Massachusetts Port Authority

St 1956, c 465 created the Massachusetts Port Authority (now commonly known as Massport), consisting of seven gubernatorial appointees serving staggered seven-year terms, to acquire through refinancing and to maintain and operate the following: from the City of Boston, the Sumner Tunnel from Boston to East Boston (this function, and that of constructing a second such tunnel were transferred by St 1958, c 598 and c 599 to the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority); from the Mystic River Bridge Authority (to be dissolved), the Mystic River (now Tobin) Bridge; from the Commonwealth, commercial facilities at the General Edward Lawrence Logan International Airport and Lawrence G. Hanscom Field; from the Port of Boston Commission (to be dissolved), the lands and piers acquired and leased by the Commonwealth in the Port of Boston.

The authority's powers include acquisition of real property by purchase or eminent domain, issuance of revenue bonds, and collection of tolls. The authority is designated a body politic and corporate and a public instrumentality, placed in but not subject to general jurisdiction of the Dept. of Public Works (Massachusetts Highway Department from 1992). St 1969, c 704, s 3 also placed it within the Executive Office of Transportation and Construction. Its functions are currently described in MGLA c 91 App s 1-1 et seq.

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