Nader urges Gov. Cellucci not to sell names of subway "T" stations

[Gary Ruskin]

Commercial Alert		January 23, 2001

Ralph Nader sent a letter today to Massachusetts Governor Paul Cellucci
asking him not to sell the names to four Boston subway "T" stations. 
The letter follows.

Dear Governor Cellucci:

According to news accounts, your Secretary of Transportation, Kevin
Sullivan, intends to sell to corporations the right to put their names
on four Boston subway "T" stations.

This is a hucksterism that degrades history and community in favor of
crass commercialism.  No other city is so identified with the birth of
American liberty.  No other American city is so rich with history.  Once
you start selling off the names of history, where will it end?  When you
rename the Harvard Square T stop for McDonalds?

A sense of place is a disappearing resource in America today.  The
corporate focus of globalization is turning every moment of our days,
and every nook and cranny of our lives into something for sale.  The
language of civic places is a last bulwark against this trend.  People
say they will meet at Park Street station and walk down to Quincy Market
or the Garden, and there is a sense of comfort and continuity that is
all too rare today.  

Already, people have to say they are going to the "Fleet Center."  Now
will they meet at Mirage Resorts Place or Pfizer Square to go there? 
Will Quincy Market become the Monsanto Market or Philip Morris Market,
when the price is right?

Consider the indignity to citizens to have their local place names
usurped by polluters, corporate welfare recipients, tortfeasors and
corporate felons.  For example, Denver's Coors Field is named after the
Adolph Coors Company, which paid a $200,000 criminal fine and pled
guilty to two criminal misdemeanor counts of contaminating groundwater
and failing to report the contamination to regulatory authorities.

Consider the affront to those fighting obesity, say, to have a
contributor to that obesity -- Burger King, say -- put its name on the T
station which they pass every day. A Back Bay Budweiser station would
sanction beer blasts and alcoholism.  Downtown Crossing Novartis station
would lend encouragement to the overmedication of our children with
Ritalin.  

These are not merely hypothetical concerns.  Take sports arenas, for
example.  Vancouver's General Motors Place celebrates a corporation
which, among other things, sells more pornography through its DirecTV
subsidiary than does Larry Flint, owner of the Hustler pornography
empire, according to The New York Times.  Denver's Pepsi Center promotes
excessive consumption of soda pop, which may contribute to obesity,
tooth decay, osteoporosis, heart disease and kidney stones, according to
"Liquid Candy: How Soft Drinks are Harming Americans' Health," a report
by the Center for Science in the Public Interest. 

Americans are already deluged with advertising.  It should not be the
role of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to set new high water marks in
the annals of aggressive commercialism.  Not everything should be for
sale.  Let's have some statesmanship!

Sincerely,

Ralph Nader
<----letter ends here---->

Following is an article in the January 17 edition of USA Today about the
sale of naming rights of the Boston T stations.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/2001-01-16-name.htm

Massachusetts subway ties into name game 
by Fred Bayles

BOSTON — Teams sell the naming rights to their sports palaces.
Developers do the same with malls and skyscrapers. Even rock stars let
beer and computer companies tack their logos onto concert tours for a
price. Next up: naming rights for subway stations.

Within the next few weeks, the naming rights for four stations in the
nation's oldest and fourth-largest subway system will be put up for bid
by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority in hopes of raising
$10 million-$20 million over the next five years.

But don't worry, says Massachusetts Transportation Secretary Kevin
Sullivan, the traditional names of Back Bay, South Station, Sullivan
Square, and Downtown Crossing, won't fade into non-commercial obscurity.
Corporate names will be added after the traditional names, both on signs
and in the conductors' announcements as the trains pull into the
stations.

"It will be like adding a middle name," Sullivan says. "It will be done
tastefully."

The authority already has experimented with the idea, letting a bank
display its name at one station in exchange for cash and the financing
of station-cleaning operations.

And the state has cut six-figure deals to let a bank put its name on
Massachusetts Turnpike toll plazas. Businesses including restaurants and
record stores pay to have their names printed on toll receipts.

Sullivan says the station-naming scheme was developed to bring in new
revenue for the transit agency, which recently became a separate
financial entity from the state.

"Government officials have to think more like a business," Sullivan
says. "Ultimately, we're in this for the same purpose, which is to take
care of our customers with better service at a reasonable cost."

The scheme is no surprise to Dean Bonham, whose Denver-based Bonham
Group has been involved in 25 naming rights deals. Bonham says the
nation's naming frenzy began in 1988 when Great Western Financial Corp.
tacked its name onto the Los Angeles Forum in a multimillion-dollar
deal. 

Today, Bonham says, naming deals on sports stadiums alone are worth $3.2
billion. And he foresees naming-rights deals for airports and even
community parks. The Boston plan, he says, is a first. 

"I think it's a creative idea and a good idea, if the community can get
behind it," he said.

Sullivan admits he's heard dissent since the plan was revealed last
week. Some, he says, complain it is another step to
over-commercialization. Others fear the naming game could create an
identity crisis, as it has in situations where dot.com companies bought
naming rights before running into financial problems.

"We are going to make sure the companies we deal with are viable," he
says. "We don't want to do these names in pencil." 

<----article ends here---->
WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP
If you live in or around Boston, please contact Massachusetts Governor
Paul Cellucci.  Ask him to oppose the sale of naming rights to Boston T
stations. Gov. Cellucci's phone is (617) 727-6250, fax is (617) 727-9725
and email is <GOffice@state.ma.us>.

If you don't live in or around Boston, please email this note to friends
who do live in Boston, and ask them to contact Gov. Cellucci.


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Gary Ruskin | Commercial Alert 
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