Biking in Boston

Shepard said:
Too bad they won't try it systemwide, although I guess I can't blame them for wanting to pilot this on a small scale.

Do we know anything yet about new stations opening next year?
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They never installed the one next to forest hills, so I'm guessing that will be one of the first ones. The Faulkner Hospital has offered to pay for the operation of a station if they put one there (who knows if this will happen, though) - but I think it'll keep creeping toward rozzie and west rox as long as Brookline expands theirs too. It would be nice to see it expanded into roxbury and dorchester, but the bike infrastructure there really needs some serious work. I also wonder if they're avoiding putting stations on DCR property...

People in Mattapan really really want Hubway there - might be a while for that, though.
 
Have any of those Mattapan residents organized into a group advocating for cycle tracks on Blue Hill Ave? That would go a long way towards attracting Hubway, I bet.
 
I know I keep beating this drum, but they need dozens in Dorchester! Upgrading infrastructure will attract Hubway. Hubway will spur the usage that necessitates an upgrade in infrastructure. One of those things needs to happen already.

Dorchester is the neighborhood that would benefit the most from Hubway expansion due to population density, lower car ownership, trips being taken in a variety of directions throughout the day and substandard transit in many parts.
 
It most certainly would help Dorchester. I hope that having Mayor Marty Walsh in office will attract more focus. I seem to recall that he was involved in the Dot Ave bike lane effort. What do you think?
 
It has been slowly expanding into Roxbury -- there's one at Egleston and another at Roxbury Crossing, at least. I don't understand why they'd go all the way out to Egleston without putting a station in Dudley, though.
 
On my side of the river, we really need Hubway in (a) Magoun Square, (b) Sullivan Square, and then (c) all along Broadway in East Somerville up to Winter Hill.
 
Ron Newman said:
It has been slowly expanding into Roxbury -- there's one at Egleston and another at Roxbury Crossing, at least. I don't understand why they'd go all the way out to Egleston without putting a station in Dudley, though.
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That's not hard to figure out. The area between Egleston and Forest Hills is being taken over by yuppies who would have lived on the other side of the Orange Line five to ten years back. That hasn't happened in Dudley yet. Hubway follows gentrification patters most likely. The other point favoring Egleston before Dudley is that it is closer to existing hubway locations, and will dovetail nicely with the planned Forest Hills facility. It could be either or both explanations, but there is some logic to the sequence.
 
Hutchison said:
There is a path between those areas? I always bike down Columbus because I thought the path between Mass ave and Back Bay Station was pedestrian only.
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There is an off street path that parallels Columbus from Ruggles to one block before Mass Ave. (complete with a separate pedestrian path). You then have to to a zig and a zag to come out next to the Mass Ave. station, and can cross there to the flower pot section of the park, where it is really pretty useless for cycling. The section along Columbus isn't well maintained, and has too many wandering pedestrians. I stopped using it before they had even painted in the bike lanes. The Southwest Corridor path has issues, primarily dealing with street crossings, but it has brought a lot of people to cycling who might not otherwise have been willing to ride from JP and beyond if it weren't for that path. Even mediocre infrastructure is a killer app when it comes to encouraging cycling.
 
HenryAlan said:
T The other point favoring Egleston before Dudley is that it is closer to existing hubway locations
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Dudley is pretty close to both Roxbury Crossing and existing South End locations. It's a logical next place to put a station, especially as it's a major bus hub.
 
HenryAlan said:
That's not hard to figure out. The area between Egleston and Forest Hills is being taken over by yuppies who would have lived on the other side of the Orange Line five to ten years back. That hasn't happened in Dudley yet. Hubway follows gentrification patters most likely. The other point favoring Egleston before Dudley is that it is closer to existing hubway locations, and will dovetail nicely with the planned Forest Hills facility. It could be either or both explanations, but there is some logic to the sequence.
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I'm not so quick to adopt a conspiracy theory, but it is peculiar that bike-shares seem to closely follow the path of yuppies. I wonder if it's a spurious correlation as yuppies are more likely to settle in densely populated areas, close to employment centers, with good transit access - generally the same qualifications bike share locations look for.

Still, I wonder why some low-income neighborhoods that would really benefit from bike-share in Washington, Chicago and Boston are delayed when compared to comparable gentrified neighborhoods. It probably has to do with political sway being greater in wealthier neighborhoods.
 
Ron Newman said:
It has been slowly expanding into Roxbury -- there's one at Egleston and another at Roxbury Crossing, at least. I don't understand why they'd go all the way out to Egleston without putting a station in Dudley, though.
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Huh? There's been a station in Dudley for a couple of years--I've used it dozens of times. It was originally on Warren on the block between the bus station and the Ferdinand. Lately its been in front of the old police station on Dudley Street.

Just checked the map and its gone though...but there's been a station there almost since the beginning of the program.
 
OK, I was depending on the map, which does not show a station in Dudley. Has it maybe been already removed as part of the winter shutdown?
 
Pretty sure uphams corner recently existed as well. Or at least is soon slated to.
 
Yeah, I didn't realize that removed stations get removed entirely from the map rather than just changing to some color indicating 'closed'.
 
Matthew said:
Have any of those Mattapan residents organized into a group advocating for cycle tracks on Blue Hill Ave? That would go a long way towards attracting Hubway, I bet.
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Try completely separate path that runs parallel to blue hill ave:

http://www.boston.com/yourtown/news/mattapan/2013/05/hold_in_mattapan_residents_con.html

Cycletracks on blue hill ave would be extremely beneficial (and best immediate solution), but there would be more of a fight with local businesses.

more info here:

http://fairmountcollaborative.org/our-work/create-a-fairmount-greenway/
 
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Cycletracks on Blue Hill Ave would interfere with any future Green Line or 28X-type service due to the limited width of the road. Businesses complaining about losing a few parking spots was one of the death knells of the original 28X proposal.
 
Blue Hill Avenue is a pretty damn wide road.

Businesses complaining about losing a few parking spaces are short sighted. They're locked into an auto-centric mindset. It's like they're in a desert, we're talking about building an aqueduct to them, and they're worried about losing a few camel-hitching posts.
 
Ron Newman said:
Yeah, I didn't realize that removed stations get removed entirely from the map rather than just changing to some color indicating 'closed'.
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The first few switched to "planned" but then they started just deleting them.
 
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