Recent content by The EGE

That was Metropolitan Coach, which ran that route until 1979. It was one of the last privately-operated local buses (versus express commuter/intercity runs) in the MBTA area.

There badly needs to be some consolidation or coordination of these TMAs. I didn't even know half of them existed because they don't appear on MBTA maps and they don't have GTFS (so they don't appear as options on Google Maps etc). At the very least, there needs to be a standard requirement that...

Guesses before looking at the above spoilers:

Station Park is so underutilized 99% of the time - unless there's a specific event, it's just flat grass with no one on it.

Yep. About 80% of the time it fails to load.

Yes please!

I'll guess Back Bay <--> World Trade Center.

As a point of comparison: when the Highland Branch was converted from commuter rail to streetcars, ridership increased by a factor of 10. Looking at surrounding density, three stops (Newton Upper Falls post-Northland, Needham Heights, Needham Center) have land use very similar to Newton Centre...

The Orange Line would also require full grade separation of the five current crossings in Needham, whereas the Green Line could continue to have some or all as grade crossings.

Amazing detective work, thank you! Adjusting a bit to match what was on the ground then (this is the 1938 Bromley map), it looks like this is B&A freight house #4, with the nearer boxcars actually on the Union Freight Railroad. We're looking over the extension of Atlantic Avenue.

A bit of a twist - I don't know the answer, so I'm enlisting AB to help. It's a War Department photo from WWII showing "fresh vegetables picked at the Victory Garden on the Boston Common being loaded into refrigerator trains". It could plausibly be the B&A Back Bay yard, the South Station yards...

If anything, the MBTA still paid more than the property was assessed. It's divided into two parcels, which have had a lot of variation but were collectively assessed for under a million in the years before the sale. Northern parcel: South parcel: The company bought the much larger riverside...

The new BEBs are starting to see use on routes aside from the 71 and 73. I caught #4201 on route 75 today, and there was another BEB operating on route 74 as well.

There would need to be a real, funded trail plan to make it worthwhile. Eminent domain is both financially and politically expensive; acquiring ROWs on spec would not be remotely feasible. Actual analysis is needed to determine where eminent domain is worthwhile and where alternate routes would...

There's a couple other lines in the southwestern suburbs that have a much higher chance of being trailed, albeit with tricky ownership: Wrentham Branch (Norwood-North Attleborough): No likely reactivation potential. The densest part in Norwood is still allegedly active, so railbanking that part...