Crazy Transit Pitches

[F-Line to Dudley]

So the enormous change in elevation between Arlington Center and the Heights doesn't correspond to geology?

Did the T just get lucky with that little spit of bedrock between Porter and Davis? What was their original plan? Or did they always know about the ability to do a very deep bore tunnel in Cambridge/Somerville?

The hard seam in Porter was well-known ever since the area was settled since it would've made digging any halfway-deep foundations a real P.I.T.A. Probably has a lot to do with why there's no particularly tall buildings around Elm. That whole area Porter & Wilson used to be the slaughterhouse district full of disposable shacks and whatnot.

As for the extension...marriage of convenience. Staying cut-and-cover and making a hard left onto the Fitchburg ROW to Alewife was one of the study options...that would've avoided the seam. Staying cut-and-cover further up Mass Ave. and hanging a hard left onto the Cutoff ROW was a study option that would've avoided the seam. But it was when they got to thinking how to shotgun-marriage Porter and Davis together that the geology ended up matching perfectly for a deep bore that didn't kill them on cost.

Fluky luck. Forces of nature just happened to be spot-on perfect for connecting the squares.

Sure, but I see the Green Line thread as a real solutions thread. Crazy Transit is throwing ideas on the wall. Picking them apart is great because it keeps us thinking. I'm not suggesting we put together an advocacy group to get this beast built. Just tossing out ideas based on previous ideas getting torpedoed. Maybe every idea to get to 128 via Red will get torpedoed, but it's worth brainstorming.

Negotiation on the same old Minuteman ROW is still going to be the least-costly and most plausible way this ever gets built. Unfortunately re-angling the tunnel out of Alewife to spit directly onto 2 now requires blowing up the entirety of the Pfizer complex before it can set itself on a westbound alignment.

I agree, but there's just no f-ing way Lexington would ever be enticed to allow above-ground, heavy rail up their gut just to improve connectivity between Boston and Hanscom/Burlington Mall. Lexington is a much different place in 2015 than it was in the 80s.

This would be the way to get it to Heights. But Lexington won't let the Great Meadows be touched. Plus it would have to go back underground around the Brown Homestead through the Center. North of the Center, the ROW is very closely abutted by fairly recent residential, McMansion construction. No way they're letting trains on <12 minute headways barrel through to Hanscom/Burlington a few dozen feet from their million dollar homes. Unless it stays underground from Woburn St until at least Revere St, and then probably again underground from Bedford St to 128....

Then it never hits Lexington until X decades later when they start getting jealous. That's why I'd treat this as 2 completely separate extensions. Heights being Red's equivalent of Blue-Lynn and Lexington being Red's equivalent of Blue-Salem. Pretend the second one doesn't even exist until service at the first is mature and there's some reality-based reference point to speak from. Lexington might still hate it, but they can say so without the complete (and largely useless) abstraction of trying to imagine what rapid transit even is. Alewife is 6-1/2 miles from Lexington Center. Arlington Heights is 3. One Lexingtonites will bus or bike to in large numbers; one is just too far away pushing through too much traffic. It's not real enough a concept to have a rational discussion. So don't until it becomes a real concept at Heights.

The 1945 plan never even tried to go to 128. It drew the line at Heights. It was only when Hanscom was declining as a military installation and the state started getting TOD ideas that they really sold themselves on the idea of taking it all the way there. So...2 separate projects for 2 separate needs pretty much is how the planning broke down.


If simply plunking parking sinks at 128 is the goal then you can take care of the NW quadrant by doing the GLX Union Branch to Waltham + Fitchburg relocation to the Central Mass ROW, and GLX Medford Branch extension to Anderson...possibly with a swap-over to HRT. That one was on the '45 expansion plan, except for the Woburn Branch ROW no longer being available. Those fingers will set up all the fast-transferring 128 shuttle buses to the office parks, Hanscom, and Burlington that anyone would ever need since their demand is so heavily skewed to M-F 9-5. If it's going to take $2B to do this extension, maybe that's $1B saved and $1B better-allocated to a two-for-one build strung together at the termini by "Suburban Ring BRT". Reconceptualize the transit strategy out there if force-feeding this extension past Heights just gets too unrealistic.

 

[vanshnookenraggen]

x-post from Green Line Reconfig thread.

Van - not sure if the station layout of a hypothetical BU Bridge would allow this, but it could be that this new A routing might routed over the Grand Junction - which, boom, maintains the historical connection of Watertown and Cambridge. And then, at BU Bridge, A line riders can change for B line service through the central subway.

There can't be any station at BU Bridge if you are going to have branches. What could be done is rerouting the B line up to the West Station, making West a 4 track transfer station like Kenmore, so that Harvard and B trains run via Central Subway and Watertown trains run up the GJ. The issue then is where do Watertown trains go? If they go via Green Line then you'd loop them at Gov't Center.

This then brings me back to one of my early Blue Line proposals which would extend the BL to Cambridge via a new tunnel to Binney St where it would follow the GJ to West Station.

While way more expensive then a simple Green Line route it do cover all the bases:
- Red-Blue connected.
- Lower Red Line congestion given alternative Cambridge service (although this isn't a huge reduction)
- Back Bay Bypass + connection to Green Line in Allston which could scoop up a lot of B line riders.
- Simplified Green Line extension to West Station + faster Green Line service by eliminating street running service through BU.
- Connecting Watertown and Allston commuters to "downtown" Cambridge and Gov't Center faster than a bus>Red Line transfer.

Obviously the cost is greater with tunneling but look at what the Blue Line would do for the GJ that Green Line propositions don't. Green Line/UR routings supposed that the GJ would be totally converted to light rail and all CR opps would have to be transferred to other facilities (new, billion dollar facilities). Since the Blue Line along GJ would require tunneling, at least below grade along Vassar St, this gives you the opportunity to build a 3 track line with space for CR movements that removed grade crossings. There is space along the line for 3 tracks, especially if you are going to tunnel under the Red Line, but it would require a new rail bridge where the existing BU Bridge is... but keep in mind any new rapid transit expansion over the GJ is going to require a new bridge. This is a much more expensive proposition BUT it has so many benefits by eliminating grade crossings and still allowing CR movements (and thus not requiring new CR facilities) that the benefit would justify the cost.

The Blue Line would also be a better balance than an additional Green Line branch. More GL branches from the west would only cause more congestion in the Central Subway. Any riders using the BL to Watertown would be getting off either in Cambridge or Boston with few (non-Logan bound) riders staying on to Eastie or Revere.

Blue Line via the Back Bay and D line would take pressure off the Green Line but it wouldn't really serve anyone new, thus requiring new Green Line branches and thus making more congestion in the Central Subway. Running it via the GJ would serve new areas, reduce congestion, and speed travel from the west to downtown Boston.

Additionally, and this is really thinking far ahead, if there was a one seat ride from Cambridge/MIT to Lynn via both Blue Line extensions then I can totally see Lynn becoming a hot spot for workers and students priced out of Cambridge. That would really help grow the economy even more than a simple BL extension to Lynn alone.

Map.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Main St.'s not an eliminable grade crossing. Plowing deep under the Red Line and under the water table isn't going to be feasible. Check the 1902 topo map on Historic Aerials. The Grand Junction from Main to BU Bridge was the riverbank until the landfillers filled out to create the Basin's wall in advance of the dam's 1910 opening. The only reason they had an easy time building the Red tunnel is because the whole area was empty and had no under-street utility layer to cut under. That's why Kendall station is so shallow vs. the level of the portal. So unfortunately there's a cost-with-depth waterproofing pain threshold that gets exceeded before you've successfully slipped under Red. GJ will always have to be on a mode suited to taking a grade crossing.

 

[vanshnookenraggen]

But where is the water table today? Is this an area prone to flooding? Isn't part of the problem with foundations for older buildings in the Bay Village and South End collapsing because the water table there dropped? Perhaps the water table here is lower than it was 100 years ago.

I'm not saying it would be cheap but given how quickly Kendall is filling up with development and that the state may very well implement CR service over the GJ I can see the day when it is politically advantageous to build a tunnel here to eliminate grade crossings. The need for better transit through this section of Cambridge is growing by the day and at some point the cost becomes worth it. Grade crossings will kill any form of rapid transit here even if it's just more CR.

Hell, if you build the tunnel strong enough you can offset the cost by selling the air rights to MIT. With a subway station, no grade crossings, and larger building footprint this area (which is now home to old facilities, repurposed warehouses, and garages) could be the next place to build out when Kendall fills up. The potential for economic development along the GJ can justify the cost.

 

[citylover94]

Just to demonstrate how the Grand Junction as light rail could help with load spreading and act as a third main line section with some of the reconfigurations that have been discussed I created this map: http://goo.gl/00cBZb

I don't think grade crossings will kill this proposal as the rail line would just flip the traffic lights at the crossings to red lights when the train goes through although it might limit frequency somewhat.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

But where is the water table today? Is this an area prone to flooding? Isn't part of the problem with foundations for older buildings in the Bay Village and South End collapsing because the water table there dropped? Perhaps the water table here is lower than it was 100 years ago.

I'm not saying it would be cheap but given how quickly Kendall is filling up with development and that the state may very well implement CR service over the GJ I can see the day when it is politically advantageous to build a tunnel here to eliminate grade crossings. The need for better transit through this section of Cambridge is growing by the day and at some point the cost becomes worth it. Grade crossings will kill any form of rapid transit here even if it's just more CR.

Hell, if you build the tunnel strong enough you can offset the cost by selling the air rights to MIT. With a subway station, no grade crossings, and larger building footprint this area (which is now home to old facilities, repurposed warehouses, and garages) could be the next place to build out when Kendall fills up. The potential for economic development along the GJ can justify the cost.

You're going to have to ask some MIT nerds about that one. It's waterproofing megabucks for sure because a tunnel with 100-year engineering lifespan in the Basin on an old shoreline has to account for unpredictability at the century level in the water table. A lot of the state reports (incl. some gobbledygook on the City of Cambridge website) about the Basin's flood susceptibility cited the drop in water tables on the Boston side as a problem to be rectified by increasing the absorption rate of the ground. Stuff as inocuous as vegetation and soil management to dredging out long-buried underground streams and aquifers so they're still underground but flowing instead of haphazardly choked.

That's the sort of stuff you have to engineer for with a 100-year tunnel. And the stuff City of Cambridge says going to be necessary since an 8-inch overtopping of the dam puts Kendall underwater. If the expert analysis says they have to exploit more absorption in what's already pretty soggy fill, plot your expenses accordingly. It is going to be, even at its most benign, an un-ordinary amount of waterproofing you would have to do here to burrow under the old shoreline for that long a stretch.


Is this accomplishing that much above-and-beyond LRT with one...maybe two total grade crossings that can't be bridged? This is, after all, a linear ROW boxed in to property lines 50 ft. or less wide over most of its distance. It's not, like, countable as square footage of real estate. The wide section from Mass Ave. to Memorial Dr. was mostly one long set of private freight sidings behind the factory buildings' loading docks. If the rail-with-trail doesn't claim it beforehand the properties will encroach out to the T's 2-track easement when MIT nukes them. Just like it did everywhere else. The remains of the Cambridgeport freight yard, Waverley St. street-running track, and associated sidings all got obliterated in the last 12 years by new development. The juiciest parcels at the juiciest points on the street grid have already been covered over. Most of the next-juiciest will be covered over by MIT before you even get to commission a scoping study. The rest is all behind other buildings, non-interfacing from the street. It's not the Pike air rights; the Pike air rights are flanked by a street grid the entire way. It's a transit service, not a rental office.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Just to demonstrate how the Grand Junction as light rail could help with load spreading and act as a third main line section with some of the reconfigurations that have been discussed I created this map: http://goo.gl/00cBZb

I don't think grade crossings will kill this proposal as the rail line would just flip the traffic lights at the crossings to red lights when the train goes through although it might limit frequency somewhat.

It really won't. The whole problem commuter rail has is that train has priority 100% of the time. So no matter when it arrives, how often it arrives...gates go down, traffic stops. That's the rules by an FRA railroad, and that's what screws up all the traffic queues on these streets.

Light rail follows traffic signals. Since the Main and Broadway crossings are right at traffic lights, you simply program it with trolley priority. As if the trolley is getting a protected left. On Main that may involve moving the stop line back 80 ft., but otherwise it's the same: a normal light cycle that has greens as long as Broadway and Main would ever have.

Mass Ave...you eliminate with an overpass. The others: ration according to funding, with Cambridge St. a #2 priority (if it's absolutely not possible, the crosswalk light at Max St. can probably be shifted 70 ft.).

 

[cozzyd]

Because of the way it doesn't quite go to either Central or the Longfellow, Main St is not really a major road for cars. It be severed at that intersection without great loss as long as it's possible for pedestrians and bicycles to cross. Pedestrians can have escalators over an at-grade heavy rail station station and I think there's enough room to build a bicycle overpass or underpass...

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Because of the way it doesn't quite go to either Central or the Longfellow, Main St is not really a major road for cars. It be severed at that intersection without great loss as long as it's possible for pedestrians and bicycles to cross. Pedestrians can have escalators over an at-grade heavy rail station station and I think there's enough room to build a bicycle overpass or underpass...

I don't think you even need to sever it. A trolley or even BRT fits snugly into a regular signal cycle, and you would want the cab stand and bus dropoff space on a curb jut behind the intersection because that weather-protected air rights overhang is the best place to plunk the platforms. On that street the signal wouldn't matter if you added a delay for the trolleys given the volumes or lackthereof.

For similar signaling reasons much busier Broadway isn't a concern on LRT or BRT. Their signal cycle can be exactly the same length/timing as today in the busier Broadway direction. If there's any trolley priority to install it's a delayed green on far less busy, multi-lane, curb cut-free Galileo Gallilei. Broadway and Galileo I believe are already no-turn-on-red (Galileo definitely is) in their dedicated right-turn lanes, so that safety + trolley priority installation isn't needed and wouldn't induce any additional delay between signal cycles since the NToR protection on rights is pre-existing.

It's as a RR where FRA rules mandate absolute 100% train has right-of-way at all times where the traffic gets disrupted. That's why if this corridor works at all as Indigo (and that's real dubious), that's only a stopgap solution for what eventually has to happen on some other mode that can deliver the headways ultimately needed.


Order of priority for crossing eliminations pretty much goes like this if you're doing a mode conversion:
-- Mass Ave. (mandatory)
#2. Cambridge St. (At-grade + shift ped traffic light only if too strapped for cash to eliminate immediately.)
#3 or #Last*. Binney (Close/ped plaza it, banning all but delivery or service vehicles. *If ped plaza option not preferable, leave it for last or don't eliminate at all because volumes are lowest here of any crossing.)
#4. Medford St. (Ample space for elimination, viaduct/embankment would help 2-for-1 Cambridge St. if you've got the money and the patience to deal with crabby residential abutters. But kick behind Binney on the priority order if the Binney closure option works.)
#5. Broadway (Possibly eliminable on trolley where the inclines from an overpass can be steeper to make it back to grade by Main, but definitely too steep for BRT. Eliminate last despite traffic levels because other eliminables don't have nearly as ops-ideal a signal placement as here.)


Of course, as RR none except the Binney plaza concept (which probably isn't worth doing at those headways) are eliminable because the maximum grades just don't allow enough incline room between crossing pairs. Especially on the Main-Mass Ave. block where the air rights pinch nearly all the running room for a 1-2% incline.

 

[cozzyd]

The reason I proposed severing Main St. is to allow HRT as Van and others have suggested.

I like the the idea of having the blue line go under the Charles, cut and cover under Binney (with stop at 2nd or 3rd), and then follow the GJ to Allston.

 

[George_Apley]

Do any cities have at-grade HRT in a central business district? I know some systems have them in more far-flung areas, but that seems fundamentally different to me.

 

[bigeman312]

Do any cities have at-grade HRT in a central business district? I know some systems have them in more far-flung areas, but that seems fundamentally different to me.

It probably depends on your definition of "central business district" and your definition of "at-grade." Haha. Does a trench count? How about an embankment? In NYC, what counts as the "central business district?" Only Midtown and Lower Manhattan? All of Manhattan? Do you count Downtown Brooklyn?

EDIT: I ask because I can think of multiple examples of the NYC Subway occupying a trench in dense parts of Brooklyn.

Double EDIT: The DC Metro Red and Blue Lines both runs at-grade through parts of Northeast DC, which is not exactly in the central business district.

Triple EDIT: Many of the Chicago "L" Lines run both at-grade (especially in the median of highways) and on an embankment in parts in the North Side, South Side, and West Side (not the CBD, but certainly close in neighborhoods of the city. Not unlike JFK/UMass).

Honestly, you probably won't get much closer than the section of the Orange Line (MBTA) that runs along the Pike between Back Bay and Tufts Medical Center.

 

[Matthew]

The "L" has about a dozen grade crossings of third rail on the Pink, Brown, Purple, and Yellow lines that I observed personally. At busy roads. Yeah, not in the core, but traffic is even heavier in the suburbs generally. Not that I ever expect the USA to ever build a third rail grade crossing ever again.

But probably the most famous grade crossings are in Japan. I believe there is a crossing in Tokyo on the Yamanote line that can only open for a sum total of a few minutes every hour due to the intense train traffic.

 

[cozzyd]

Do any cities have at-grade HRT in a central business district? I know some systems have them in more far-flung areas, but that seems fundamentally different to me.

Airport Station is probably the closest thing on the T. The idea would be to build a pedestrian plaza above the station changing the effective ground level for pedestrians, but the approach might be a little tight on the MIT side.

 

[bigeman312]

I see! You are wondering about rapid transit grade-crossings in a CBD. That is different from how interpreted your question. Ya...probably doesn't happen.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

I see! You are wondering about rapid transit grade-crossings in a CBD. That is different from how interpreted your question. Ya...probably doesn't happen.

All of the ones CTA has on the L's Brown, Yellow, and Pink lines are all legacy installations slowly declining in number and reduced to pretty much the toughest holdouts. They're protected out the wazoo and CTA pays some steep insurance premiums on theirs. If they had the wherewithal to do 100% eliminations without each one having big cost/pain threshold, they would've done it by now.

Even NYC Subway had grade crossings until the last one was eliminated in Brooklyn in 1975. The T considered building the extension of the Orange Line to Reading with some of the Western Route's 13 grade crossings remaining and a Blue Line-like switch from 3rd rail to overhead at Oak Grove. It's why they ordered the same make of cars of Blue and Orange; the Orange 01200's have pantograph hookups on the roof that can plug-and-play with one of the pantographs off a Blue 0600 car.

But that was late-60's/early-70's when it was in planning; by the time it was actually built they'd truncated to Oak Grove because of Melrose NIMBY's. And in that span NYC had fully grade separated, and CTA had sharply reduced its remaining count...removing the "other cities do it" justification that would've kept their insurance liability in-check. It'll never ever be allowed today. Unlike low-to-the-ground LRV's, commuter rail locomotives, and commuter rail cab cars with their permanently mounted snowplow blades heavy-rail subway cars are too exposed on the underside and don't demonstrate the "cowcatcher" effect when hitting something on the tracks...i.e. the obstruction gets pushed ahead of and away from the train. It's why when somebody commits suicide-by-train on Red/Orange/Blue they get pinned underneath instead of being launched up or forward. Make that hit on a grade crossing a car or truck instead and you add the risk of the heavy-rail car telescoping off the tracks when the obstruction gets pinned underneath.

See for yourself:

HRT (note height of underside, and coupler acting as the only protection):

LRV (with idiot's truck for reference):

Locomotive:

Cab car (note the plow blade; comparably a little more vulnerable at a crossing than a loco or LRV, but still heavy enough to push in a collision):

It's freak-accident odds, to be sure...but it's enough of a risk that there'll never ever ever be a new installation. Nor is the T ever going to start ordering heavy-rail cars deviating from 105 years of rote-generic design and switch over to carbodies shaped more like a commuter rail EMU to get the full cowcatcher effect.

You really, really have to demonstrate that full 100% grade separation and HRT matters that freaking much to spend a billion dollars on separation--and waterproofing of said separation--here, vs. LRT where every crossing except Main is eliminable. The performance difference has to be worth $1B in additional ridership revenue on a 6-car heavy-rail train vs. a 4-car light rail train to even think about subwaying here. And I can't conceive of a scenario where that difference neutralizes the cost. You could probably spend the same amount of money on light rail capacity increases elsewhere and get better throughput here than the perfectionism of full HRT burial. Every bit of air rights property fiscally worth MIT's while to build over will be built over the surface ROW. That sure as hell isn't going to be a revenue driver narrowing the gap.

This is a more obvious call than most.

 

[George_Apley]

Back to Lex for a moment. Assuming that someday Red is able to get through Lexington through a combo of surface running and selective tunneling via Minuteman, where would the Hanscome/I-95 station be sited? Behind the Hartwell Ave developments in Tophet Swamp? Would that require new ramps off of 128? Or would it go closer to Bedford Street and be accessed via the existing 128/225 interchange?

 

[BostonUrbEx]

Ok, seriously guys, can we have a chat?

Why on Earth do we keep talking about a rapid transit extension through a low-density area which couldn't even support commuter rail? Out of all the viable rapid transit extensions, I feel not a single one is ever talked about more on this forum than a Red Line North extension. Red to Waltham is more viable than that. The horse's decomposed remains have been beat into dust, and the dust was beat until it dispersed and blew away in the breeze. And then it was beat some more.

 

[vanshnookenraggen]

Back to Lex for a moment. Assuming that someday Red is able to get through Lexington through a combo of surface running and selective tunneling via Minuteman, where would the Hanscome/I-95 station be sited? Behind the Hartwell Ave developments in Tophet Swamp? Would that require new ramps off of 128? Or would it go closer to Bedford Street and be accessed via the existing 128/225 interchange?

No. All of the No. Just No.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Ok, seriously guys, can we have a chat?

Why on Earth do we keep talking about a rapid transit extension through a low-density area which couldn't even support commuter rail? Out of all the viable rapid transit extensions, I feel not a single one is ever talked about more on this forum than a Red Line North extension. Red to Waltham is more viable than that. The horse's decomposed remains have been beat into dust, and the dust was beat until it dispersed and blew away in the breeze. And then it was beat some more.

Per the most recent estimates (2003 PMT) they crunched +6700 daily weekday riders on the Red Line and +1700 daily weekday riders not currently taking any form of transit. That's not chopped liver, and either extreme--"WE NEED THIS NOW!" or "IT'S A DEAD HORSE!"--is a bunch of shrill histrionics.

It's low-rated overall because it's the most end-to-end miles of any rapid transit extension and the capital cost per rider is going to be a bitch because of the mileage. And you need to have a winning development strategy for Hanscom before before dragging it all the way out there. That doesn't exist today. The talk about Boston needing a second airport is premature, and it's a long ways away from being an employment anchor. But that's why you frame this as TWO separate extensions: Heights, and Hanscom. Nobody treats Blue to Salem as a monolithic build out of Wonderland despite the new transit ridership and cost-per-rider on the stations past Lynn being better than to Lynn. For simple fact that Lynn has other pressing needs, and one foot has to go before the other. This one shouldn't be treated that way either. That's just its legacy because it happened to be the last thing formally studied in an era that couldn't be more different than today.


It's 1.5 miles of shallow box tunneling that restores the Minuteman to as-is condition, and 1 subway stop. That's non-controversial and a non-backbreaker. It's 1.5 miles of preferably surface routing with shifted trail, less-preferably a combo of some surface and some cover-over around abutters. At a third the total distance to Hanscom and only 2 of the 5 stations specced for an extension to Hanscom, Height's per-rider capital and operating costs more or less hit the league average for the much better-hyped Orange/Blue extension proposals. So don't be absolutist and lump the two builds together, and don't treat it as off-scale with similar extensions. It's not off-scale.

Demand for Heights has been established since 1945, is growing acute with Mass Ave. congestion, will grow more acute when GLX gets to Route 16 and generates still more rapid transit demand in Arlington...and they have some degree of non-buyer's remorse about turning this down in the 70's when it was there for the taking at more favorable cost. You can't blithely assume the 1.5 miles miles past the High School will be nuked from orbit without attempting to negotiate. So neither be absolutist nor lump it in with Hanscom, which is a future-not-present tense growth prospect.

Lex isn't ready for it. Hanscom definitely isn't ready for it without some sort of compelling master plan. We don't know if either will ever be ready for it. We also don't know how Lexington would utilize it, since Alewife is 6 miles away from Lexington Center and virtually unreachable because of congestion and multiple required bus transfers while Heights would be a fast transfer. You also can't assume the first leg doesn't serve and draw Lexington ridership. So don't be absolutist.


OK? That's not unrealistic. Whether you would rank it in your Top 5 system expansion priorities is up for debate, but hyperbole...no. That's as useless at either extreme.

So is comparing it to commuter rail that ran one round trip per day in 1977 on equipment so shot it had with par odds of not making it to destination...run by an operator in its 7th year of bankruptcy reorganization. It is a bunk, hysterical comparison.

And Red to Waltham as icing-on-cake for a hyperbolic statement about Arlington/Lexington is equally useless. You can't physically get out of Alewife in that direction without blowing up the Pfizer campus, and you probably can't eliminate the Waltham Ctr. grade crossings with the bridges immediately east constraining the incline room and the Charles 100 ft. away most definitely making a cut no-go. LRT out of Union/Porter is probably the only extensible mode out there. That's a whole separate argument, but using that as the basis for a hyperbole indictment of Red extensions is likewise...a bunk, hysterical comparison. Waltham has absolutely zilch to do with a Red extension.