Bowker Overpass replacement?

That's pretty scary. A lot more folks walk under this than under the McGrath overpass (though it has its share of pedestrians, too). I sure hope the section over the Mass Pike is in better shape.
 
Sounds like DoT is not on board with removing Bowker within 10-15 years

http://backbay.patch.com/articles/bowker-overpass-repairs-delayed-till-fall

Removal seems unlikely as [DOT spokesman] Verseckes pointed at "unacceptable impact" to traffic in the area.

"Because there is no other existing major roadway connection serving this same purpose, removal of the Bowker Overpass would likely result in the creation of a major traffic bottleneck," he said.
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How about new ramps off of the Mass Pike? Tear down Bowker, and boot people off of Soldiers Field and Storrow in favor of the Pike.
 
At least they're grounding the Casey and McGrath, supposedly. I can deal with being 2 of 3. :)
 
Well, Bowker is also tied into the Storrow tunnel replacement issue. Basically, I don't think it's worth the money to rebuild that tunnel. And if that's not going to be grade separated, then Bowker doesn't need to be grade separated either.

I think that's what it may come down to in the next 10-15 years. The money won't be there to rebuild these overdone 1950s-era grade separations, and the old-timers at MassDOT will move on.
 
And while we're on the topic:

http://www.postbulletin.com/enterta...cle_7a851cd1-e0dd-51ec-b488-1d0abe44509d.html

Mayor Bertrand Delanoe inaugurated the 2.3-kilometer (1.4 mile) stretch along the Seine River between the Royal and Alma bridges on the Left Bank on Wednesday. Once a road with buzzing traffic, it's now a liberating walkway with athletic activities, restaurants, a floating garden, a picnic spot and a children's area.
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51c4951b867b3.preview-300.jpg
 
I need to ask of the numbers of the Bowker Overpass? If it was brought up in the middle part of this thread, I missed out the middle part of the of the discussion if it was already brought up. So apologies in advance if so.

I lean to find the idea of removing Casey and McGrath as justified by the numbers. The discussions seems to point that Casey was designed to handle more cars that never arised while historically (or so I read) that the area handle it just fine without it back then. Meanwhile the McGrath have been seeing declining traffic without abation and should only decline more with the Green Line (assuming it gets built) and reworked ramps to I-93 (I'm assuming this reworking should help with how Leverett Connector backups kills the rest of the highway). Thus removing it would do more good to the immediate neighborhood with only a slight delay for drivers (unless it is that terribly timed)

But what about the Bowker? It seems MassDOT says the numbers indicate removing it will do more damage than good by the bottleneck. To me, just saying it is highway mentality without knowing the actual flaws in calculation and decision making seems to be only its own type of thinking rather trying to figure out the most good for most people.

Also, there are other middle ground solution to the bridge too. The objective of is not the overpass itself, but the damage to the surrounding area by its ugliness, but even the picture above shows a bridge that if rebuilt to look like that would still accomplish the ultimate aim. The first page with Van suggested it too.
 
"Because there is no other existing major roadway connection serving this same purpose, removal of the Bowker Overpass would likely result in the creation of a major traffic bottleneck," he said.
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That would certainly be true if "removal" included the section over the Mass Pike -- but nobody is proposing that. The part over Beacon Street and Comm. Ave. is entirely redundant with the parallel surface roads Charlesgate East and West, so removing it would not take away any connectivity.
 
There are major downsides to an overpass even if it's replaced with something prettier- stone overpasses are still foreboding and dark underneath. (Though a dramatic arch actually worthy of the Back Bay would be worlds better than what's there now, yes)

I would call it highway-era thinking because it appears the decision was made solely by traffic volumes- without the consideration of the continuing blight these monstrosities provide. (Extremist pro-auto thinking demands extremist anti-auto in response)
 
novitiate said:
There are major downsides to an overpass even if it's replaced with something prettier- stone overpasses are still foreboding and dark underneath. (Though a dramatic arch actually worthy of the Back Bay would be worlds better than what's there now, yes)
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But keep in mind there are major downsides to just shifting traffic to the surface roads. Charlesgate E/W would now have very heavy traffic all the time. As someone who passes through the area as a pedestrian daily (and has never used the Bowker overpass itself driving), I'm heavily opposed to removing it. It'd turn what are now fairly easy to walk through and calm intersections most of the time, into a honking overcrowded mess.

And if I were a resident in any of the buildings on/near Charlesgate E/W I'd be heavily opposed as well. Taking all the traffic on the Bowker and shoving it 80ft (W)/250 ft (E) closer to my house, and now making it have to idle, stop, honk, and make additional noise, would not make me happy. Red Sox game days especially will be miserable.

I also don't like mixing drunk college students (Major BU housing + MIT fraternities on Beacon St) with heavy traffic.

The Overpass is certainly ugly, but I think removing it is far worse for pedestrians, residents, and drivers alike.

I'd like to see a replacement. I'd just like them to find some way to avoid having the large stone wall + giant concrete supports that ruin any sense of "park" @ Beacon St currently, and in general do some landscaping of the area. Poorly maintained grass and gravel doesn't help the looks.

I also do think it'd have a massive impact on traffic in the area in general, probably backing up onto Storrow + Boylston constantly.

I would call it highway-era thinking because it appears the decision was made solely by traffic volumes- without the consideration of the continuing blight these monstrosities provide. (Extremist pro-auto thinking demands extremist anti-auto in response)
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I don't disagree that it is ugly. On the other hand, "blight" is a term which generally implies to me that it's having negative impacts on the surrounding area....and looking at anything nearby there, you're going to have a pretty difficult time finding much evidence for that.
 
A ruined, decrepit park is not a negative impact? Or the Esplanade land lost to the swooping highway ramps necessary to maintain grade separation? The traffic and sprawl induced by the overpass?

It is possible to construct minimally intrusive, tasteful overpasses. I just have no confidence in American builders to be able to do it right.
 
Millerm277 still have a point Matthew. Part of blight is feeling it and being on our minds. The impact never hits the residences nor the shops. What got hurt is Olmstead's vision. Which I would like to see it one day, but he right that continuous backed up surface won't bring that vision back - probably makes everyone unhappier all those cars on the surface.

A tasteful overpass sounds like the best bet (though the probable ideal is putting on the Turnpike than just a pretty overpass, no tolls in the area to match Storrow - Which I recall there isn't anyways, eastwards to 93 at least).

American builders don't know how to do it, but our hopes have to be on that rather than surface but I think he has a point. It won't achieve any of the goals.

Unless the numbers says differently. Which I'm still wondering about that.
 
I used to live in this neighborhood (111 Bay State Road), and I certainly considered the overpass to be a blight. Removing it would have given me pleasant parkland to walk through on the way to and from MIT each day.

The traffic would not have mattered to me -- it's comparable to crossing Commonwealth Avenue, which people don't complain about at all.
 
Ron Newman said:
I used to live in this neighborhood (111 Bay State Road), and I certainly considered the overpass to be a blight. Removing it would have given me pleasant parkland to walk through on the way to and from MIT each day.

The traffic would not have mattered to me -- it's comparable to crossing Commonwealth Avenue, which people don't complain about at all.
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Bingo. These are about the most cut-and-dried intersections you can get...one-way vs. one-way, separated by 1 block in each direction, all signaled, no right turns on red. The only part they need to fix is the Charlesgate W/Beacon intersection where Storrow EB and WB traffic splits and fans out before the light. The Storrow WB ramp is the only place where speeding traffic and poor sightlines are liable to create a crossing hazard. That problem goes away when the overpass does because then they have the space to make a more orderly split after the light instead of before. Yes, the overpass degrades ped accessibility worse than if it were fully at-grade.


I have never ever felt as a pedestrian that car queues at a light...especially at a very orderly and symmetrical set like this...are degrading my "urban experience". Whereas I always felt like the light rain of pigeon shit coming from the overpass above was degrading. And tend to avoid sidewalks next to over-widened, multi-lane urban speed traps. Like trying to cross the clusterfuck on the Fenway side where the Bowker, Charlesgate, and Boylston all converge and high-speed drivers are a lot less mindful of the crosswalks.


But that's sort of beside the point. MassHighway is playing framing games here treating Storrow traffic counts as a static thing wholly organic to Storrow trips. Until some of the available options include Pike WB ramps downtown and totally free intra-city Pike access between downtown and the Allston exit (which there still isn't today)...Storrow's numbers are propped up by a whole lot of induced demand smoke-and-mirrors. Too many people still use Storrow to get to 93 because they don't want to get dinged $1.25 for a measly couple miles east on the Pike. And if there were equivalent Pike WB exits in the Back Bay and Fenway + unrestricted travel the loads on the two roads would go asynchronous...Storrow EB loads would stay the same while WB loads would drop off dramatically between the Back Bay exit and Allston as that trip becomes way easier via Pike. The traffic counts over the Bowker/Charlesgate look vastly different if the volumes--today predicated on more or less equal Storrow EB and WB trips and equal-capacity ramps to/from every direction, forever in perpetuity--suddenly lose thousands of vehicles in one Storrow direction because the Pike has picked up the WB slack.


They haven't yet produced numbers showing why the overpass is needed with intra-city Pike access opened up. Their preference for an overpass has to-date been predicated entirely on existing patterns, which has some significant amount of artificual induced demand because of how strongly intra-city Pike trips are discouraged by the tolls and lack of ramps. We don't know how significant it is, because MassHighway won't show us those numbers. I'll certainly let myself be convinced otherwise if they show us, but burden of proof is on them to prove that the traffic counts through Bowker/Charlesgate demand a new overpass even after all Pike load-sharing options are on the table. I am skeptical given the keep-away games they played with the Casey and McGrath groundings. But it's on them to show us the numbers before we show them the money. They have not produced the goods yet.
 
Is this the thread where we would also discuss the "worst bridge in the country" designation given to Storrow Drive by Travel & Leisure magazine?

http://www.myfoxboston.com/story/23...re-storrow-drive-westbound-bridge-worst-in-us

The repairs they did this year were just temporary, right? Until they decide how to repair/replace the whole thing?

I seem to remember they went with temporary repair b/c my dear friends in the Back Bay wet their pants over the plans to build a temporary road on the Esplanade.
 
JohnAKeith said:
Is this the thread where we would also discuss the "worst bridge in the country" designation given to Storrow Drive by Travel & Leisure magazine?

http://www.myfoxboston.com/story/23...re-storrow-drive-westbound-bridge-worst-in-us

The repairs they did this year were just temporary, right? Until they decide how to repair/replace the whole thing?

I seem to remember they went with temporary repair b/c my dear friends in the Back Bay wet their pants over the plans to build a temporary road on the Esplanade.
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Woohoo! Boston's #1!!!!!
 
JohnAKeith said:
Is this the thread where we would also discuss the "worst bridge in the country" designation given to Storrow Drive by Travel & Leisure magazine?

http://www.myfoxboston.com/story/23...re-storrow-drive-westbound-bridge-worst-in-us

The repairs they did this year were just temporary, right? Until they decide how to repair/replace the whole thing?

I seem to remember they went with temporary repair b/c my dear friends in the Back Bay wet their pants over the plans to build a temporary road on the Esplanade.
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Yeah...this is like the temporary McCarthy and Casey Overpass patches. The thing is so ready to start falling down or raining chunks on pedestrians below that the day-to-day maintenance is escalating rapidly and requires semi-substantial band-aid work every 2-4 years to keep it in-service.

It can't come down soon enough, but even in the case of the Casey--where the decision to replace at-grade is final--they're still in design and not ready to start construction. You can't let a structure that's ready to collapse go totally out-of-service with no alternative in the couple years it'll take before construction can feasibly start, so they have no choice in the interim but to spend nuisance money on constant maintenance.


Believe me...if this were any sort of substantial or long-lasting rehab City Hall and the nearby residents who want the Bowker gone would be throwing fits.
 
Why can't they let it go out-of-service? It is entirely redundant with Charlesgate East and Charlesgate West. (I'm assuming that the overpass over the Mass Pike is not falling apart.)
 
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