Biking the Boston 'Burbs (Trails, MDC, & Towns beyond Hubway area)

[sm89]

Arlington will probably focus its Hubways on Mass Ave--maybe the Rink/Summer St--rather than the bike path--when locating its stations to de-emphasize commuting and make shopping/Post Office/Town Hall stuff more the focus.

I know they were considering Hubway, but have the committed to it?

Does anyone know the status of other municipalities joining the system? I've heard rumors of Newton and Medford over the past few months.

There are a lot of new stations and expansions in the existing towns coming up with the new operating contract they announced a month or so ago. I wonder if they are waiting for this to happen first?

 

[ceo]

That's awesome! Why do they need to replace the rail bridge, though?

Did a little research. Per this article, the 1265 Main developers' plans for new on- and off-ramps from 117 to I-95 require the existing bridge to be demolished. But, the maps and videos on the 1265 Main site show the bike path going across the existing bridge, and in fact neither of the new ramps encroaches on the bridge: they want to extend Green St south into the Rte. 20 ramp system to provide access to I-95 NB and SB, with an additional ramp from 117 to I-95 NB.
Interestingly, they also want to relocate the Kendal Green commuter rail stop to right behind the retirement home just east of the Waltham/Weston line, with a new road along the Central Mass. ROW connecting it to Green St.

 

[Arlington]

I know they were considering Hubway, but have the committed to it?

Does anyone know the status of other municipalities joining the system? I've heard rumors of Newton and Medford over the past few months.

There are a lot of new stations and expansions in the existing towns coming up with the new operating contract they announced a month or so ago. I wonder if they are waiting for this to happen first?

The town of Arlington has not had any official progress since January (when Hubway was the leading contender and they were seeking community input)

I could see Medford begging Somerville to put a station at the Medford Whole Foods (part of the parking lot is in Somerville), but I think Medford has its hands full getting the Clippership Connector built (along the Mystic on City/State property)

MEDFORD UPDATE

Medford has a couple of complete streets pilot projects. One of them would add a bike lane to inbound Boston Ave in West Medford (pointing towards Tufts) when the street undergoes and upcoming repaving. This is a bigger political deal (progress) given that Medford has
precious few bike lanes on its own streets (a tiny strip from Winchester to the High School where the thermoplastic crumbled off within 1 season) and few even on DCR roads (there's one on the Fellsway West where it is not near anyone's homes)

The other item that the Mayor is working on is cobbling together city & foundation money to build the Clippership Conector along land that is in various (but friendly) hands (DCR, MassDOT, City, & City Housing Auth)

 

[Balerion]

Input wanted on new Weston rail trail

Before long, Weston will have a brand new recreation area that, if well designed, will be enjoyed by lots of Weston residents doing lots of different things.

Yes, Weston will soon have a Rail Trail, a multi-use paved path, 10 feet wide, along the 100-foot-wide abandoned right-of-way of the defunct Central Massachusetts Railroad. Think of this as a long, thin recreational park.

...

RTAC verified that portions of the right-of-way currently used by equestrians could continue to be used in that manner after the new trail is in place.

RTAC has overseen a preliminary engineering study of a tunnel under Conant Road, where the trail route is currently blocked. It is also starting to consider how the trail should be continued to the Waltham border, a distance under a quarter mile.

The article has no mention of NIMBY opposition, but given that it's Weston there must be some grumbling about this, no?

Given the progress of Waltham's Wayside trail and possibly the Belmont Community Path, this could be a really long and nifty corridor.

 

[cden4]

My only requirement is that it's easy for me to access people's backyards so I can steal all their fancy TVs and take them on my bike back to the city :-D

 

[Roxxma]

My only requirement is that it's easy for me to access people's backyards so I can steal all their fancy TVs and take them on my bike back to the city :-D

I remember that being an argument at a Selectmen's meeting in Lexington when the Minuteman was proposed. I was in high school at the time and remember my biology teacher, a Watertown native who had a thing against "snooty towns" (not to mention, Lexington was our school's rival, so I think he was coming at it from that angle -either his brother or best friend taught at LHS, so they exploited a friendly rivalry), having a field day with that argument and how illogical it was. Thankfully, Lexington's Board of Selectmen was a bit wiser than some of its NIMBYs.

 

[FK4]

My only requirement is that it's easy for me to access people's backyards so I can steal all their fancy TVs and take them on my bike back to the city :-D

Isnt that what bike trails are for?

 

[FK4]

This is a bit of an aside, but over the past two years I've visited Hudson on the way back from apple picking and it's really blowing up - lots of new small businesses, and young people everywhere in them; the main street (which is Main St) has seriously revitalized over the past 10 years but accelerated over the past 2 and remarkably so. I'm not really sure what's driving this since Hudson is pretty remote. It might just be 495 businesses and people getting priced out of the city and deciding to live in an affordable revitalizing mill town. Anyway, the Assabet Trail runs right through town, but if they ever get the Mass Central laid out, it would be a pretty be HUGE for Hudson. Worth checking out.

 

[CBCArch61]

This is a bit of an aside, but over the past two years I've visited Hudson on the way back from apple picking and it's really blowing up - lots of new small businesses, and young people everywhere in them; the main street (which is Main St) has seriously revitalized over the past 10 years but accelerated over the past 2 and remarkably so. I'm not really sure what's driving this since Hudson is pretty remote. It might just be 495 businesses and people getting priced out of the city and deciding to live in an affordable revitalizing mill town. Anyway, the Assabet Trail runs right through town, but if they ever get the Mass Central laid out, it would be a pretty be HUGE for Hudson. Worth checking out.

I grew up in Lancaster (2 towns over from Hudson) and the transformation has been incredible. They've been doing a lot of road improvements that make getting to downtown from 495 a ton easier. I remember the Assabet Trail took forever to finish over on the east side of town due to reconstructing an old bridge. Ive never rode it myself but hear good things. If you ever have time, I would recommend the Rail Trail Flat Bread Company on Main, delicious!

 

[FK4]

^Thanks!

 

[elemenoh]

Has anyone here heard of VBikes? Apparently they're a Dallas-based stationless bike rental company that's looking to open in some of the non-Hubway towns and out on Cape Cod.

I'm wondering if any MA towns have put in place regulations for these rental schemes, since otherwise it sounds like they can just put the bikes out and start operating.

 

[JeffDowntown]

Has anyone here heard of VBikes? Apparently they're a Dallas-based stationless bike rental company that's looking to open in some of the non-Hubway towns and out on Cape Cod.

I'm wondering if any MA towns have put in place regulations for these rental schemes, since otherwise it sounds like they can just put the bikes out and start operating.

I don't know how this has worked out in the US, but in China these stationless rentals have become an enormous nuisance in most major cities. Bikes randomly abandoned all over public spaces and private property. Huge pushback is ensuing.

 

[Balerion]

Rail trail update in Swampscott

Town officials have received nine proposals from design firms to advance their plans for the construction of a rail trail.

The two-plus mile 10-foot wide trail will run from Swampscott Train Station to the Marblehead line at Seaview Avenue, connecting with the Marblehead Rail Trail, which also links to trails in Salem.

 

[elemenoh]

I don't know how this has worked out in the US, but in China these stationless rentals have become an enormous nuisance in most major cities. Bikes randomly abandoned all over public spaces and private property. Huge pushback is ensuing.

Worcester just launched a dockless system with Ofo this weekend:
Bike-sharing company ofo puts 400 bicycles in Worcester: Here's how you can rent one for $1 an hour

The China-based company officially launched in Worcester on Thursday, unloading 200 of their iconic yellow bikes on the Common...
For the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce, which last year prioritized bike-sharing as a needed Worcester amenity, the ofo move is a big win because the city won't have to pay for any infrastructure.

 

[Arlington]

Winchester-Stoneham-Woburn Tri-Community Greenway continues to have brisk construction progress:
https://www.facebook.com/pg/TriCommunityGreenway/photos/

from their website (http://www.tricommunitygreenway.org/), they report:

November: Construction continues. Currently, most construction is happening in Woburn. The majority of the main path in Winchester is complete, except for a small section near 620 Washington Street. October construction was mainly along the old railroad right-of-way in Woburn between Central Street and the city line. Construction has also started in Stoneham with grubbing along the path for roots, etc. for the path bed. Construction for the path will continue as long as it is warm enough for paving to be done, and then the contractor will work on installing the new bridge over the Aberjona River in Woburn, as long as the weather permits.

October: Construction is finishing up in Winchester and the path bed is being prepared and filled along the railroad right-of-way in Woburn. Tree work is also being done in Stoneham.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

By contrast, if you plan to commute "that far" and "that regularly" by bike, planners want you to buy a bike, and the correct "public facilities" response is to increase Pedal-and-Park cage capacity.

It's great to encourage people who are on the fence about the own vs bikeshare question to choose the own option, but has anyone looked carefully from a public health perspective at whether the folks considering bikeshare vs not-bike in this context would benefit from bikeshare?

Hubway tries to avoid stations with 100% commute-direction demand because a lot of human labor goes into:
- re-stocking home-end stations during AM start (avoiding depletion)
- unclogging work-end stations at the end of the AM rush (to ensure some empty docks)
- re-stocking the work-end stations during the PM rush (to avoid all-empty docks)
- and re-stocking work-end stations to support evening errands

If someone were to propose to replace the 40' buses used on route 77 with a large fleet of vehicles the size Hubway uses to move bikes around, that would probably be perceived as totally absurd. Does that suggest that maybe we ought to consider using 40' vehicles to move shared bikes around? If we have buses that currently have a clear peak direction, would filling them with bikeshare bikes for some reverse peak trips (which would be operated non-revenue from a passenger carrying perspective) end up improving the number of people who get to their jobs per bus round trip?

Arlington will probably focus its Hubways on Mass Ave--maybe the Rink/Summer St--rather than the bike path--when locating its stations to de-emphasize commuting and make shopping/Post Office/Town Hall stuff more the focus.

Are the stores in Arlington Center uninterested in getting the business of folks who live near the intersection of Lake St and the Minuteman?

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

Re: Lynnfield to Peabody trail

That path would be a lovely thing if it was connected through, but crossing Rte 1 is going to be a bit of an issue.

I have gradually come to the conclusion that a road diet on Route 1 is likely the right solution here. Less than half a mile to the south of that potential trail crossing, southbound Route 1 narrows to a single lane just before merging with two lanes from I-95. If you move the merge down to a single lane to just north of the crossing, and turn the left lanes of route 1 at the crossing into island space for cyclists, and narrow the single travel lanes to 10' at the crossing, and set a suitably slow speed limit on Route 1 at the crossing, and perhaps add flashing lights that bicyclists can hit a button to activate, the crossing will probably work out OK.

 

[Balerion]

In early December, the Belmont Board of Selectmen approved a design for the Belmont Community Path. It'll cost $27.9m.

http://belmontonian.com/news/a-quar...king-selectmen-ok-recommended-community-path/

The committee’s timeline for the roughly two-mile project includes funding for preliminary and final design in 2018, secure construction funds from state and federal agencies by 2019 and construction in 2020 and 2021.

The design starts south of the Fitchburg line just west of Waverley and as the path moves east, it crosses to the north side of the tracks west of Belmont Ctr, then back to the south side near Alexander Ave. The crossings account for nearly half of the project cost.

http://belmont.wickedlocal.com/news/20171205/selectmen-approve-belmont-community-path-route

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

Given the challenges Belmont has had working with some of the abutters, I'm pleasantly surprised to see their Selectmen unanimously approving the bike path.

https://tedstransporttakes.wordpress.com/2017/12/27/the-value-of-bike-trails/ argues that bike paths in the suburbs are primarily useful for getting people to commuter rail stations, and argues that we should deprioritize recreational trails. While perhaps the potential trails that provide commuter rail connections deserve a bit more attention, I think the basic point that most bike paths are relatively cheap suggests that we might as well keep working on completing the long distance recreational trails as well.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

Given the progress of Waltham's Wayside trail and possibly the Belmont Community Path, this could be a really long and nifty corridor.

Given that the Mass Central Rail Trail already connects to the Farmington Canal Heritage Trail in Northampton, if we fill in all the gaps there will be a contiguous trail all the way from North Point Park in Cambridge to New Haven, and the southern part of the Farmington Canal Heritage Trail is part of the East Coast Greenway, which continues to Florida. North Point Park probably will also turn out to be not far from where the East Coast Greenway will continue to Maine.