DCR Allston-Brighton Riverfront Parks and Parkways

sneijder said:
This is maybe a more minor point, but we need to advocate at these meetings to get away from the default "shared-use path" design for everything next to the river. Anyone who has been on the riverbank on a nice day knows that the 10-foot path creates constant conflict between faster bike commuters, leisure bikers, dog-walkers, college kids walking 4-abreast, etc. The riverbank gets enough foot/bike traffic that it arguably carries more people than all of Soldiers Field/Storrow/Memorial COMBINED. The DEFAULT design for any new construction here needs to be a dedicated cycle track + separate 5' dirt path for peds, separated by a grass median.
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I agree. Getting some good data on usage and devoting resources according to that usage would be a great thing to advocate for.
 
RandomWalk said:
So many add-a-lanes in all the proposals… Where does the DCR think this is? Florida?
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This had me get looking at it more, and....where?

The current contraption is basically 8+ lanes wide continuously end to end, the widest this gets is 6ish. The current mess is just less noticeable because it's sprawled out over a vast area. This is almost certainly less lane-miles of asphalt in the project area than the current config as well.

As far as feeders: I would consider the the new left from Nonantum/Brooks to be a direct replacement for the EB U-turn ramp + the new left from WB SFR to be a direct replacement for the WB U-turn ramp.

That makes the only net additions in my view to be the turn lanes from Parsons + WB Birmingham/North Beacon. Latter might be unnecessary but it's also not very consequential.

If the modeling thinks it'll work, arguably that's actually pretty solid for converting this currently only partially signalized thing to a fully signalized intersection.

Especially since the current thing basically excludes peds/bikes entirely from most of it and devotes about zero cycle time to them.

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Anyway, I know the point's already been made, but if you've got relatively high-volume intersections and can only allow relatively short queue lengths without causing traffic flow to gridlock back through other intersections + collapse your only option for solving that is additional lanes at the lights for queue space.

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sneijder said:
This is maybe a more minor point, but we need to advocate at these meetings to get away from the default "shared-use path" design for everything next to the river. Anyone who has been on the riverbank on a nice day knows that the 10-foot path creates constant conflict between faster bike commuters, leisure bikers, dog-walkers, college kids walking 4-abreast, etc. The riverbank gets enough foot/bike traffic that it arguably carries more people than all of Soldiers Field/Storrow/Memorial COMBINED. The DEFAULT design for any new construction here needs to be a dedicated cycle track + separate 5' dirt path for peds, separated by a grass median.
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Agree with you from a future proofing sense, although I feel that's (to date) been a somewhat less serious problem at this end than at some other points. This particular project looks to be avoiding doing much with the actual river path though. I assume that's more the domain of whatever that community center project is.
 
mass.streetsblog.org

DCR Proposes A Six-Lane Riverfront Highway For Its Brighton 'Park' - Streetsblog Massachusetts

The state's parks agency maintains numerous riverfront highways in the Boston region that contribute to the region's air pollution and congestion by subsidizing suburban car commuters to drive into downtown Boston.
mass.streetsblog.org mass.streetsblog.org

Comment at: https://www.mass.gov/forms/dcr-public-comments

Please also send your comments to
William.Brownsberger@masenate.gov
Michael.Moran@mahouse.gov
matthew.petersen@boston.gov

If you'd like to help with outreach and advocacy, email fixIHOProtary@gmail.com
 
sneijder said:
This is maybe a more minor point, but we need to advocate at these meetings to get away from the default "shared-use path" design for everything next to the river. Anyone who has been on the riverbank on a nice day knows that the 10-foot path creates constant conflict between faster bike commuters, leisure bikers, dog-walkers, college kids walking 4-abreast, etc. The riverbank gets enough foot/bike traffic that it arguably carries more people than all of Soldiers Field/Storrow/Memorial COMBINED. The DEFAULT design for any new construction here needs to be a dedicated cycle track + separate 5' dirt path for peds, separated by a grass median.
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Agree 100% this is actually a major pain in the ass and if theyre fixing it might as well go all the way.
 
stick n move said:
Agree 100% this is actually a major pain in the ass and if theyre fixing it might as well go all the way.
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Agree. At the meeting, which I don't believe has been posted online yet, the DCR seemed to defend their 12' wide path as being wide enough. I think they should start building 2 paths for the users traveling at VERY different speeds
 
sneijder said:
This is maybe a more minor point, but we need to advocate at these meetings to get away from the default "shared-use path" design for everything next to the river. Anyone who has been on the riverbank on a nice day knows that the 10-foot path creates constant conflict between faster bike commuters, leisure bikers, dog-walkers, college kids walking 4-abreast, etc. The riverbank gets enough foot/bike traffic that it arguably carries more people than all of Soldiers Field/Storrow/Memorial COMBINED. The DEFAULT design for any new construction here needs to be a dedicated cycle track + separate 5' dirt path for peds, separated by a grass median.
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I like it, except that the pedestrian path shouldn't be dirt. Older people can tripe on tree roots popping up through the dirt, plus it gets muddy and is just all around a tougher surface to walk on for everyone, young and old.
 
Charlie_mta said:
I like it, except that the pedestrian path shouldn't be dirt. Older people can tripe on tree roots popping up through the dirt, plus it gets muddy and is just all around a tougher surface to walk on for everyone, young and old.
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The memorial drive reconstruction (from Harvard JFK bridge to Eliot bridge) reduces car lanes to build a 10ft path + dirt walking path. At certain pinch points the two paths are adjacent, but at least we're moving in the right direction. This really needs to be the bare minimum.
 
sneijder said:
The memorial drive reconstruction (from Harvard JFK bridge to Eliot bridge) reduces car lanes to build a 10ft path + dirt walking path. At certain pinch points the two paths are adjacent, but at least we're moving in the right direction. This really needs to be the bare minimum.
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What will happen is people will walk on the adjacent paved path and not on the dirt path. I know that's what I would do.
 
Charlie_mta said:
What will happen is people will walk on the adjacent paved path and not on the dirt path. I know that's what I would do.
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I think that will happen in some cases, but what I see by MIT is a very clear divide between walkers and runners on the dirt/stone dust path and bicycles on the paved path. There are some walkers in the paved path but not as many/it doesn't feel as crowded.
 
I honestly kinda think it would've been more worthwhile going all-in on Leo M. Birmingham instead of Soldiers Field Rd. But it's too late for this now:

This whole bit is a mess for everyone involved
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But what if Soldiers Field was reconfigured to more directly interface with Market St. with both directions of travel coming up to meet the intersection and only the Westbound continuing as a single lane under the underpass. Very rough MS paint drawings but hopefully gets the idea across. This would make it a single normal intersection with tad more queue space on Arsenal.
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Then the intersection with Leo M. Birmingham and Market would be the main continuation of Soldiers Field. With Soldiers Field continuing as a normal 2-lane plus turning lanes street. This makes more sense to me since Soldiers Field Rd is the one that actually interfaces with businesses and the new apartments, whilst LMB is just a highway next to a highway. The off ramp from Soldiers East onto Market can remain and be either right turns only or another intersection. Traffic going to Soldiers Field West from Western Ave would need to take a left onto Market then right onto LMB to loop around or continue West whilst traffic from Arsenal would have basically the same connectivity to the road. This segment would then interface with the 2021 DCR proposal. This would return half of the current Soldiers Field Rd back to riverfront space and move the heavier traffic away from the new housing in the middle.
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For those travelling from Nonantum onto Soldiers Field Rd today it'd add an additional 2 or 3 intersections depending on N. Beacon and Opposite Lothrop, but there would no longer be such a large queue of traffic needing to make the left onto Soldiers Field at the propsed new Parsons intersection allowing for it to be downsized with less turn lanes. Whilst there'd still be a queue to make a left onto Market St to continue onto Soldiers Field it'd have more space to do so on LMB where it'd be next to the Pike away from the residences, businesses, and the riverfront. As for going to Nonantum from Soldiers Field, that would remain unchanged but the hope is by reducing it to a single lane going west it'd both help better manage the subsequent left turn onto Nonantum as well as encourage more people and their GPS systems to go up to the right onto LMB to avoid any single lane queuing.
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Anyway with the LMB lane removal underway this is pretty meaningless but it was fun to draw poorly in paint
 
Koopzilla24 said:
I honestly kinda think it would've been more worthwhile going all-in on Leo M. Birmingham instead of Soldiers Field Rd. But it's too late for this now:

This whole bit is a mess for everyone involved
View attachment 62567
But what if Soldiers Field was reconfigured to more directly interface with Market St. with both directions of travel coming up to meet the intersection and only the Westbound continuing as a single lane under the underpass. Very rough MS paint drawings but hopefully gets the idea across. This would make it a single normal intersection with tad more queue space on Arsenal.
View attachment 62573
Then the intersection with Leo M. Birmingham and Market would be the main continuation of Soldiers Field. With Soldiers Field continuing as a normal 2-lane plus turning lanes street. This makes more sense to me since Soldiers Field Rd is the one that actually interfaces with businesses and the new apartments, whilst LMB is just a highway next to a highway. The off ramp from Soldiers East onto Market can remain and be either right turns only or another intersection. Traffic going to Soldiers Field West from Western Ave would need to take a left onto Market then right onto LMB to loop around or continue West whilst traffic from Arsenal would have basically the same connectivity to the road. This segment would then interface with the 2021 DCR proposal. This would return half of the current Soldiers Field Rd back to riverfront space and move the heavier traffic away from the new housing in the middle.
View attachment 62571
For those travelling from Nonantum onto Soldiers Field Rd today it'd add an additional 2 or 3 intersections depending on N. Beacon and Opposite Lothrop, but there would no longer be such a large queue of traffic needing to make the left onto Soldiers Field at the propsed new Parsons intersection allowing for it to be downsized with less turn lanes. Whilst there'd still be a queue to make a left onto Market St to continue onto Soldiers Field it'd have more space to do so on LMB where it'd be next to the Pike away from the residences, businesses, and the riverfront. As for going to Nonantum from Soldiers Field, that would remain unchanged but the hope is by reducing it to a single lane going west it'd both help better manage the subsequent left turn onto Nonantum as well as encourage more people and their GPS systems to go up to the right onto LMB to avoid any single lane queuing.
View attachment 62574

Anyway with the LMB lane removal underway this is pretty meaningless but it was fun to draw poorly in paint
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I'm inclined to point you at the 2022 master plan for Herter Park, which showed a significantly road dieted SFR along it's scope from the Western Ave intersection to Eliot Bridge.
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It would then logically follow that future phases would and could consider the Western Ave intersection itself and the SFR segment between Western Ave and N. Beacon, where I suspect a significant diet is still in this segment's future- it's just out of scope for this particular intersection project. It's a symptom of DCRs lack of funding that their projects are narrowly scoped and phased and can't extend the work area further.
 
nortor said:
Those street level bike lanes do not look fun…
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Just a master plan, so like 5-10% concept design, but since a separated path is provided they appear to just be there to narrow the traffic lanes from 12' to 10.5' without redefining the parkway's existing cross-section, which gets more complicated.
RandomWalk said:
Is that plan shelved, shredded, or still in the works?
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My understanding is that it's shelved - they completed the master plan, but haven't moved to take it into construction for want of funding / capacity. The current next big parkway builds for DCR are known; with Leo Birmingham underway last year, Mem Drive Phase 3 getting underway this year, N. beacon in 2026, after that it'll be Arborway scheduled for 2027. DCR doesn't have the capacity to design & execute more than 1-2 major parkway builds simultaneously, nor does it get much transportation funding.
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stefal said:
I think that will happen in some cases, but what I see by MIT is a very clear divide between walkers and runners on the dirt/stone dust path and bicycles on the paved path. There are some walkers in the paved path but not as many/it doesn't feel as crowded.
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I commute along the river on the shared use path quite regularly and at least from my perspective, the moment the temperature gets above 60 degrees, there are so many people walking/running on the paved portion vs. the dirt that it effectively shifts from a convenient link in the broader bike network to something that is less than functional. (And I say that as someone who also walks and runs along that same stretch of shared-use path!)

Ideal world in my opinion would be to double the width of the paved portion, at least. Obv the ROW isn't there near MIT, but the experience cycling/walking/running on something like the Midtown Greenway in Minneapolis vs. most of the DCR shared-use paths in Boston is night and day. Much better!
 
#bancars said:
I commute along the river on the shared use path quite regularly and at least from my perspective, the moment the temperature gets above 60 degrees, there are so many people walking/running on the paved portion vs. the dirt that it effectively shifts from a convenient link in the broader bike network to something that is less than functional. (And I say that as someone who also walks and runs along that same stretch of shared-use path!)

Ideal world in my opinion would be to double the width of the paved portion, at least. Obv the ROW isn't there near MIT, but the experience cycling/walking/running on something like the Midtown Greenway in Minneapolis vs. most of the DCR shared-use paths in Boston is night and day. Much better!
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the concept of a "shared-use path" is lazy, car-centric planning. As in, we're saving all the money and ROW space to build extra car lanes, so everybody else can just be lumped in together into a 10 foot path. It's like if I-90 was built with a single lane in either direction as a "shared-use highway" and all the tractor-trailers, semi trucks, and cars are expected to go the same speed.

I'm pretty sure the dutch always separate red cycle tracks from sidewalks and would never willingly create infrastructure that promotes conflict between walkers and cyclists.
 
The pedestrian and bike routes need to not only be separate, but the pedestrian path needs to be both more appealing and more obvious than the bike route. Most of the Southwest Corridor involves separated, parallel paths, but very few people use the pedestrian path, so the de facto result is the bike route as a shared use path. It's frustrating as somebody who mostly bikes the route, but I am sympathetic to the walkers and joggers, because the pedestrian path sucks much of the time (concrete instead of asphalt, closer to car traffic, etc.). Too often, paths for non-car ROW users are made inconvenient and physically taxing. As a bike rider, I'll accept less convenient, because the combination of speed and gear leverage makes it less of an issue. But when I'm walking, I don't want something that clearly tells me I have no business being there in the first place.
 
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