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Wait, I'm sorry, can you clarify, are you suggesting that automating the Orange Line is the better deal, or building a Sullivan <> GJ <> Longwood service is better?

Great to see you again, @omaja! Your maps from ~10 (!) years ago have remained a source of inspiration (which I'm sure is visible in many of my ideas which have built on yours). The new map looks fantastic, I'm eager to see the rest! More specifically, the map looks fantastic both...

This was my vague recollection as well, but I can't easily lay my hands on the analysis.

I'd love to see the data on this. (@TheRatmeister IIRC you've become a bit of a wizard for questions like this?)

Re increasing Orange Line headways: I am increasingly intrigued by the prospect of higher frequencies through automation. But most of the examples I know of are either new systems or in places like London with populations much larger than Greater Boston's. Just some back of the napkin math...

The dashed line is meant to indicate that the alignment is not precise. The gradient aspect is one I hadn't thought about, though, as you say, it's probably doable. I don't see why Gateway Center would need to be partially demolished though. (Well, one thing to note is that the Wellington...

So, the Orange Line does a whole lot of nothing between Assembly and Malden Center. After stopping at Wellington -- a park-n-ride with some nearby TOD, though not very much in walking distance -- it runs non-stop for 1.7 miles, one of the longest gaps between stations in the entire system...

I wonder if a geographic inset for Allston/Brookline/Longwood would be feasible.

Re the underpass at Boylston: from what I've read, and what I've seen in pictures, I cannot imagine those ever being opened for public use again. They looked, for lack of a better word, gnarly (and not in the cool way). I think @JeffDowntown is suggesting that the renovation question...

There are a bunch of possible solutions for that, though. A lane of the Surface Road between Summer and Lincoln could be handed over to transit use. Bear in mind, this will get the full SL4 + SL5 frequencies, currently planned at 4 minute headways at peak. That's a pretty strong argument for...

Looks fantastic. Interestingly, the forum software distorted the image in the email preview for me, turning the background black. ("Dark mode.") Not gonna lie, it looked pretty damn good that way too. The tiniest of nitpicks -- which I imagine you are probably aware of, and for which I'm aware...

I have a vague recollection that at one point it was common that emergency dispatchers would call railroad dispatchers in a situation like this, but I have no idea how that would actually work in practice. I also can't really imagine a railroad ever giving anyone, even emergency vehicles...

It's interesting, though, because "higher capacity rail that can still interact with the streetscape" is really a description of Los Angeles-style light rail. It does make me wonder if there's a world where some of the Comm Ave (or Beacon St, for that matter) crossings are closed, and others...

I'll stop spamming the thread now, but I see that BostonInTransit.com now has full scans of the Plates of the above report, which either they didn't have before, or which I didn't notice. Either way, they are very cool...

Oh shit wait they were proposing the extension to Brighton be at grade. (I think.)

Really makes you wish the 1926 proposal for a subway under Commonwealth had worked out.

For better or worse, the Mattapan Line has been branded as part of the Red Line since the MBTA adopted the Cambridge Seven rebranding in the 1960s. To the T's credit, it's never been shown as contiguous -- there's also been a gap or other visual discontinuity to imply the need to transfer. For...

So what I'm hearing is that, at least in terms of the OCR projects, which do seem broadly comparable, SCR is coming in a bit more expensive than Middleboro/Kingston, at $1.3B for 35 miles, versus $1.2B for ~50 miles. But hardly an order of magnitude difference -- something like $25M per mile vs...

Wow! That's the biggest change to the system map in 20 years. Looking forward to digging in to this!

Looking for a bit of a history lesson here. South Coast Rail has become (very visibly) a long expensive project. Was the same true for previous recent commuter rail expansions? I recall Greenbush going through some birthing pains and delays, but in general it seems like Old Colony Restoration...