Tobin Bridge Relocation/Replacement

[F-Line to Dudley]

Interestingly, I would have been concerned about GLX Medford branch exceeding capacity on Day 1, given its extremely dense walkshed (80k compared to RL North's 90k). But while anecdotal reports suggest that E trains are packed, its ridership is still much smaller than RL North, and comparable to each individual GL streetcar branch, despite much faster grade-separated service to downtown.

Do we know that for sure when fare collection enforcement on GLX has been...intermittent at best...since launch? I suspect that what ridership has been tallied so far has a rather severe undercount.

 

[TheRatmeister]

Do we know that for sure when fare collection enforcement on GLX has been...intermittent at best...since launch? I suspect that what ridership has been tallied so far has a rather severe undercount.

I suspect you are correct. Going through the data for the green line which is collected with APCs (I think?) rather than station entries leads to... interesting results. It suggests for example that every surface E branch station along Huntington Ave had less than 1000 daily average boardings in Fall 2019. Either that or that Boylston had more than 1.5 times as many boardings as gated entries. That's why I use the 2013 statistics instead because there is really nothing better.

 

[vanshnookenraggen]

I guess the bigger question is: Does the "ease" of connecting to the Brattle Loop and a Charlestown station make it more advantageous over building a very expensive FJ at Maverick and the difficulty of tunneling in East Boston and Chelsea? Picking Green over Tobin means you mostly have to go with elevated rail in Chelsea which reduces cost once you get there too. I'm also a bit concerned about Chelsea ridership exceeding capacity on Day 1.

Yes, but that's more so because a FJ at Maverick is a terrible idea. If you *must* branch the Blue Line, do it after Airport and have it follow the old Grand Junction in a tunnel to Chelsea. But as has been pointed out, this will screw over the rest of the riders up to Wonderland. If Red-Blue is built, and maybe CBTC signals go in, you can probably get away with splitting service if you can boost capacity to 30tph. Even so, that is limiting for any extension to Lynn.

A Green Line branch doesn't mean elevated in Chelsea at all, although this is obviously going to be based on the route. My preferred route is up Everett Ave to the Revere Beahc Pkwy. The avenue is wide enough to build out a median (probably have to take some land but not buildings), or build a cut and cover tunnel.

If you're talking about going along Broadway instead, you probably aren't using the new Tobin at all.