Government Center Renovation

Shepard said:
F-Line - to your point - was Charles MGH station constructed with the BLX in mind - i.e. room for escalators and elevators down to a below-grade platform?
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It certainly was.

Red-Blue needs to happen if they're going to shut down for 3 years.

But they shouldn't need 3 years to begin with..... ._.
 
This is ridiculous! So the choice is between closing for three years, or spending more money to do it in four? This should be a no brainer. The 'T is the life blood of this city, and that is a pivotal transfer point. There shouldn't even be lip service to the idea of shutting it down, no matter how much is saved. Losing government center for three years will cost a lot more than the "keep it open" option. Myopic idiots!
 
Well if Copley and Arlington are any indication, Government Center should be done in about 8 years.
 
HenryAlan said:
This is ridiculous! So the choice is between closing for three years, or spending more money to do it in four? This should be a no brainer. The 'T is the life blood of this city, and that is a pivotal transfer point. There shouldn't even be lip service to the idea of shutting it down, no matter how much is saved. Losing government center for three years will cost a lot more than the "keep it open" option. Myopic idiots!
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We all know how this is going to go. They could close it for 3 years and get the job faster and cheaper, but will opt to keep it running where it will take longer and cost more. They will do this under the guise that they don't want to affect people's commutes too much and they are doing it for us. Which is real terms means they are going out of their way to help out some construction companies that use only union labor and make large political donations to Democrats on Beacon Hill.
 
I just commented about this on UHub.

Is it possible for them to maybe reopen/sloppily refurbish the abandoned Hanover St. entrance concourse on the other end of the BL platform to still allow access?
 
I really need to know, what engineering difficulties that it would take 3 years to of total closure to renovate a station? If I was the governor, I would have to say, "I'm not an engineer, but I have some serious doubts of that the challenges really requires 3 years to overcome it."

I'm pretty sure that if they kept it open, it will take more than 4 years, but closing the station the the gain of a year, but a loss of 3 years is unacceptable. I seriously doubt that it really takes 3 years (unless they only work on nights and weekends or in week long spurts with months of nothing).
 
If this is union meddling, someone needs to call them out on it BIG TIME. In this economy there are plenty skilled construction workers to do the project in a timely fashion and the public shouldn't tolerate blatant extortion. Especially given the critical nature of Government Center as a central transfer station.
 
If this were a private company the job could be done in 3 months, probably less. This is completely ridiculous. Every time I think the people running this city have reached a new summit to their stupidity, they keep climbing.

As for the union workers that will be doing this, if you have no fear of being fired for slacking off, you can get a lot of slacking off done.
 
They have no intention of closeing the station for 3 years. Look at the outrage on this forum in just a few hours. They will keep the station open, take a ridiculous length of time at a ridiculous price and say see this is what you asked for it's not our fault.
 
Honestly, I had to read that article twice to make sure that it wasn't dated April 1. But it's not April Fool's, it's just the usual T fools.

Every T project drags on forever and runs way over budget. Presumably this keeps the unions happy? But what's interesting is that the actual work occurs in brief bursts over the course of the 3-5 years of the typical unambitious T renovation. If you spent any time near Copley, Arlington, Shawmut, Ashmont, State, or the Lechmere viaduct projects that ooozed their way to completion at some point over the past decade, you know what I mean. Middle of the day, middle of the week on the blocked-off platforms and mostly .... crickets. You'd need time-lapse photography to determine that any actual work was being done, or to watch the parked vehicle of the detail cop slowly rust. And then you walk down the street and you see non-public sector project - let's take MassArt as a current example - and the contrast couldn't be more stark. Actual workers! Working! On some private sector projects, you even sometimes see work being performed after 3 PM! And even - good gracious - on Saturday! With visible progress week-to-week!

Someone has got to wake up and realize that the world has changed and these games just won't cut it anymore. If the same "don't kill the job" spirit had ruled when the original central subway was being planned, it would have taken approximately 230 years to complete, and twenty generations of "bus substitutions." I don't want to derail this thread onto another unproductive political rant, and I'm far from a right-winger, but honestly, when crap like this is presented to the public with a straight face you can understand the wellspring of rage and contempt that got those guys in Wisconsin elected. The point of public works has to be to work for the damned public, not to provide a decade worth of paychecks to a handful of connected people.
 
mass88 said:
Which is real terms means they are going out of their way to help out some construction companies that use only union labor and make large political donations to Democrats on Beacon Hill.
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Really? Just, really?

I'm somewhere to the far left of liberal on 90% of the issues and here's what I want: the T to fucking set a construction schedule and stick to it. Why doesn't it happen? Because of deferred maintenance. And why do they defer basic repair? Because Rethuglicans scream and holler about the damn Socialist, Nazi, Commie, Fascist burdens imposed by the "Welfare State" that operating budgets are reduced to somewhere around 90% below what's actually needed to keep the system operational.

::generalizations work both ways::
 
bbfen said:
Really? Just, really?

I'm somewhere to the far left of liberal on 90% of the issues and here's what I want: the T to fucking set a construction schedule and stick to it. Why doesn't it happen? Because of deferred maintenance. And why do they defer basic repair? Because Rethuglicans scream and holler about the damn Socialist, Nazi, Commie, Fascist burdens imposed by the "Welfare State" that operating budgets are reduced to somewhere around 90% below what's actually needed to keep the system operational.

::generalizations work both ways::
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Precisely. No one is willing to support the upkeep of the rapidly aging system BECAUSE of the inconveniences they experience. They're holding grudges against the T for issues caused by a lack of proper funding. For some reason they don't understand that increased funding would mean LESS inconveniences. All anyone cares about in this day and age is saving the pennies in their pocket right now and has absolutely no care or outlook towards the long-term. The GOP is rapidly tainting the entire country with this mindset and infrastructure will continue to fail until they're properly funded.
 
I'm afraid I don't follow the above comments.

I agree that the T funding is a shambles and I'd support moves by the legislature to shore that up, even if that meant some painful "revenue increase" measures that hit me and others in the wallet.

But let's be clear about two things:

1) In Massachusetts, at least, you can't blame ANY of this on the Republicans

2) With respect to SPECIFIC T improvement projects, the delays and the failure to execute aren't due to underfunding. Underfunding has led to bloat in the T's debt structure and postponement of some projects, but the projects that have moved forward have been funded hansomely. No matter how you measure it, by mile, by man hour, per elevator, etc., the cost to lift a shovel in Boston dwarfs that just about anywhere in the world. Dragging out projects doesn't reduce their cost ... on the contrary, any competent project manager will tell you that it makes costs increase. Competently managed, the funds allocated to the Arlington rebuild (to take just one example) ought to have covered two stations in half the time. And no, the age of the system here doesn't create such a "special case" that makes things impossible to execute. Even in the most expensive cities in Europe, where some infrastructure is ancient and labor costs are sky-high, projects are routinely completed faster and cheaper.

Even if you have no background as a PM or in construction, if you spend a few days, weeks, or months at a T construction site, you can figure this out. Everything is in super slow-motion. Workers drift in late, leave early, and don't work with any urgency. Some materials show up way early and sit in crates for ages, risking damage. Other materials must be late - if that's the explanation for the frequency with which people stand around doing nothing. A commercial building site looks nothing like this.

Whether it's the unions or the politicians or sheer management incompetence, I don't really care, but it has got to change.
 
The issue isn't funding. Look at the Big Dig, a near limitless stream of money was thrown into that project and we all know how long it took to build and how well it is holding up.

The issue is a union monopoly on projects, prevailing wage bullshit, ridiculous work rules, horrible construction scheduling, and a criminal lack of oversight or basic competence in matters of construction administration. The public rightfully doesn't want to part with any more money from their pockets, when it is obvious any additional funding is going to into someone else's pockets rather than increased productivity.
 
bbfen said:
Really? Just, really?

I'm somewhere to the far left of liberal on 90% of the issues and here's what I want: the T to fucking set a construction schedule and stick to it. Why doesn't it happen? Because of deferred maintenance. And why do they defer basic repair? Because Rethuglicans scream and holler about the damn Socialist, Nazi, Commie, Fascist burdens imposed by the "Welfare State" that operating budgets are reduced to somewhere around 90% below what's actually needed to keep the system operational.

::generalizations work both ways::
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What you responded with has nothing to do with what I said. I am guessing you don't agree with my assessment of the situation.
 
Another article on this issue from the Boston Globe. Looks like they are really aiming for a two-year closure.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/ma...nter_project_t_leaning_toward_2_year_closure/

In construction, time is money. Transportation officials in the Big Dig state say they are committed to doing highway and MBTA projects faster and more efficiently than the public has become resigned to expect.

Take the Interstate 93 bridge replacement project that the state is calling ?Fast 14.??

That plan calls for the replacement of 14 deteriorated I-93 bridges in Medford ? seven in each direction ? this summer. Using prefabricated sections, the state will swap out old for new and replace each bridge in a single weekend, with financial penalties for the contractor if the highway is not open again by Monday morning.

Under traditional methods, the work would have required three years of partial closures, doing a lane at a time. Hailing the innovation, the US Department of Transportation just awarded it $1 million through a grant program to promote innovative techniques.

When it comes to subway stations, of course, old and new can?t be swapped in a single weekend.

So the choice is between keeping a station open during construction, to minimize the inconvenience to the public, or closing it to speed the work and save money ? kind of like ripping off a Band-Aid quickly, with a shorter but more intense sting.

The T has tended to err on the side of the former. That made projects such as the Ashmont and State Street transit stations and the Kenmore Square bus facility seem to take epochs, with the additional time and work costing T riders and taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.

Until now, with the reconstruction of Government Center approaching.

?There is a policy shift,?? Secretary of Transportation Jeffrey B. Mullan said last week, aimed at curbing ?the seemingly endless construction cycle.??

With Government Center, the T is leaning toward closing the station for two years. That could save $16 million and shave 15 months or more off a project that might take four or more years and approach $71 million the old way.

It?s not a decision made lightly, Mullan said, nor is it yet written in stone. The work is not expected to begin until November 2012.

?Certainly we are not going to be advocating a major issue of closing such an important station without a lot of discussion with the city and with the customers,?? he told the board that oversees the DOT and MBTA last week, in a briefing that signaled the beginning of that public process.

State officials have worked closely with city officials on the design. Now they are talking about the construction, and they will gather plenty of public input, MBTA General Manager Richard A. Davey said.

Board member Elizabeth Levin, a Boston resident, said she wants to make sure the city is comfortable with the choice. ?They haven?t definitively told us that, but they clearly were happy that we were trying to be creative in finding ways to reduce that schedule,?? Davey said. ?While we presented it such that the closure seems to be the alternative that makes a little more sense . . . we still want to make sure we have a comfort level with the city.??

The proposal bundles better access for people with disabilities with a thorough modernization of a station that, according to the T, was built in 1897 as Scollay Square Station and was last significantly freshened in 1962, when it was renamed Government Center, to reflect the razing of Scollay Square for Boston?s new City Hall.

It calls for a soaring new glass headhouse ? an entrance, in subway parlance ? in place of today?s brick bunker, as well as new escalators, elevators, stairs, lighting, and communication systems. The Green Line platforms will be raised so passengers can access vehicles more easily. And the Blue Line platforms will be lengthened to accommodate six-car trains.

Ed Hunter, the T?s director of construction, presented both potential timelines to the board.

Under the longer one, the project would consume more space on the plaza and include construction of a temporary headhouse, which increases the likelihood of running into unexpected utility lines, always a risk when digging in Boston.

?Utilities have not really treated us very kindly in any endeavor that we?ve had,?? Hunter said.

Most of the work would be done at night, reducing passenger risk but increasing noise to neighbors in the slightly residential area. The station would remain open, but boarding and walking areas would be frequently changed and rerouted. And the T would divert service to buses on 32 weekends.

The alternative would close Government Center to Blue and Green Line passengers seeking to enter and exit, but would limit the busing weekends to six, with the trains otherwise rolling through without stopping. It would allow for two shifts of construction workers at the station. And most importantly, Hunter said, ?it?s safer . . . It separates the work from the passengers, and reduces the risk of accident and potential litigation from somebody that wanders into a work area that might not be secure, [and] customer exposure to noise and dust.??

The T?s last statistical bible, the 2009 Blue Book, found 11,127 passengers a day entering the station or transferring between lines at Government Center; it did not tally exits.

As an alternative, Green Line customers will be able to walk about one-fifth of a mile to Haymarket ? cutting across the Government Center plaza ? or one-quarter of a mile to Park Street.

For the Blue Line, Bowdoin is about one-fifth mile, and State Street is just one-10th mile. Bowdoin, now open only for weekday commuters, would be open later and on weekends during construction.

Meanwhile, the revamped State Street ? which has been under construction for more than six years ? is supposed to be finished by the end of this month.
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Good grief, people, if you are accepting the T's "we need at least three years because we don't know what's up with the utilities" line of argument, I've got a viaduct or two that I'd like to sell you. Just because Davey says so to the Herald and Globe doesn't mean that the T is working on a schedule that any other transit agency in the world would accept.

Exhibit A: London. Yep, they've got old and unknown utilities there, too. And yep, they've closed a bunch of tube stations as they've worked on renovations to improve access for disabled persons. And while they aren't at all snappy by continental European standards, their work is absolutely warp speed compared to the T. They work at night, they work on weekends, and you can watch the forward progress week-to-week. Months went by without bupkus happening at Copley or State.

Exhibit B: Zurich. The gold standard for light rail. A "typical" project last year was the replacement of all the track and all the catenary between Bellevue and Tiefenbrunnen, a busy stretch over a mile long, with many stops ... the equivalent of taking out every existing bit of infrastructure between Brigham Circle and Heath and putting in all-new steel and wires in conjunction with repaving all of the streets and improving the sewers (the Swiss coordinate such things). Time from start-to-finish: 3 months, and service stopped on exactly the day thay said it would and it came back up exactly on the day they said it would. Seriously, if the Swiss were running things, something like the Arborway restoration could be a done deal in 8 months, and if they said in October it would be running on June 23rd, you could bet your life's savings then and there that the first Arborway tram would be moving at 5AM on June 23.

We settle for much, much less. And the T's response to criticism for the huge over-runs in both time and money is simply to move the goalposts ... make the task even easier, make the timeline longer, customer service be damned. Hey, at least there will be lots of jobs.
 
InTheHood said:
Good grief, people, if you are accepting the T's "we need at least three years because we don't know what's up with the utilities" line of argument, I've got a viaduct or two that I'd like to sell you. Just because Davey says so to the Herald and Globe doesn't mean that the T is working on a schedule that any other transit agency in the world would accept.

Exhibit A: London. Yep, they've got old and unknown utilities there, too. And yep, they've closed a bunch of tube stations as they've worked on renovations to improve access for disabled persons. And while they aren't at all snappy by continental European standards, their work is absolutely warp speed compared to the T. They work at night, they work on weekends, and you can watch the forward progress week-to-week. Months went by without bupkus happening at Copley or State.

Exhibit B: Zurich. The gold standard for light rail. A "typical" project last year was the replacement of all the track and all the catenary between Bellevue and Tiefenbrunnen, a busy stretch over a mile long, with many stops ... the equivalent of taking out every existing bit of infrastructure between Brigham Circle and Heath and putting in all-new steel and wires in conjunction with repaving all of the streets and improving the sewers (the Swiss coordinate such things). Time from start-to-finish: 3 months, and service stopped on exactly the day thay said it would and it came back up exactly on the day they said it would. Seriously, if the Swiss were running things, something like the Arborway restoration could be a done deal in 8 months, and if they said in October it would be running on June 23rd, you could bet your life's savings then and there that the first Arborway tram would be moving at 5AM on June 23.

We settle for much, much less. And the T's response to criticism for the huge over-runs in both time and money is simply to move the goalposts ... make the task even easier, make the timeline longer, customer service be damned. Hey, at least there will be lots of jobs.
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Well said.
 
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