Crossroads Initiative

Good to see that some street lights will be added.
 
It will be nice to have some trees and street lights for drunk kids to lean on while they're puking after leaving the bars in Fanny. I find it's much easier to keep the vomit off your shoes that way.
 
There certainly are exceptions to this apparent rule, even locally.
Exceptions indeed; those are beautiful photographs and make a good case for the species.

Speaking of oriental trees, have you ever seen Ailanthus deliberately planted as a street tree? Also called stinkweed, this tree grows so fast you can almost watch it get bigger.

It loves concrete and apparently car exhausts. Perhaps because it's such a survivor, it's usually hacked down and chopped up. It don't get no respect.
 
I was just thinking about this project the other day and I'm happy to see some movement. Glad to see the intersections will be narrowed.

I believe Ailanthus are growing all over parts of Beacon Hill. If I recall, Myrtle St. is lined with them (hard to see with the poor Streetview photo quality) as well as Garden Street.
 
^ Yep, them's stinkweeds. So far as I know, they're never intentionally planted. Their numerous airborne seeds often wedge themselves between sidewalk and building wall.

Like the folks on this forum, they just love cities.

Any arborist will tell you Garden Street is too narrow to have trees, and yet ...

Perfection as the enemy of the possible.

If it weren't for ailanthus, such streets would have no trees.
 
There's a street near my home called Ailanthus Court.

That has nothing to do with anything at all.
 
Anyone know what's going on with this project? Things seemed to be moving forward in March, but I haven't seen anything started on Broad Street since then, except some work replacing some underground water/sewer pipes.
 
Utility relocation takes a long time. I have a bad feeling Broad Street doesn't have very accurate data on existing utilities. This sort of thing dramatically prolonged much of the surface street work for the Big Dig nearby.
 
This project is called "Connect Historic Boston" but it seems to incorporate parts of the Crossroads Initiative, no? It includes "complete reconstruction of Causeway Street".

The groundbreaking for “Connect Historic Boston” will be on Friday, July 10th, 1pm on Union Street in Blackstone Block. Including major street reconstruction, the CHB Bike Trail and cycle track will run along the North End waterfront’s Commercial Street and Causeway Street. More information in the flyer below and at ConnectHistoric-Boston.org.

http://northendwaterfront.com/2015/...oston-bike-trail-groundbreaking-on-july-10th/
 

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