Casey Overpass

Needs a slightly wider roadway median so the center can fit more pedestrians caught between light cycles, but otherwise does what it says effectively enough.


Now, it better not take 12 years to blow up the Bowker. The construction schedule on this is a head-scratcher given that it took no more than months to take out the Sullivan overpass and 2 years to scrap the whole frigging Central Artery. Casey is a smaller and less complicated structure than even Sullivan was.
 
BussesAin'tTrains said:
2013 to 2016?? Why on Earth does it take THREE YEARS to tear down a dilapidated bridge and widen an intersection??
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They're probably phasing the project so it never gets down to just 2 lanes in each direction.
Phase I - Temporarily widen the surface roads, preserve access to the T.
Phase II - Tear down the overpass.
Phase III - Build permanent lanes on final configuration.
Phase IV - Shift traffic onto final configuration. Remove temporary lanes. Landscape.
 
That's a pretty peripheral part of the project. Perhaps this could remain a rotary while the remainder of it proceeds as planned.
 
This overpass is flat out awful. Terrible road quality, terrible lighting. Really, the street lighting along that stretch and on the Arborway heading towards Faulker is insufficient and needs to be upgraded.
 
Ron Newman said:
That's a pretty peripheral part of the project. Perhaps this could remain a rotary while the remainder of it proceeds as planned.
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I though the same thing when I first saw the plans. Maybe the traffic data supports a redesigned interchange?
 
Is Ferris the old guy who showed up at a MassDOT meeting one day and yelled at them that they must widen every road in Boston to accommodate future traffic?

As for the signalized 4-way intersection, that may be a mistake. A roundabout can be a safer option, they really ought to take a look at keeping that.

The DOT better not renege on grounding Casey... that would be terrible.
 
^ Powderhouse Circle in Somerville gives pedestrians priority for crossing.
 
BussesAin'tTrains said:
^ Powderhouse Circle in Somerville gives pedestrians priority for crossing.
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Powderhouse Circle has traffic lights to stop the movement of traffic through the circle. This is acceptable and useful for pedestrian movements, but also means it is not a real roundabout. (I know that sounds like a No True Scotsman fallacy but I've been assured by some smart people that a roundabout and a rotary/traffic circle are two completely different things.)

Real roundabouts, if they are signalized at all, are only signalized at their entrances; e.g., traffic does not and is not supposed to stop once it's moving through the actual roundabout. For this reason, directly crossing the roundabout is unsafe and inadvisable.

Furthermore, there's very little vehicular safety or capacity improvements on a roundabout versus a three-way or four-way signalized intersection. (Certainly, signalizing the interior of a roundabout in addition to its entrances makes it strictly worse than a straight intersection.) Roundabouts have their place - they're excellent if you have at least five directions of traffic meeting - but they're hardly without problems of their own.
 
Roundabouts are very safe if done right, because everyone is moving slowly and carefully.
 
Please don't confuse Shea circle with a round-about, Shea is a classic old Mass style two lane rotary. Due to the confused existing street network, the 7 streets entering and exiting have a very confused layout. Vehicle throughput is 25,000 per day, too much for single lane roundabout. No accommodations for pedestrians or cyclists and as a result, most pedestrians simply don't cross there.

The crash data in the Functional Design Report shows 27 accidents per year at Shea Circle, the next highest was at Forest Hills and Rt 203 with 9 per year, most of the other intersections were around 2 accidents per year.

Shea Circle wasn't even in the project area until residents complained about it.
Turning it into a signalized intersection solves so many problems for so many users it's hard to believe that Mass Historic would stand in the way.
 
The next public meeting (25% design) for the Casey Arborway Project is:

POSTPONED!

Seems the public notices did not go out in time.
 
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Matthew,
While it may be possible in the Netherlands, I sincerely doubt it's possible to do this on the commuter thoroughfare that is Rt 203. So many drivers on the Arborway, J-way, and Riverway still have the same mentality as the MDC and DCR police did several years ago when they were known to ticket cyclists who dared ride on MDC/DCR parkways.

The roundabout in the video is only one lane wide, with (what appears to be) two lane streets , one lane each direction, entering it. With Shea circle, I just can't see how you can replace it with a single lane wide roundabout when rt 203 entering and exiting is two lanes wide and gets backed up today.
Maybe the roundabout gets relatively constant traffic whereas Rt 203 has strong AM and PM peaks.
 
Something needs to be done. The road quality and the street lighting on the overpass and in that area is terrible.
 
How much traffic does the rotary at the BU Bridge see? Or the ones along the Fresh Pond / Alewife Brook Parkways? I just have a hard time believing the traffic in Forest Hills approaches those volumes, but I will admit I haven't been down there.

Might connecting Walk Hill St to a reactivated Arboretum Road underpass also work as a relief valve for all the traffic cramming through there?
 
The problem in that area is the on/off ramps and the signal timing at the on/off ramps (if you've driven through there, you'd know that the lights aren't timed correctly). Removing the bridge actually solves most of the traffic back-ups there. They also built the bridge anticipating major increases in traffic volume at that intersection (as part of another plan that never panned out), but it's only up maybe a few hundred cars a day from the 1940s.

anyway - this opens up a lot of land for development and suddenly makes this area much more enticing - I just hope they don't mess up the bike infrastructure down along washington street.
 
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rinserepeat said:
anyway - this opens up a lot of land for development and suddenly makes this area much more enticing - I just hope they don't mess up the bike infrastructure down along washington street.
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According to the plans I've seen, bike infrastructure will greatly improve, providing a much better connection between Washington St. bike lanes and the Lalemont Path in the SWC park. Right now the lanes end at Ukraine Ave., followed by two extremely dangerous blocks (wouldn't recommend them for anybody who isn't fairly advanced at riding among cars), followed by a right turn in traffic, and then the need to move left across four lanes to reach the park. It would be hard to make it worse than that.
 
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