Mayor Thomas M. Menino may have won another four more years in office, but whether he’ll stick around for the full term - or try to install a successor - is an open question in the minds of many City Hall savants.

“That’s what he’d like to do,” predicted Michael J. McCormack, a former city councilor and a longtime political observer. “He’d like to pass the baton off to someone else in either two or four years.”