Crazy Transit Pitches
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I couldn't disagree with that statement more.
F-Line to Dudley
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Harvard curve really isn't that much of a problem. It's technically 'the' line throughput limiter capping headways at 3 mins., but the doors-open dwells at Park and DTX (and right behind them SS and Kendall) aren't very far behind at imposing their own headway limits at peak loading. 3 mins. from the RLT resignaling effort probably won't itself be sustainable for more than 5-10 years max unless you built Red-Blue...not sustainable for 10-15 years unless you also build a second Red-only Park St. egress on top of Red-Blue and tighten every bolt with the egress layout at DTX...and not sustainable for 20 years unless you build Green-Transitway. See also: Urban Ring augment for Kendall in similar timespan, if your ceiling for multi-decade Kendall platform overcrowding tops out at the high end.
That's several billion dollars in busywork to keep us occupied before Harvard curve straightening does anything of lasting effect unto itself.
That's several billion dollars in busywork to keep us occupied before Harvard curve straightening does anything of lasting effect unto itself.
Charlie_mta
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The deep bore tunnel required for this realignment under city blocks would be very deep with long escalators to access it, even from the bus tunnel.
Charlie_mta
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Heh, heh, the plaza in front of Holyoke Center was hippie central back in the late 1960s, like a Haight-Ashbury east. Hippies would be there hanging out and selling copies of the Avatar underground newspaper. More innocent times than today.
The EGE
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I was trolling just a little, but it was an interesting exercise in how to straighten the curve. Sert's work (as with any brutalism) is polarizing; I happen not to be a fan. He does have an interesting connection to the T, though: he designed the Bowdoin headhouse.
Here's a combined Blue/Green "rethreading" crayon that I've been working on for a bit. I'll go into specifics on the various parts below.
Blue is the simpler one to explain, so we'll start there.
Blue Southside:
-After the Red/Blue connector, Blue continues along the Esplanade to Kenmore (as has been discussed a bit here).
-From Kenmore, Blue swallows a (buried) C line all the way to Cleveland Circle, where it turns south to Reservoir
-From Reservoir, it takes over the outer end of the D Line, forking into Needham and Riverside branches
Blue Northside:
-From Wonderland, Blue hooks west under Revere St and Squire Rd
-Blue forks at the Squire Rd/Rte 1 rotary into two branches: South Lynnfield and Lynn (technically making this a BLX crayon, haha)
-The Lynn branch goes underneath the Saugus bike path, the Lynn Common, and Market St/Lynnway to terminate at Lynn Beach.
-The South Lynnfield branch runs under/down the center (depends on budget) of Route 1, terminating at a traffic sponge P&R near the 128/1 interchange.
Green is a little more tricky, but in brief, there are now two trunks running four branches: an A/B trunk and a C/D trunk. The two trunks generally run independently of each other, but have opportunities for trains to move between them if necessary.
The destination pairs are:
A - Watertown to West Medford
B - Boston College to Medford Sq
C - Boston College (again) to Everett (Eastern Ave)
D - Forest Hills to Revere (Squire Rd)
More below, here's the overview map!
A little more detailed view of the Southside.
I decided to go with Blue taking C instead of D because Coolidge Corner is a really strong destination, and a near perfectly-straight alignment + stop consolidation + subway conversion = very quick and efficient service. Reservoir becomes a transfer station between Blue and Green (now the C line in this crayon).
As for Green:
The A/B trunk runs through Kenmore. The A Line branches off at Packard's corner, straight shot on/under N. Beacon to Watertown. The B Line is unchanged, maybe some stop consolidation.
The C/D trunk uses the Tremont - Marginal - Back Bay alignment. The tracks are buried under Huntington, then the C/D split happens at Mission Park. The C runs under Boylston St to an underground Brookline Village station, then ducks under the dog park to Brookline Hills. After Reservoir it cuts under Chestnut Hill Ave to join the B line tracks and terminate at Boston College.
Having both the B (from the A/B trunk) and the C (from the C/D trunk) terminate at the Boston College yard creates a handy opportunity for trainsets to switch between trunk lines as necessary with zero deadheading if you do it right. It also gives riders from that station their choice of which trunk line they want to use to get downtown.
As for the (new) D line, it hugs the Jamaicaway/Arborway all the way to Forest Hills. While it's not as densely populated at Centre St, it also doesn't overlap as much with the Orange Line walkshed.
Of course, downtown is where the fun really begins! So let's zoom in on that.
The A/B trunk approaches from Kenmore as normal, but then hooks northeast after Charles St, under the Parkman Bandstand. As best I can tell, there should be enough space under there for this since the garage is situated a bit farther to the north. This cuts Boylston and the famous screeeeeeech out of the equation for the A/B trunk. A bit of a loss, but Arlington is close enough for it to be okay.
Since C/D approaches from Tremont it still serves Boylston, without the screeching this time.
Park Street is where the fun begins: not only is it the Red Line transfer, but it's also where the A/B and C/D trunks can transfer between one another. The Central Subway has enough tracks to accommodate this, but squeezing two extra tracks under Tremont St to the north to accommodate a second trunk is unlikely to work. So this is where we play the "crazy and stupid but maybe crazy and stupid enough to work" card: the A/B trunk will use the normal Park Street to Government Center tunnel, but the C/D trunk is going to do the same trip as an elevated. So we're still quad-tracking, but two tracks above and two below.
Yes, this probably requires blowing up historic Park Street station and starting over. That's why we're in the Crazy thread.
Anyway, the A/B branch continues to Haymarket/North Station as normal, nothing to talk about there. The C/D runs as an elevated, then hooks east over Government Center and the steps between City Hall and Fanueil Hall. It cruises over Congress Street and North Street, then stops at "Fanueil Station," located above a pedestrianized Clinton St. The elevated slides over the Kennedy Greenway (this is also why I went with an el -- good luck trying to get any more tunnel perpendicular under the Big Dig) and then "lands" on Commercial Street, where it dips into a tunnel.
The C/D tunnels under Commercial Street, stopping at a North End station under Commercial @ Hanover. Then we tunnel under Langone Park and the Harbor to get to Constitution Wharf, then turn under Chelsea St to run parellel to the Tobin.
Phew! That was fun. Now the Northside bit.
Blue has been explained already, not much to add. A/B is relatively boring. A is just the Green Line Extention + West Medford. B departs from GLX to run underneath McGrath, then turns northwest under Mystic Ave all the way to Medford Square. As for Union Sq, that becomes part of another Urban Loop crayon that I'm not getting into right now.
C/D is a little more interesting: the tunnel dips under the Tobin at Medford St in Charlestown, serves a station at Barry Field, then tunnels down under the Mystic.The split happens underground around O'Malley Park in Chelsea.
The C heads north to the industrial park, where it emerges to the surface and runs along the existing freight ROW. From there we pop under Sweetster Circle and then it's just a straight shot up Broadway!
The D runs under Commandants Way, turns southeast under Williams St, then utilizes the JJ Mahoney Rest Are to partially mitigate the tiiight turn at Williams and Park St. Once we make the turn, though, we're in the clear for another straight shot up Broadway through Chelsea and Revere, terminating at a Blue/Green connection station at the Squire Rd rotary.
Anyway, plenty to nitpick and a bit of hand-waving to make this all work, but the end result is pretty nice: the Green Line goes from an unbalanced "3 + 1" system with a heavy Southside bias to a "2 + 2" system of 99% independent trunk lines that's equally balanced in the north and south. And all we had to do was blow up the country's most historic subway stations and spend a few billions to do it!
Blue is the simpler one to explain, so we'll start there.
Blue Southside:
-After the Red/Blue connector, Blue continues along the Esplanade to Kenmore (as has been discussed a bit here).
-From Kenmore, Blue swallows a (buried) C line all the way to Cleveland Circle, where it turns south to Reservoir
-From Reservoir, it takes over the outer end of the D Line, forking into Needham and Riverside branches
Blue Northside:
-From Wonderland, Blue hooks west under Revere St and Squire Rd
-Blue forks at the Squire Rd/Rte 1 rotary into two branches: South Lynnfield and Lynn (technically making this a BLX crayon, haha)
-The Lynn branch goes underneath the Saugus bike path, the Lynn Common, and Market St/Lynnway to terminate at Lynn Beach.
-The South Lynnfield branch runs under/down the center (depends on budget) of Route 1, terminating at a traffic sponge P&R near the 128/1 interchange.
Green is a little more tricky, but in brief, there are now two trunks running four branches: an A/B trunk and a C/D trunk. The two trunks generally run independently of each other, but have opportunities for trains to move between them if necessary.
The destination pairs are:
A - Watertown to West Medford
B - Boston College to Medford Sq
C - Boston College (again) to Everett (Eastern Ave)
D - Forest Hills to Revere (Squire Rd)
More below, here's the overview map!
A little more detailed view of the Southside.
I decided to go with Blue taking C instead of D because Coolidge Corner is a really strong destination, and a near perfectly-straight alignment + stop consolidation + subway conversion = very quick and efficient service. Reservoir becomes a transfer station between Blue and Green (now the C line in this crayon).
As for Green:
The A/B trunk runs through Kenmore. The A Line branches off at Packard's corner, straight shot on/under N. Beacon to Watertown. The B Line is unchanged, maybe some stop consolidation.
The C/D trunk uses the Tremont - Marginal - Back Bay alignment. The tracks are buried under Huntington, then the C/D split happens at Mission Park. The C runs under Boylston St to an underground Brookline Village station, then ducks under the dog park to Brookline Hills. After Reservoir it cuts under Chestnut Hill Ave to join the B line tracks and terminate at Boston College.
Having both the B (from the A/B trunk) and the C (from the C/D trunk) terminate at the Boston College yard creates a handy opportunity for trainsets to switch between trunk lines as necessary with zero deadheading if you do it right. It also gives riders from that station their choice of which trunk line they want to use to get downtown.
As for the (new) D line, it hugs the Jamaicaway/Arborway all the way to Forest Hills. While it's not as densely populated at Centre St, it also doesn't overlap as much with the Orange Line walkshed.
Of course, downtown is where the fun really begins! So let's zoom in on that.
The A/B trunk approaches from Kenmore as normal, but then hooks northeast after Charles St, under the Parkman Bandstand. As best I can tell, there should be enough space under there for this since the garage is situated a bit farther to the north. This cuts Boylston and the famous screeeeeeech out of the equation for the A/B trunk. A bit of a loss, but Arlington is close enough for it to be okay.
Since C/D approaches from Tremont it still serves Boylston, without the screeching this time.
Park Street is where the fun begins: not only is it the Red Line transfer, but it's also where the A/B and C/D trunks can transfer between one another. The Central Subway has enough tracks to accommodate this, but squeezing two extra tracks under Tremont St to the north to accommodate a second trunk is unlikely to work. So this is where we play the "crazy and stupid but maybe crazy and stupid enough to work" card: the A/B trunk will use the normal Park Street to Government Center tunnel, but the C/D trunk is going to do the same trip as an elevated. So we're still quad-tracking, but two tracks above and two below.
Yes, this probably requires blowing up historic Park Street station and starting over. That's why we're in the Crazy thread.
Anyway, the A/B branch continues to Haymarket/North Station as normal, nothing to talk about there. The C/D runs as an elevated, then hooks east over Government Center and the steps between City Hall and Fanueil Hall. It cruises over Congress Street and North Street, then stops at "Fanueil Station," located above a pedestrianized Clinton St. The elevated slides over the Kennedy Greenway (this is also why I went with an el -- good luck trying to get any more tunnel perpendicular under the Big Dig) and then "lands" on Commercial Street, where it dips into a tunnel.
The C/D tunnels under Commercial Street, stopping at a North End station under Commercial @ Hanover. Then we tunnel under Langone Park and the Harbor to get to Constitution Wharf, then turn under Chelsea St to run parellel to the Tobin.
Phew! That was fun. Now the Northside bit.
Blue has been explained already, not much to add. A/B is relatively boring. A is just the Green Line Extention + West Medford. B departs from GLX to run underneath McGrath, then turns northwest under Mystic Ave all the way to Medford Square. As for Union Sq, that becomes part of another Urban Loop crayon that I'm not getting into right now.
C/D is a little more interesting: the tunnel dips under the Tobin at Medford St in Charlestown, serves a station at Barry Field, then tunnels down under the Mystic.The split happens underground around O'Malley Park in Chelsea.
The C heads north to the industrial park, where it emerges to the surface and runs along the existing freight ROW. From there we pop under Sweetster Circle and then it's just a straight shot up Broadway!
The D runs under Commandants Way, turns southeast under Williams St, then utilizes the JJ Mahoney Rest Are to partially mitigate the tiiight turn at Williams and Park St. Once we make the turn, though, we're in the clear for another straight shot up Broadway through Chelsea and Revere, terminating at a Blue/Green connection station at the Squire Rd rotary.
Anyway, plenty to nitpick and a bit of hand-waving to make this all work, but the end result is pretty nice: the Green Line goes from an unbalanced "3 + 1" system with a heavy Southside bias to a "2 + 2" system of 99% independent trunk lines that's equally balanced in the north and south. And all we had to do was blow up the country's most historic subway stations and spend a few billions to do it!
F-Line to Dudley
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Tunneling the C encounters manifold problems with the grades up Heartbreak Hill. It's within the native capabilities of trolleys, but multiple-unit HRT lash-ups perform a lot poorer with adhesion on really steep climbs. That's the primary reason why fixed-guideway rubber-tire HRT exists as a modal alternative to steel wheels, as it's primarily deployed in cities that have to push the envelope with tunnels under hills. Coolidge Corner would really heap on the costs with how deep it would have to be bored to make the gradient somewhat manageable for steel-wheel HRT, and I doubt the ridership is going to track well enough with the cost escalation.
The B has very similar problems up the hill, with Washington St. likely needing to be even deeper-bore than Coolidge would. For HRT past Kenmore it's pretty much D, B&A ROW, something trans-JP via Brookline Ave., or tunneling the ex- A Line for further pathways...not CC or BC.
HRT is a poor fit for the Needham Branch because the grade crossings that full-spec LRT can effortlessly live with via shared traffic signaling become total non-optional eliminations with HRT and HRT's extremely more-dangerous crash profile at mixed-traffic crossings. All 8 of them on this corridor. Plus the added cost of redoing a slew of D stations with present platform-to-platform track crossings as fully separated up-and-over access when that would largely make station access noticeably slower than it is now. The extra expenses incurred by zapping every single one of those crossings--including changing the entire station-access elevations @ Upper Falls, Needham Heights, and Needham Ctr. for the switch--probably outstrips the gains from the very D/Newton-profile riderships at each of the new stops and whatever would be gained by increased frequencies at most of the existing D stops. It's build-feasible if you have an extra $150-200M burning a hole in your pocket, but is comparatively a LOT of waste for very little added benefit other than the feng sui of saying you did up a sealed corridor.
Branching or end-running Blue anywhere before Lynn is cardinal sin. That's the largest bus terminal to-be served anywhere by Blue, and the largest one presently un-served by rapid transit. You cannot dilute frequencies before reaching there, or the whole North Shore transit works will not work. The bus transfers will still be famished for connecting frequencies like today, and the 'waste' miles that chew up 30-40% of the equipment cycles duplicating efforts to Wonderland and Downtown will have to remain fully in-place, meaning the anemic Yellow Line frequencies spraying out of Lynn Terminal across the North Shore can never easily be pulsed-up. Lynn's been an unbuilt mandate for 60 years because of this, and no half-measures have ever licked the endemic problem with the bus terminal's frequency anemia except for bringing whole-hog Blue mainline frequencies to Central Sq.
There is an alternative for the Saugus Branch...but it's pricey and via Orange, not Blue. IF you built out OLX to Reading eating commuter rail, the OL express track gets extended from Wellington to Oak Grove. Malden Ctr. would be a theoretically kosher place to branch 3 min. OL mainline frequencies into separate halves, because it's the last big bus terminal on the route and doesn't vulture any frequencies needed for the heavy transfer crowds. You could split branches before MC station, feed them into separate "upstairs/downstairs" MC platforms, and turn the lower branch out under Florence St. in a subway to descend deep-bore under property lines from the Main to Holden St. blocks. Then portal-up onto the Saugus Branch ROW after Franklin St. You'd be required to elevate it on the Saugus ROW around the problem crossing clusters in-town at questionable community support (since Malden was the town that vociferously KO'd the Main St. El 85 years ago and probably isn't going to be wild about a shitload of new rail overpasses in their backyards) and considerable expense, but it's totally build-feasible. 6 min. headways to Reading and Saugus after the MC split, which is probably adequate for the ridership profile of each branch. This would be a much better overall plan than the Mystic Working Group's utter nonstarter proposal to branch Orange via Everett @ Sullivan, fucking over MC terminal's frequencies in the process .
Alternatively, you could do up OLX-Reading, and take the Tracks 3 & 4 berths over the Mystic Bridge to give over to the Green Line run out of Sullivan via the Urban Ring LRT routing. Split branches for Everett/Chelsea and Malden @ Assembly, co-run it alongside Orange on the same ROW to MC, do the same mini-subway under Florence St. from MC, and do the same Saugus Branch routing with some but not all of the grade-crossings zapped if you can successfully arm-twist the locals. I don't think the ROI would be quite as high with that one since it's a lot of ops duplication and would probably vulture some frequencies @ Assembly split from the Urban Ring route...but it's similarly build-feasible. Lot of dependencies, however.
Route 1 north of the Saugus ghost ramps travels through a really big density cavity, however, unless car-hellhole big box shopping is really expected to drive transit shares. Lynn Woods really gets all up in 1's grill for a few miles there all points deeper than the actual turnpike-facing storefronts. Look at the bus desert here; most routes vacate by Northgate Shopping Ctr., and what few don't all finish up their business by Square One Mall. That's a big tell that happens to correspond with where the Woods muscle in and severely break up all the non- big box density the rest of the way. South Lynnfield/128 itself where the density sorta reappears after the Woods would be well within the catchment of Peabody/128 commuter rail @ North Shore Mall...especially if after Salem got pulsed up into a semi-breakaway North Shore bus depot that hosted more feeder routes into the Regional Rail transfers there.
The B has very similar problems up the hill, with Washington St. likely needing to be even deeper-bore than Coolidge would. For HRT past Kenmore it's pretty much D, B&A ROW, something trans-JP via Brookline Ave., or tunneling the ex- A Line for further pathways...not CC or BC.
HRT is a poor fit for the Needham Branch because the grade crossings that full-spec LRT can effortlessly live with via shared traffic signaling become total non-optional eliminations with HRT and HRT's extremely more-dangerous crash profile at mixed-traffic crossings. All 8 of them on this corridor. Plus the added cost of redoing a slew of D stations with present platform-to-platform track crossings as fully separated up-and-over access when that would largely make station access noticeably slower than it is now. The extra expenses incurred by zapping every single one of those crossings--including changing the entire station-access elevations @ Upper Falls, Needham Heights, and Needham Ctr. for the switch--probably outstrips the gains from the very D/Newton-profile riderships at each of the new stops and whatever would be gained by increased frequencies at most of the existing D stops. It's build-feasible if you have an extra $150-200M burning a hole in your pocket, but is comparatively a LOT of waste for very little added benefit other than the feng sui of saying you did up a sealed corridor.
Branching or end-running Blue anywhere before Lynn is cardinal sin. That's the largest bus terminal to-be served anywhere by Blue, and the largest one presently un-served by rapid transit. You cannot dilute frequencies before reaching there, or the whole North Shore transit works will not work. The bus transfers will still be famished for connecting frequencies like today, and the 'waste' miles that chew up 30-40% of the equipment cycles duplicating efforts to Wonderland and Downtown will have to remain fully in-place, meaning the anemic Yellow Line frequencies spraying out of Lynn Terminal across the North Shore can never easily be pulsed-up. Lynn's been an unbuilt mandate for 60 years because of this, and no half-measures have ever licked the endemic problem with the bus terminal's frequency anemia except for bringing whole-hog Blue mainline frequencies to Central Sq.
There is an alternative for the Saugus Branch...but it's pricey and via Orange, not Blue. IF you built out OLX to Reading eating commuter rail, the OL express track gets extended from Wellington to Oak Grove. Malden Ctr. would be a theoretically kosher place to branch 3 min. OL mainline frequencies into separate halves, because it's the last big bus terminal on the route and doesn't vulture any frequencies needed for the heavy transfer crowds. You could split branches before MC station, feed them into separate "upstairs/downstairs" MC platforms, and turn the lower branch out under Florence St. in a subway to descend deep-bore under property lines from the Main to Holden St. blocks. Then portal-up onto the Saugus Branch ROW after Franklin St. You'd be required to elevate it on the Saugus ROW around the problem crossing clusters in-town at questionable community support (since Malden was the town that vociferously KO'd the Main St. El 85 years ago and probably isn't going to be wild about a shitload of new rail overpasses in their backyards) and considerable expense, but it's totally build-feasible. 6 min. headways to Reading and Saugus after the MC split, which is probably adequate for the ridership profile of each branch. This would be a much better overall plan than the Mystic Working Group's utter nonstarter proposal to branch Orange via Everett @ Sullivan, fucking over MC terminal's frequencies in the process .
Alternatively, you could do up OLX-Reading, and take the Tracks 3 & 4 berths over the Mystic Bridge to give over to the Green Line run out of Sullivan via the Urban Ring LRT routing. Split branches for Everett/Chelsea and Malden @ Assembly, co-run it alongside Orange on the same ROW to MC, do the same mini-subway under Florence St. from MC, and do the same Saugus Branch routing with some but not all of the grade-crossings zapped if you can successfully arm-twist the locals. I don't think the ROI would be quite as high with that one since it's a lot of ops duplication and would probably vulture some frequencies @ Assembly split from the Urban Ring route...but it's similarly build-feasible. Lot of dependencies, however.
Route 1 north of the Saugus ghost ramps travels through a really big density cavity, however, unless car-hellhole big box shopping is really expected to drive transit shares. Lynn Woods really gets all up in 1's grill for a few miles there all points deeper than the actual turnpike-facing storefronts. Look at the bus desert here; most routes vacate by Northgate Shopping Ctr., and what few don't all finish up their business by Square One Mall. That's a big tell that happens to correspond with where the Woods muscle in and severely break up all the non- big box density the rest of the way. South Lynnfield/128 itself where the density sorta reappears after the Woods would be well within the catchment of Peabody/128 commuter rail @ North Shore Mall...especially if after Salem got pulsed up into a semi-breakaway North Shore bus depot that hosted more feeder routes into the Regional Rail transfers there.
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Now that's the good shit right there -- talking good classic crazy transit pitches stuff right there. Unfeasible in any number of ways, but I really like where your head is at!
I have a hard time imagining an el being built in downtown again -- but that's one reason I like crazy transit pitches, because it forces me to examine why I have a hard time imagining it. I think in your case you'd run into grade problems -- your tracks would need to traverse a whole lot of vertical distance across not very much horizontal distance.
Chelsea, Everett, East Malden and central Revere have long been vexing for rapid transit planners. I agree with you that the pair of Broadways are ultimately an excellent target for rapid transit, but the tricky part is getting over all that water. It sounds like your solution is lots of (deep) tunnel. Why not claim some of the real estate on the Tobin? Or build track next to the Tobin? Yes, it makes it a bit harder to swing up and over to Everett, but not impossible.
I'm curious, what's your thinking behind that second Medford branch? That's not an idea I see everyday.
bigeman312
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I love this. Building off of this (truly crazy and fun) transit pitch:
For destination pairs, why not:
A - Watertown to Revere (Squire Rd)
B - Boston College (via Comm Ave) to Medford Sq
C - Boston College (via Highland Branch) to Everett (Eastern Ave)
D - Forest Hills to West Medford
As is, the Watertown <-> West Medford matching would discourage through-ridership. Just due to the geographical circuitous nature of the proposed pairing, most station pairs on respective branches of the A Watertown - West Medford line would be better served by some combination of:
For destination pairs, why not:
A - Watertown to Revere (Squire Rd)
B - Boston College (via Comm Ave) to Medford Sq
C - Boston College (via Highland Branch) to Everett (Eastern Ave)
D - Forest Hills to West Medford
As is, the Watertown <-> West Medford matching would discourage through-ridership. Just due to the geographical circuitous nature of the proposed pairing, most station pairs on respective branches of the A Watertown - West Medford line would be better served by some combination of:
- 86 bus improvements
- Extending the 69 to Watertown Square
- Extending the 91 to Union Square, Allston
- Extending the 96 to Union Square, Allston
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^ Good point about the destination pairs, and it does highlight something interesting about Boston's geography: the harbor causes a distortion in our radial routes (both rail and road). The Orange Line is almost straight north-south, but the southern leg bends a bit to the west -- offset by maybe 30º. The Red Line's southern half is largely north-south, but then it's northern half is much more predominantly east-west, offset by something much closer to 90º. The Green Line (once GLX is finished) also will have a severe turn, getting modestly close to actual horseshoe territory -- especially apparent when you look at the Union and Commonwealth branches, which both pretty much parallel the Red Line equidistantly (at least until Packards Corner on the B).
My point: it's much easier to run into those redundant destination pairs than one might expect.
My point: it's much easier to run into those redundant destination pairs than one might expect.
Thanks for the feedback, definitely some things to think about
- C Line grades: I'll admit to being guilty of 2D crayonista sins here and not fully considering the 3D picture. That said, wouldn't the Blue Line--which is already built around trolley geometry to some extent--be relatively well-equipped for this problem?
- Needham grade crossings: Yup, I never said this wouldn't be spendy. That's why it's in the Crazy Thread.
- Lynn: I should say that decent RR on the Eastern Route is a baked-in assumption of this crayon. If Lynn can be getting 5-10 minute RR service, duplicating that with Blue is less appealing than opening up access to new areas. Northern Revere, Saugus, South Lynnfield, etc. don't have many other options to get tied in.
- Route 1: Big box stores aren't great, but they do mean access to jobs and lots of relatively easy TOD potential with overbuilt parking lots--building a T station next door changes the land use calculus on marginal parking spaces that only get used on Black Friday. Another part of the selling point here is the South Lynnfield Park & Ride, which can sponge up a lot of the traffic coming down Route 1.
- Downtown elevated grade issues: This is where the "blow up Park Street station" part comes in and we get full Crazy. You could keep one of the trunks underground in the current station area, but the second trunk would have to already be elevated by the time it gets to Park, meaning it emerges from the ground between Boylston and Park (or Arlington and Park if you wanna elevate the A/B instead). NIMBYs will scream at the idea of an elevated casting shadows on the Common, of course.
- Tunnels under the Mystic: I think the area under the Tobin is dredged to 40 ft., so the tunnel doesn't have to be THAT deep. And the tunnel allows you to use the ample real estate at O'Malley Park to navigate the branch junction, instead of trying to do weird stuff on/around/(above?) to Tobin bridge to try to split off the Everett and Revere branches in the right places.
- Medford Branch: Medford Square has potential but is awkwardly located too far from Davis to really meet that potential. I did go back and forth about using the current alignment in Somerville to get there vs. hopping across the Mystic earlier and going through eastern Medford, which is less dense but has less overlap with GLX.
- Different destination pairs: This is a good idea, and just means that you need to make the A/B the elevated branch downtown and send the C/D underground instead. It works fine, I think I ended up making the "U-shaped" lines just because I was trying to think of A/B and C/D as running independently and having no crossover points. But there's no reason to not do it with the pairs you suggested.
F-Line to Dudley
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No. The Day 1 intent was to HRT the East Boston tunnel, and by the time Bowdoin was built they were trying to reverse-branch the Red Line at Charles Circle (then station-less) to sent one El segment under Beacon Hill and one El segment into the Cambridge St. portal. The LRT interregnum is because they deadlocked at making up their minds on exactly how/where they were going to pipe an HRT source into it. It probably would've run Orange Line-spec cars if hooked up to Charles Circle that way, not persisted so long on shrunken lengths for sake of Bowdoin Loop. It also doesn't have steep grades. It very gradually descends for the Harbor crossing, with Aquarium needing to be as long an escalator as it is because Blue has already done most of the descending labor prior to there.
It's spendy vs. ridership generation that's problematic here. You can absorb high capital costs if the ops ratios stay near ideal range. Outer D Line-level station loading but with 6-car HRT lashups instead of LRV's deuces carries a lot of waste on ops cost per rider. LRT fares significantly better on that front, too, because the capacity is more right-sized. Since there are several potential western BLX alignments you could benchmark against each other, it's kind of important to weight the ones that would do better on ops-per-rider cost. This isn't gonna be one of them that rates well.
Ops cost-per-rider is lower running it LRT. Capital cost for grade crossing elimination is cosmically lower. Takes some highly individualistic feng sui feels to attempt to paper that difference over with a must-be-HRT pitch.
Purple Line as drop-in replacement for BLX is a myth that's been debunked many, many times over. It assumes that all else would be equal if frequencies were pulsed up in the same neighborhood. It's not true; there are HUGE remaining differences. Inter- North Shore transit has a Revere/Eastie, not Chelsea/Everett orientation. A giant swamp marked by a giant bus desert separates Revere/Lynn from Chelsea; they are direct neighbors who have never had much of a travel orientation. Including before WWII when Eastern Route frequencies were exactly that frequent. Logan Airport is also a thing that exists. Maverick bus terminal is also a thing that exists. Easy rapid transit transfers in the CBD behind prepayment is a thing that exists. The equivalent application on Purple Line is nowhere near as easy; North Station is a lot of footsteps to the accompanying Green/Orange-only station, and NSRL's stations would have escalators running considerably longer than system-longest Aquarium's for changing levels at consequentially very long transfer time penalty.
You can pulse up Eastern Route frequencies as high as they can go, and indeed we do plan for exactly that. But the buses will still all waste 40% of their equipment cycles distending inbound on 1A to Wonderland and Downtown with those 10 min. Purple frequencies because they follow the path where more North Shore riders aim to go. You don't get to reinvest in higher feeder frequencies on any of the North Shore routes unless you can cut them all at Lynn Terminal for 1:1 equipment recycling. That's only possible with BLX coming to Central Sq. Again: not a Crazy Pitch, but rather a 7 decades delayed mandate.
Every additional time this myth gets re-presented as some self-evident self-correcting truth, it ends up exactly as much bunk as the last time the same thing was said. Purple ≠ Blue. Doesn't do a remotely similar job for remotely similar audience.
[citation needed] on job generation figures for strict retail. It's an order of magnitude lower than office or mixed-use. We already have the canary-in-coalmine evidence in-hand with the bus desert up there. The more mixed-orientation Northgate + Square One malls are where the buses go to end...not the big-box pockets.
Route 1 isn't very mixed in usage cases; it's the end stage of a feedback loop of car-centric dev begatting more car-centric dev that the towns in question are still wrapped up in. It's not "easy" TOD potential umpteen times into that double-down cycle. Stopping on a dime and changing the density is actually quite hard. It's why that's only starting to gain legs with formerly integrated malls: the starting density was an order-of-magnitude higher than pure big-box strips, and for the considerable elbow grease it takes to strongarm an ex- indoor mall into true TOD-supporting density it's nonetheless a lot more daunting to try the same on a big-box strip lot. So Northgate + Square One--where the buses already go--will ultimately end up decades ahead of the turnpike big-box strip on densification in any universe where those towns learn to change their ways.
As I said, the South Lynnfield Pn'R doesn't accomplish anything much different than a commuter rail station at Peabody/North Shore Mall would. Because most of that traffic spongeing on 1 is sourced from 95/128, not Lynn Woods. That tail isn't going to wag the dog.
And there you've articulated the essence of why we have separate "Crazy" and "God-mode" threads. Seriously: an elevated on Boston Common???
Uhh...draft depth of 40 feet means the tunnel is considerably lower than that. The bore needs to be both safe from getting its roof clipped by a shipping accident and to avoid the tidal influence of currents pushing incrementally on the overlying sediment. Aquarium Station on the interface to the East Boston Tunnel's Harbor crossing is a record-breaking 50 ft. down, and that's not quite at the bottommost grade. It's extremely deep. Plugging a junction in while it's that extremely deep is an extremely complex extra incursion on top.
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Another "New Heavy Rail Subway in Boston" pitch: this time blue-line related. How about Blue-Everett?
Branch off the existing blue line tunnel under Maverick Square. Cut-and cover under Meridian street to a new station at Eagle Hill, then under Chelsea Creek to Chelsea Under. Portal up from there along the commuter rail tracks with a stop at Mystic Mall (and possibly a deep-bore under half of Everett to get a stop somewhere downtown). From there's the possibilities are limitless. Wellington? Sullivan Square? Medford? Wherever you like!
Branch off the existing blue line tunnel under Maverick Square. Cut-and cover under Meridian street to a new station at Eagle Hill, then under Chelsea Creek to Chelsea Under. Portal up from there along the commuter rail tracks with a stop at Mystic Mall (and possibly a deep-bore under half of Everett to get a stop somewhere downtown). From there's the possibilities are limitless. Wellington? Sullivan Square? Medford? Wherever you like!
I think if you were to do anything comparable to that it needs to be after Airport.
themissinglink
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Branching before Lynn/Central Square would be a no-go. Any branching of the Blue Line on the northside would therefore have to be north of Lynn.
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themissinglink
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Speaking of potential future Blue Line branches, I've always wondered how "crazy" of a pitch it would be to build a Blue Line branch to Marblehead (obviously after BLX to Lynn and Salem), splitting off north of Swampscott using the Marblehead rail trail ROW. Would probably have to be in a tunnel similar to how the proposed RLX to Arlington would be in a tunnel under the Minuteman Bikeway.
Stations would be at East Swampscott, Clifton, Devereux, and Marblehead.
Stations would be at East Swampscott, Clifton, Devereux, and Marblehead.
F-Line to Dudley
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Marblehead isn't really that dense, though. The B&M service wasn't exactly a winner, and it's not like the place is being upzoned any. Buses would be pretty nice from there with BLX-Lynn, and a degree better with BLX-Salem swallowing Swampscott Station.
JeffDowntown
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To be fair, Marblehead is close in density to Salem and twice as densely populated as Beverly, and Beverly has 5 commuter rail stops.
But the long lack of rail service has likely sorted North Shore commuters. People that want rail access choose towns like Beverly over Marblehead. One of the planning fallacies is to assume that turning service on will result in people naturally switching commute modes. But people really do factor in available commuting options in their choice of where to live, so there is a natural sorting of interest in rail service, based on the availability of rail service. And changing the interest level with new service will take years, perhaps decades to resort (because real estate turnover is slow).
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Marblehead...or at least the portions of it along the Marblehead Branch ROW...are uniformly single-family residential. The Downtown terminus might do some pretty decent numbers during the daytime, albeit somewhat hours-constrained because the place shuts down at sunset. Single-occupancy, owner-occupied (meaning high-end enough demographics to trend very strongly to 9-5'ers rather than shift labor), and spaced-out by half-acre plots. With a big density gap in the form of the country club only mildly made up by a mini-spike from the High School. These characteristics are sort of why that was one of the first branchlines the B&M sought federal permission to schedule-gut down to peak-only; it was total famine on the off-peak and at the intermediates.
The existing low outliers on the HRT system like Savin Hill and Shawmut have similar dearth of commercial property in their walksheds, but are all tight-packed triple-deckers with scattered larger apartment complexes and more shift variance because of the enormously higher middle/low-income rental characteristics. Projecting from there, you can maybe expect...25%?...of the patronage on the Marblehead Branch intermediates and a somewhat muted Downtown terminus because of the early curtain call. Salem, despite having similar population density, is thoroughly mixed-use everywhere outside the Salem Woods conservation cavity. SSU is a giant all-day trip generator, the Downtown has a defined nightlife, and there is a rentals market because of the school. Even the *weakest* possible BLX-Salem intermediate--Essex St./"Hawthorne Crossing"--spacing one end of Salem Woods from the SSU/Jefferson Ave. stop, would probably escape being one of the low outliers because of the walkshed to the very upzonable Mall. No such luck in Marblehead. I doubt it's going to be a strong look to halve Blue frequencies at Swampscott with how much more poorly one branch is going to look than the other.
The only remaining argument is looking for bus troubleshoots. Downtown Marblehead is covered by 2 bus routes (pre-COVID was 4, with separate numbers for the Haymarket-continued vs. Wonderland turns)
- 441/448 via Swampscott Station ( :30 frequency, :25 to Lynn Central Square).
- 442/449 via MA 129 ( :30 frequency, :25 to Lynn Central Square)
I think in a BLX-Lynn universe Marblehead potentially rates as a corridor worthy of BRT featuring to add capacity and amenities on top of the already outstanding travel times on these fork routes. Then if BLX-Salem then puts a rapid transit transfer @ Swampscott a 12-15 minute trip from Downtown Marblehead?...buff BRT corridor. But the twin-prong BRT corridors stick more to the unbroken density than the rail ROW, and probably do it equal-or-better on travel time because they're straight while the rail ROW does its little neverending sine-wave jiggle the whole route. So that ends up solving all the problem. It would be a very high-ROI corridor for BRT featuring, whereas it would be middling-low ROI for any rail restoration. The sliding scale thus probably dictates that buff-assed BRT is probably the ultimate solution here, because it would rake hard in pretty much any configuration and is more easily time-of-day scalable in service characteristics to the demographics of the corridor. It's actually a quite very nice future for them, without any overthinking required. Marblehead gets swank frequencies and travel times with the BRT augments, while BLX frequencies get rationed a little more usefully for Salem's much more mixed land use and breakaway North Shore bus-hub potential. Everybody wins.