Biking in Boston

[HenryAlan]

How on earth do they already have the design in one week and the funding??

I'm pretty sure this was already in the works. They just didn't get there fast enough, but it's not a case of the decision being made because somebody was killed by a reckless driver.

 

[Texasian]

I'm pretty sure this was already in the works. They just didn't get there fast enough, but it's not a case of the decision being made because somebody was killed by a reckless driver.

Ehhh… no?

Everything east of Anderson Bridge was descoped from DCR’s current Memorial Drive projects back in 2022. This really smells of a cover your ass reaction. It’s possible they had some designs on a shelf gathering dust, but I can’t find any evidence that suggests it was being actively pursued.

 

[bigeman312]

I think they mean 12’ wide. How on earth do they already have the design in one week and the funding??

EDIT: Crimson reporting it’s a 12’ wide path the entire length from the boathouse to the bridge https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2024/10/1/cambridge-bike-safety-policy-order/

This appears to be approximately a 0.2 mile extension of the full-width multi-use trail to the BU Bridge.

Fine for a start, but what about the section between the BU Bridge and the Eliot Bridge? That’s over 2.3 miles or, by my arithmetic, 12 cyclist-death worth of projects. I don’t accept that conversion rate.

 

[ritchiew]

What exactly is the plan for this 12' bike path? There's no extra 12' in the existing road and sidewalk. Are they expanding the sidewalk south? Rebuilding part of the bridge over an active railway? This doesn't make sense they can just announce something like that and start next week. What's going on here?

 

[cubbe8]

What exactly is the plan for this 12' bike path? There's no extra 12' in the existing road and sidewalk. Are they expanding the sidewalk south? Rebuilding part of the bridge over an active railway? This doesn't make sense they can just announce something like that and start next week. What's going on here?

I would assume the buffered bike lane would be removed and space allocated for the shared use path.

 

[HenryAlan]

Ehhh… no?

Everything east of Anderson Bridge was descoped from DCR’s current Memorial Drive projects back in 2022. This really smells of a cover your ass reaction. It’s possible they had some designs on a shelf gathering dust, but I can’t find any evidence that suggests it was being actively pursued.

According to Mike Connolly, it was already in the works:

x.com

x.com

It’s something our delegation has been advocating for going back more than year; my understanding is DCR had agreed to do it and had been taking steps to move forward prior to last week.

 

[Texasian]

According to Mike Connolly, it was already in the works:

x.com

x.com

I'm just surprised that any public project can get to a shovel ready status without public meetings. My curiosity has gotten the better of me and I submitted a FOIA request for designs and comms around prioritization/scheduling of the project.

 

[HenryAlan]

I suspect you won't find any records of meetings. A project in the planning phases can be underway without having reached the public meeting phase. I think that's what is going on here -- they have some plans, they have not yet engaged the public. The question I have, is whether they should go down that engagement path at all, or simply build the proposed infrastructure as quickly as possible. It is an obvious safety issue, much like the need to fill potholes, and should probably get a quick build without requiring public comment.

 

[FK4]

Let's not give the MBTA more assets to maintain, especially in a category they have no expertise maintaining. Plus, I'm inclined to keep the DCR parkways with DCR, rather than MassDOT, as I do want them managed over the long term as a park asset first, not as a transportation asset. DCR has been getting better, they just don't get the money they need. Plus, it's complex assets like bridges *were* transfered to MassDOT in 2009 - to include the BU rotary overpass and the bridge over the Grand Junction, the segment where the fatality occurred. As I mentioned upthread, the stretch from Magazine to Dewolfe is currently in the middle of a major $51M MassDOT proposal to rebuild it all in 2027; DCR was left holding the bag there, but MassDOT is the one responsible for improving that stretch of road.View attachment 56034

After the death last week I was reading all these articles saying that DCR or just the state in general dropped this reconstruction bomb on Cambridge and had never bothered to reach out to the city government in anyway whatsoever. Pretty abysmal. It’s definitely true that DCR does not get anywhere near enough funding, But I feel like Massachusetts, everybody is polarized between just hating the bureaucracy, and being a bureaucracy apologist arguing that [insert bureaucratic entity here] is underfunded. It’s pretty clear that for situations like DCR and the MBTA, there’s not enough money but there is also an astounding lack of accountability and good functioning that is not entirely excused by the lack of money. It would be nice if we had more critical executives and legislators.

Anyway, when this overpass gets rebuilt, it should be one lane in each direction. Over- and underpasses are always speedways because they are brief stretches where only cars go. It’s inevitable that people fly over this bridge, and that has ripple effects for the sidewalks near the on-ramps, since cars trying to enter at the tail end of the bridge are worrying about getting clipped by people flying over the bridge at 50mph.

 

[bigeman312]

After the death last week I was reading all these articles saying that DCR or just the state in general dropped this reconstruction bomb on Cambridge and had never bothered to reach out to the city government in anyway whatsoever. Pretty abysmal. It’s definitely true that DCR does not get anywhere near enough funding, But I feel like Massachusetts, everybody is polarized between just hating the bureaucracy, and being a bureaucracy apologist arguing that [insert bureaucratic entity here] is underfunded. It’s pretty clear that for situations like DCR and the MBTA, there’s not enough money but there is also an astounding lack of accountability and good functioning that is not entirely excused by the lack of money. It would be nice if we had more critical executives and legislators.

Anyway, when this overpass gets rebuilt, it should be one lane in each direction. Over- and underpasses are always speedways because they are brief stretches where only cars go. It’s inevitable that people fly over this bridge, and that has ripple effects for the sidewalks near the on-ramps, since cars trying to enter at the tail end of the bridge are worrying about getting clipped by people flying over the bridge at 50mph.

This overpass should come down and Memorial Blvd should be boulevard-ized a la Casey Overpass and the Arborway in Forest Hills.

Instead of a rotary, this could be a signalized intersection, like the one with JFK St. That would free up space for a two way cycle track and separated sidewalks on both sides.

Thoughts?

EDITED FOR SPELLING

 

[ritchiew]

I suspect you won't find any records of meetings. A project in the planning phases can be underway without having reached the public meeting phase. I think that's what is going on here -- they have some plans, they have not yet engaged the public. The question I have, is whether they should go down that engagement path at all, or simply build the proposed infrastructure as quickly as possible. It is an obvious safety issue, much like the need to fill potholes, and should probably get a quick build without requiring public comment.

I think I agree. My hesitation is I kind of expect DCR to do a crap job without some public oversight. There are so many instances of them favoring car traffic above the safety of anyone else. Now it looks like they're building a bike lane in an really reactive way. There seems like a risk they are about to build something stupid and call it progress.

 

[sneijder]

I think I agree. My hesitation is I kind of expect DCR to do a crap job without some public oversight. There are so many instances of them favoring car traffic above the safety of anyone else. Now it looks like they're building a bike lane in an really reactive way. There seems like a risk they are about to build something stupid and call is progress.

Yes this. This is a great opportunity to push back against the narrative of "we need someone to die in order for change to happen" and accelerate a full review of all the different chokepoints on the bike path, not just this one. The entire stretch past the BU bridge to River St is uncomfortably narrow and basically a sidewalk.

 

[millerm277]

This overpass should come down and Memorial Blvd should be boulevard-ized a la Casey Overpass and the Arborway in Forest Hills.

Instead of a rotary, this could be a signalized intersection, like the one with JFK St. That would free up space for a two way cycle track and separated sidewalks on both sides.

Thoughts?

The intersection at JFK Street appears to be a disaster every time I've been there, so using that as a positive example doesn't....seem like one to me.

It's so inadequate to handle the load that it frequently causes jams stretching all the way back up to Harvard Square. That stretch is also identified as a MBTA high delay bus corridor, as the 66/86 are heavily impacted by it, it's not just a "car" problem.

I'm sure there is some sort of surface intersection configuration that could work tolerably but I also expect that it will probably wind up a bit like the other side of the BU Bridge - and some seem not so fond of how many lanes wide that is, either.

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That said, I'll propose an alternative for some consideration - Chop the overpass from 4 lanes to 2 and regain 20ft+ of width to improve things with. Functionally it's only a 2-lane anyway at peak times, the right lanes of each are occupied by queues for the rotary. Should be zero downsides for anyone relative to now.

And with no merging on the ramps causing splits in driver attention/"difficult" decision-making/high accident locations, the areas immediately before/after there will see less obvious gains in safety as well. (like in front of the boathouse).

 

[Stlin]

For reference: the previous design alternatives from 2019, before phase 3 got truncated to Eliot-Anderson and the Reid/BU bridge overpass project got handed to MassDOT.

Since ~January 2021 as part of the rescoping of phase III, it's been managed by MassDOT as project 611987, with a apparent scope that extends from the Morse School to Dewolfe. For all the criticism of DCR, MassDOT also isn't exactly known for not prioritizing car throughput above all else - but either way given mixed ownership it's definitely some sort of interagency deal. Whatever DCR is building now might very well be functionally temporary, what with the MassDOT project having an FY27 date on it, or they're building something that had been templated to connect to that project. Regardless, I'd actually be surprised if these immediate DCR improvements are able to match that east of Dewolfe, the constraint being available width on the bridge crossing the Grand Junction. I'd be shocked if this wasn't limited to something along the lines of restriping and perhaps widening the area where the path hops onto the sidewalk.

 

[Koopzilla24]

Fine for a start, but what about the section between the BU Bridge and the Eliot Bridge? That’s over 2.3 miles or, by my arithmetic, 12 cyclist-death worth of projects. I don’t accept that conversion rate.

At the very least most of that section has wider paths either some more distance from the road or with guard rails or trees between the road and path. Should still have a separate protected bike path from the pedestrian path though just saying it's in a mildly better place than south of BU Bridge