General MBTA Topics (Multi Modal, Budget, MassDOT)

Arlington said:
Platform doors also keep trash off the tracks, keep drunks and jumpers out, and encourage orderly queues. Bonus: they make basic Air Conditioning feasible.

As soon as we get a "final" train door layout (new OL and RL are wider and sometimes differently spaced than the 3-door Reds in particular) it will be ripe to talk platform doors on the RL & OL. BL might have to wait until that next fleet with it's "final" door design.

Much less urgent on GL where cross-track access is a feature, not a bug. (Eg Park St inbound)
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I was imagining this exactly with the new cars in mind.

datadyne007 said:
Omg please no. Not the PSD discussion again.

PSD thread: http://www.archboston.org/community/showthread.php?t=4288&page=4
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Thanks for the link! Didn’t realize it was an annoying topic though, haha.
 
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Just want to announce that the Silver Line to the airport is completely shut down due to a disabled bus at South Station. Happy Memorial Weekend
 
KentXie said:
Just want to announce that the Silver Line to the airport is completely shut down due to a disabled bus at South Station. Happy Memorial Weekend
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The fact that they don't have a street running back up in criminal.
 
vanshnookenraggen said:
The fact that they don't have a street running back up in criminal.
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When the tunnel was shut a couple weeks ago and the SL took a scheduled surface route, they didn’t accommodate red line transfers at all - after getting dropped off at street level, still had to tap in to get to the red line. So what’s normally a free silver-red ride from the airport ended up costing everyone full fare. Embarrassingly bad customer service treatment for their already inconvenienced riders (compared to Kendall-Park shuttles, where they just wave everyone through an open turnstile).
 
The Boston Globe has a good article reminding us how important the Grand Junction link is to our regional rail network. The Grand Junction tracks are offline until at least mid-June for GLX work. Alternative route for N-S linkage is 120 miles out of the way!

picture.php


http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/20...e-now-miles/xW1FlYMr7leULRIqWQGBVL/story.html
 
The Grand Junction will again be removed from service when the Mass Pike realignment kicks up.
 
What is the GLX work they are talking about? The grand junction has no tracks across Mass Ave currently as they are replacing the grade crossing.
 
sm89 said:
What is the GLX work they are talking about? The grand junction has no tracks across Mass Ave currently as they are replacing the grade crossing.
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It also has no tracks across Binney St. near the One Kendall complex. Maybe they are using the GLX work as an opportunity to do track work on grand junction?
 
bigpicture7 said:
It also has no tracks across Binney St. near the One Kendall complex. Maybe they are using the GLX work as an opportunity to do track work on grand junction?
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The article mentions that they are using the down time for needed track work.
 
That map is ridiculously inaccurate (though it does make the point).
 
datadyne007 said:
The SL ran at the surface yesterday. That is the back up plan.

https://twitter.com/MBTA/status/1000132066468655104
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The problem is they never announced exactly where the SL is picking up passengers at the surface. Nothing like seeing hundreds of passengers wandering to different directions outside South station looking for the bus. No signs, no official, nothing to direct passengers.

Also I just realized how stupid it is that when designing the silver line, that they never planned an extra lane at stations in case a disabled bus ends up blocking the path. Absolutely no foresight was put into avoiding what should be a minor problem.
 
I'm going to say that the silver line underground as built is the most inefficient thing and the biggest waste of money.
 
tysmith95 said:
I'm going to say that the silver line underground as built is the most inefficient thing and the biggest waste of money.
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I'll be the first to agree that the present implementation is a p.o.s.,

But your statement is completely unfair. This was one of the big dig's sacrificial lambs when the pols had to shed some scope. It was designed to be a subway tunnel, then someone chopped its budget and it got half-ass implemented. Of course it was going to suck. Politicians don't realize that halving the funding of something doesn't = getting half the value. Halving the funding probably means getting 1/10th the value.
 
Yea this was a case of well figure it out later but in the mean time well save the money now... but then it actually ends up costing 100x more down the line since we not only need to fix our mistakes that are now in the way, but then completely build what we were supposed to just build in the first place.


Its lack of foresight... not realizing that if they just paid the damn money back then it doesnt make this a complete disaster later down the line. The cost over runs were so out of control they should have just shut it down and did an audit, then audited the audit. There was probably a billion dollars in completely wasted money in there that they could have put into something that really needed it.

Plus it would have already paid dividends having good access in this huge neighborhood theyre building whereas instead it has the worst transit in the city thats going to dramatically affect the neighborhood until the day its opened. I know its tough, but planning for the future and doing it right the first time is always better than half assing it for the meantime then having to get rid of all the half assed crap later and then just building what you should have built anyways.
 
datadyne007 said:
The SL ran at the surface yesterday. That is the back up plan.

https://twitter.com/MBTA/status/1000132066468655104
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KentXie said:
The problem is they never announced exactly where the SL is picking up passengers at the surface. Nothing like seeing hundreds of passengers wandering to different directions outside South station looking for the bus. No signs, no official, nothing to direct passengers.

Also I just realized how stupid it is that when designing the silver line, that they never planned an extra lane at stations in case a disabled bus ends up blocking the path. Absolutely no foresight was put into avoiding what should be a minor problem.
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I (along with a couple other hundred people) was standing on the SL platform on Friday as a few T workers were struggling with the "bus with a mechanical issue" that was broken down in the station in front of us all on the inbound side. After about 15 minutes, another T official came out and started hollering "service is at street level." KentXie is totally right, there was no explanation beyond that. Nobody, including myself, had any idea of where to go. As the hundreds of us were all heading upstairs, other T officials throughout South Station were still guiding suitcase-toting passengers down to the Silver Line for service to the airport. If you asked them where to catch the Silver Line to the airport, they said "downstairs on the platform"; if you told them that was closed, they shrugged.

I ended up spending $19 (more than 1/5th of a monthly T pass) on an Uber to take me to Logan, as I had a work conference call I planned to join from the airport and a plane to catch. I ended up missing the call, but at least I still caught my flight. Whenver T officials moan about Uber/Lyft decreasing their ridership, I hope they recognize experiences like mine on Friday as a driving source of that passenger displacement.

BRT in a tunnel is the worst of both worlds. You get all the inflexibility and high costs of tunneling coupled with the low capacity, low speed, and traffic issues of street level bus routes. Huzzah!
 
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Does the city/state have any real big ideas lined up to really address the growing infrastructure/traffic congestion problems?

Please dumb it down.
 
Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker announced new passenger rail service is coming to western Massachusetts next year.

Speaking in Springfield’s Union Station Tuesday, the Republican governor said a deal has been finalized to have Amtrak operate commuter trains between Springfield and Greenfield on a pilot basis starting in 2019.

"That is going to leverage the MassDOT-owned Knowledge Corridor, which is currently used by Amtrak's Vermonter service and the recent renovations that have been made here at Union Station," Baker said.

The announcement by Baker comes just days before the launch of new train service on the Hartford Line between Springfield and New Haven.

Baker also announced the state will request bids starting Wednesday to hire a consultant to do the long sought feasibility study of connecting Boston and Springfield by high speed rail. He said the anticipated time frame for the study is 12-18 months

"It will give us the chance to take a comprehensive look at all the options possible and to make the best decision going forward for the Commonwealth and for the region," said Baker.

The study is to include rail service to Pittsfield along with a possible stop in Palmer
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http://wamc.org/post/commuter-trains-run-north-springfield-starting-2019
 
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