General MBTA Topics (Multi Modal, Budget, MassDOT)

Arlington said:
I recall when I was a daily GL commuter (1998-2001) that every once in a while I'd spot something back there and think: "Hey, that's clever" Stuff like:
Car 1752 really was the first streetcar to use the subway
The 5 cent fare lasted for 25 years


How much of it was previously covered with ads?
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Anyone know when the last time it was uncovered ? Also, wow, those twitter comments.
 
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Community will scream holy hell if they try to, and at this point the MBTA probably understands that. At this point, I would hope it's more CYA to demonstrate due diligence when pursuing federal grants or whatnot.
 
The EGE said:
Community will scream holy hell if they try to, and at this point the MBTA probably understands that. At this point, I would hope it's more CYA to demonstrate due diligence when pursuing federal grants or whatnot.
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In fairness, the community's opposition to buses is stated in the documents - they could go all "we know better" on us, but one would think the various failure-to-communicate debacles (such as the original 28X) would indicate to them that they can't cram something like that down the community's throat. They could go "fine we don't want to spend money on procuring new LRVs so we'll just keep on with the old PCCs", but the community would definitely prefer that over a switch to buses.

Of course, if someone could find some... leverage on the town of Milton we could just extend Red properly to Mattapan...
 
Random question: If we ever get rail transit directly to Logan by whatever means, what would we rename Airport station? Bremen? Eagle Hill?
 
^ I mean, I think @The EGE's question isn't really about the rail service, but rather about the general question of place-naming in the area of the current Airport Station. In which case, the renaming question is really just a framing device.
 
I remember -- it must have been 20 years ago -- coming across an idea someone floated to do a Blue-Eats-Transitway, where trains would go Goverment Center-State-Maverick-Logan Airport-Seaport-South Station. (It seemed crazy even then, but I digress.) One thing that I've remembered all these years later was the idea of renaming Airport Station to "Airport Junction," being the place where the new branch would diverge.

Blue-East-Transitway aside, there is some aesthetic appeal to such a name -- it does call to mind a particular station-naming trope wherein "XYZ Junction" was in fact not anywhere near XYZ itself, but was where the track diverged in order to reach XYZ.

It's pretty awful for wayfinding, of course.

Just watch -- they'd rename that area "Airport Square" so that they'd avoid having to change all the station sign names. "Oh yeah, Airport Square! Nah, if you wanna fly somewhere you got to go to Logan station. Different place altogether." "But why isn't it called 'Logan Airport station' or something?," the wayward tourist asks. "Well, everyone around here just calls the airport 'Logan'," the Bostonian says with a shrug.
 
Maryland's solution:
BWI Rail (MARC/AMtrak, requires shuttle bus)
BWI Airport (Light Rail at Terminals)
BWI Business District (a big parking lot for now)
bwi-detail.PNG
 
In a scenario where there's rapid transit directly to the airport terminals, the current Airport station would be much more important to East Boston than to the Airport, and the name should reflect that.
 
Back in the late eighties or early nineties, there was a proposal by SOM to create a giant "Transportation Hall" where the Central Garage now stands. The Blue Line was envisioned to loop into this grand, glass covered, Transportation Hall. There were giant posters in Terminal C and the walkway to Terminal B of the proposal. I can't seem to find them online. This was BEFORE the new Terminal A, all the renovations to B, plus the expansion of the Central Garage. Does anyone else remember this? I think it was a visioning competition by Massport, and never really serious stuff.
 
^ that sounds like something from the early stages of the central artery planning where the question was which modes and how much connectivity would get to the airport
 
^ It's not great for rapid transit or bus riders either. 10 minute peak headways, 15 off-peak? And during a pandemic where crowding is dangerous? I understand that money is becoming tight, but literally our entire society depends on people being able to move around freely, safely, and independently. You would think that would qualify as something that we loosen the pursestrings for.
 
Some of this is hard to parse. Couple of examples:

  • Green Line trunk would get 10 minute rush headways? So that's less than two trains an hour per branch?
  • Some commuter rail stations deemed as Hight Transit Critical are on lines that are deemed as Low Transit Critical. How does that work? EG, if you cut back on the Low Transit Critical Needham Line, you are then also cutting back on the High Transit Critical Roslindale and Belvue stations.

And I found this item deeply concerning:

Once implemented, it could take months to years to re-add service depending on mode, scale of reductions, actions taken, and financial certainty.
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And probably the very worst item in the presentation is the proposal to cut non key routes bus service to 30/60 headways and 7AM - 7PM service span. That's... not going to work.
 
It's important to remember why the T makes presentations like that, its primarily to put pressure on the legislature (both state and federal) to show the what's going to happen without extra funding. So much can change in the legislative world (and world in general) before next summer so I wouldn't expect any of these proposals to actually happen as shown here.
 
HelloBostonHi said:
It's important to remember why the T makes presentations like that, its primarily to put pressure on the legislature (both state and federal) to show the what's going to happen without extra funding. So much can change in the legislative world (and world in general) before next summer so I wouldn't expect any of these proposals to actually happen as shown here.
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Agreed. And in the realm of a potential 300 million (or 577 million) dollar shortfall i believe it is prudent to be upfront about what that means. They're using the foot in the door method with the board.
 
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