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

The City of Waltham striped a section of Lexington Street near Lake Street with the new road diet configuration with bike lanes. It's currently grooved pavement and is being used to show people what the new set up will be when paving is completed.
 
Now can they PLEASE do the section between Western Ave and the BU Bridge? It is so insanely narrow and bumpy.
 
sm89 said:
Now can they PLEASE do the section between Western Ave and the BU Bridge? It is so insanely narrow and bumpy.
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Yes, please. Not safe at all. Nor is the sidewalk on the Grand Junction overpass.
 
Definitely. Now, the Cambridge-side sections:
  • from the Eliot Bridge to JFK Street
  • from River Street to the BU Boathouse
as well as the Boston-side section:
  • at Cambridge Street, and the first stretch south of Cambridge Street
are the three worst sections remaining downstream from Arsenal Street. They've done great work the past couple years upgrading some of the worst stretches.

I've been a daily PDW bike commuter for years now, and I'm impressed/want to see the momentum continue.
 
Bike lanes have been striped on Lexington Street in Waltham from Windsor Village to Curve Street. It even is a buffered bike lane northbound at the High School.
 
Zagster is coming to Bridgewater State University this year thanks to a student governance 'sustainability committee' that I was apart of. It's only the first phase of the bike share for the school but I hope to get more integration of the program into the local Bridgewater community in the next phases.
I think this universities can help push these smaller communities to accept more pro-bike policies.
https://www.bridgew.edu/news-events/news/bike-sharing-program-planned
 
DAVE said:
Zagster is coming to Bridgewater State University this year thanks to a student governance 'sustainability committee' that I was apart of. It's only the first phase of the bike share for the school but I hope to get more integration of the program into the local Bridgewater community in the next phases.
I think this universities can help push these smaller communities to accept more pro-bike policies.
https://www.bridgew.edu/news-events/news/bike-sharing-program-planned
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Congrats & thanks for your alternative transit advocacy.
 
DAVE said:
Zagster is coming to Bridgewater State University this year thanks to a student governance 'sustainability committee' that I was apart of. It's only the first phase of the bike share for the school but I hope to get more integration of the program into the local Bridgewater community in the next phases.
I think this universities can help push these smaller communities to accept more pro-bike policies.
https://www.bridgew.edu/news-events/news/bike-sharing-program-planned
Click to expand...

We just teamed with Zagster to launch bikeshare in Manchester, NH this summer. There are 6 stations open now with a 7th due to open on Manchester's Westside next month. The real challenge is finding sponsors for a station with a minimum 2-year commitment ($9,000/year). If you're working to get more of the Bridgewater community on board, work first with the large employers around the community to see if they'll support stations. It would be great if you guys connected your network to Brockton, or maybe even the correctional facility south of the campus if their employees live in town.
 
1265 Main LLC developer of Polaroid property in Waltham has committed to $500,000 in funding to help build the Wayside rail trail from there Property to Lexington Street. They have also agreed to fund the design of a new pedestrian bridge over I-95 to replace the rail bridge to carry the Wayside trail.
 
^That's huge, great news. Biking on Main Street in Waltham is a disaster. I do it every day, but not for the past couple weeks as I'm recovering from a bike accident on Main Street.
 
That's awesome! Why do they need to replace the rail bridge, though?
 
Main St in Waltham really just seems like a fail for everyone. The lane configurations make no sense and leave no room for bikes.
 
ceo said:
That's awesome! Why do they need to replace the rail bridge, though?
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I had this question too. Seems more like the RR bridge over 128 or its eastern approach might need some revision/upgrade?
 
What, you guys don't think if Waltham builds the train to the city limits, Weston will spring into action on their segment of Mass Central?

(just kidding)
 
Lexington is putting in a 1-station Zagster bike share...

Bike share pilot planned for Lexington Center
http://lexington.wickedlocal.com/news/20170815/bike-share-pilot-planned-for-lexington-center

The two-year pilot program will be done through a company called Zagster and would cost $27,000 a year, said Tintacolis. However, she said, that cost included marketing, bike maintenance, instillation of the rack of 14 bikes, and bike replacement. It would not include the pad on which to place the bike rack, which would likely be made of sod and gravel and would be installed by the Department of Public Works.
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What's the point of a bike share with just one station?
 
Think of it as an automated bike rental stand for recreational jaunts along the minuteman bikepath
 
Lexington should eventually get at least one HubWay in the Center for Alewife commuters.
 
BussesAin'tTrains said:
Lexington should eventually get at least one HubWay in the Center for Alewife commuters.
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Both Hubway and Zagster want you to think of them for spontaneous and errand trips, or for tourists going site-to-site, not for daily commuters.

To get political and local business support in a town for the kind of subsidization that both Hubway and Zagster demand, it seems you need to keep the bikes "in town" and improve the convenience of "shopping local" and not just be a boon to the 10 to 15 or so commuters it takes to empty the docks each morning (they come in 5 bike increments and ideal fullness no more than capacity-minus-one to allow an arrival to dock)

Hubway's network assumes a station-to-station web of trips, with stations being "near enough" to businesses that they can picture customers using them.

Zagster has grown by supporting work-"anyplace errand"-work (and use their self-locking system at the "errand" end, rather than a station). This works better in less-dense places and/or for One Big Employer (where bikes get you "off campus" or "across campus")

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.

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

Zagster is probably the better option (for now) for Lexington, because "stuff" is just a little more spread out, and it is hard to put a dock everyplace you want to go.

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.
 
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