Plan to ease Storrow load would add 2 Pike ramps
Earlier options to fix drive are called unworkable
By Matt Viser, Globe Staff | May 9, 2007
A state transportation committee wants to add an entrance and exit ramp to the Massachusetts Turnpike in the Back Bay to relieve traffic on Storrow Drive as the panel struggles to come up with plans for renovating the badly deteroriating Storrow Drive tunnel between Clarendon and Arlington streets.
The Transportation Advisory Committee, established by state officials to determine the best solution for the Storrow renovation, said the four options presented for consideration last year are impractical or unrealistic.
The options ranged from simple reconfigurations that would eliminate the tunnel and make the Back Bay portion of Storrow a surface road to an elaborate redesign with large east- and westbound tunnels. But the advisory committee concluded that neither of the two simple reconfigurations could handle Storrow's traffic loads and that the two more complex options would be too costly and attract more commuter traffic to the road by opening up bottlenecks.
As a result, the panel has asked the state Executive Office of Transportation to look into the feasibility of a new plan that would convert the pike into the main artery feeding the Back Bay and make Storrow a more pedestrian-friendly parkway, like Memorial Drive in Cambridge. Construction on the mammoth Storrow project, originally scheduled for 2008, has been pushed back to 2010.
"Fundamentally, there are too many cars on that road," said Elliott Laffer, chairman of the Transportation Advisory Committee, referring to Storrow. "We're suggesting that a look be taken to get people off Storrow by adding exit ramps off the turnpike."
Since officials announced the need to overhaul the Storrow Drive tunnel last year, the project has been the subject of intense public scrutiny.
Expected to require 18 months to four years to complete at a cost of $25 million to $200 million, renovation means major traffic disruptions.
And the road's future has stirred strong feelings. Some say that Storrow Drive, one of the city's busiest thouroughfares, must be expanded to accommodate increasing volumes of traffic. But the street also cuts through a fashionable Boston neighborhood, where it separates pricey town houses from parkland along the Charles River, and some say it should be scaled back.
Several officials said yesterday that the original hope of beginning construction next year was overly optimistic.
"This is a project that requires, demands, and deserves an extensive public process," said Wendy Fox, spokeswoman for the state Department of Conservation and Recreation, which oversees the 56-year-old Storrow Drive. "Based on the amount of public input we want to be able to have, and the length of the permitting process, 2010 is not far out."
The advisory committee says it wants the Executive Office of Transportation to look at several possibilities that would encourage some of the more than 100,000 drivers who use Storrow Drive each day to use the turnpike.
Ramps that would allow drivers to enter or leave the turnpike would make it an attractive alternative to Storrow Drive, which many motorists use because of its multiple ramps in the Back Bay.
Among the options the advisory committee has discussed is a westbound Mass. Pike exit ramp near Brookline Avenue, which would allow drivers to get off near Kenmore Square, and an eastbound onramp to the turnpike near the Bowker Overpass that carries traffic from the Fenway onto Storrow Drive. The committee also asked the Transportation Department to propose other locations for ramps to carry Back Bay traffic.
"For the most part, the benefits of the Big Dig are bypassing the Back Bay," said Meg Mainzer- Cohen, president of the Back Bay Association, a business group that has been lobbying Governor Deval Patrick to back ramps on the turnpike. "An offshoot of that is that some people are traveling on Storrow Drive right now who, if there was an option, would take the turnpike."
John Lamontagne, spokesman for the Executive Office of Transportation, said the office is reviewing the committee's request.
In plotting how to proceed with Storrow Drive, the advisory committee is looking into variations of the least complicated option proposed last spring, bringing Storrow Drive to grade level and adding traffic lights.
But it wants the Executive Office of Transportation to help determine whether Back Bay ramps on the turnpike would divert enough traffic from Storrow to make that plan feasible. In the event that studies determine that Storrow must continue to carry large volumes of traffic, the advisory committee is brainstorming options that would cut down on cost but reduce the impact of a major roadway in the neighborhood, such as an uncovered sunken roadway.
"There's a lot of conversations about this," said state Representative Marty Walz, a Democrat from the Back Bay. "It's like a balloon: You push it, the traffic goes somewhere else, and you want to understand the consequences of realigning your roadway configuration."
Changes to the roadway are limited because the Charles River Esplanade is on one side and Beacon Hill and Back Bay brownstones on the other. In the middle is a busy, curvy thoroughfare where nearly 6 out of 10 drivers are commuting to work, according to a recent transportation study.
Meanwhile, state officials keep a close eye on the aging tunnel. The latest inspection, conducted in March, found that the tunnel has cracked support beams and damage from collisions but that the conditions were no worse than they were in September, the time of its previous inspection.
State officials insisted yesterday that the tunnel is safe and said that they would do repairs as they are needed and monitor trouble spots.
"We do continuous repairs on anything that needs to be done in there," Fox said.
Matt Viser can be reached at
maviser@globe.com.
? Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.
