said the agency has gone to great lengths to keep the Glastonbury Abbey monks happy, yet they continue to demand more.

"The MBTA... is frustrated and disappointed with the abbey's continued misrepresentation of the facts," he said by e-mail last week.

Pesaturo said that what the abbey is asking for in soundproofing is disproportionate to the noise that will be caused by the trains, although the T is willing to do more sound testing after train service is restored, to see whether sound projections are accurate.

The abbey is already in a noisy environment, he said, because of planes overhead; truck traffic on Route 228, which borders the abbey; and heavy machinery from adjacent gravel pits and contractor yards.

"It seems the abbey feels the MBTA should be responsible for mitigating noise impacts caused by others," Pesaturo said.

Matt Carroll can be reached at mcarroll@globe.com.