Cheap and easy Boston improvement ideas

I can understand why they wouldn't want to give it up, but it is still being bad nieghbors.
 
A cheap and easy Boston (and Cambridge and Brookline) improvement idea:

Make the 66 and 77 bus routes one route. They both run at about the same high frequency and terminate at Harvard Square from different directions. Have it use the bus tunnel if possible.
 
One big problem with this: the southbound bus tunnel at Harvard is designed for people to board only from the left side -- so only trackless trolleys, no diesel buses.
 
Another problem with connecting them is that the longer the route, the more bunching you'll have.
 
I moved this thread to the forum because I thought it was more appropriate.
 
My suggestions all center on the eyesore that is City Hall Plaza.

I would suggest moving the produce market from Haymarket over to City Hall Plaza. Seasonally, I think the city could open up a Christmas Market there as well. Plenty of Northern European cities have them and Boston could be no different. In the summer, the city could cart in a bunch of sand and create a "Boston Beach" much like Paris' "plage" along the Seine during the summer.
 
The Boston beach is quite un-possible, even for this forum. How do you clean that up? How do you put it away? It's too small. Not enough water. You have any idea how much that would cost?
 
^They carted in sand and set up a beach for the Phantom Gourmet BBQ Fest (or whatever it was called) this summer, so it's not entirley un-do-able. I think the bigger issue is, why build a fake beach when you could just neaten up our real beaches?
 
That too. But that was a much smaller, and temporary "beach" than the one aqua was proposing.
 
And as someone else said, Boston has real beaches, a short T ride away from downtown. Paris doesn't.
 
Ron Newman said:
And as someone else said, Boston has real beaches, a short T ride away from downtown. Paris doesn't.
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And for those of who do not take the T everywhere they go there are both shores, Buzzards Bay, Newport, and if a longer drive is in the cards, Cape Cod. I suppose the Boston beaches are alright too, I've never gone but they are supposedly clean enough to swim at half the summer. There's just no reason for this, it would probably recieve a worse welcome than City Hall itself. We're talking about improving the city, not making a (bigger) mess of it.
 
If I haven't said this before:

If the MBTA can't make the automated announcement system on the newer Red Line cars work, it should be disabled. I'm embarrassed for Boston when visitors hear the conductor arguing with the automated voice.
 
The MBTA also needs to take a cue from the London tube and keep dry erase boards with current updates at all stations. It costs almost nothing and riders will always know where to look for updates instead of having these random printouts taped in random places...
 
Dry erase boards? Aren't those a bit prone to tampering?

Anyway: I hope whatever happens to South Station, they add an interior connection from the bus terminal to the main station/subway. A down escalator from the bus terminal to the street would be nice, too. Arriving here by Chinatown bus feels so welcoming...until you face that steep, long stairway and the chilly walk outside.
 
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I do imagine they must have trouble with tampering, but with the T employees there, I can't imagine too much happening. Here's a picture of what they use: http://www.flickr.com/photos/knapster/27746443/. They were placed near the entrances/turnstiles of almost every station, and seemed pretty accurate from what I saw.
 
My idea would be to replace every trash barrel with a recepticle that has many different sections. Meaning, a trash, plastics, paper, glass, and aluminum part to each recepticle. Montreal had something similar to that.
 
This would ber cheap in comparison with other transit solutions if not cheap in general:

turn the 66 and 1 buses in to trackless trolleys as well as the silver line washington st. This would look like this:

Google Maps-Trolley Bus Boston


Trolley Buses don't require new tracks, and would keep the air clean. The 66 and Mass Ave line would use the bus tunnel and then coninue on.

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Another Idea is installing trolley wires for the silver line in the airport. It's sad that the majority of the time the buses are sitting idle in traffic underneath these overhangs that are perfect for some wires that the bus could just reconnect to once it surfaces from the tunnel. even better would be wire in the tunnel for it.
 
^^ Love the idea but the link isnt working for me...
 
Shepard said:
^^ Love the idea but the link isnt working for me...
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sorry man, heres a rout description:


Line 1(Harvard-Dudley-Mass Ave.)

Mass Ave. to Washington St.-Dudley Sq.

Line 2(Harvard-Dudley via Brookline/Allston)

66 as normal, but through the bus tunnel

Line 3(Boylston-Dudley)

Silver line as usual

I'd also like to make a line from Downtown ot Harvard Sq., so that this would work as a cheap Urban Ring-type thing, but I'm not sure what street to use.
 
maximum927 said:
I'd also like to make a line from Downtown ot Harvard Sq., so that this would work as a cheap Urban Ring-type thing, but I'm not sure what street to use.
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Maybe: Harvard Square - Cambridge Street - Museum of Science - North Station - Beyond (South Station via Greenway?)
 
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