Green Line Extension to Medford & Union Sq

Does that substation even need to be there at all? Surely there are countless better things to build on that site.
 
It’s a key part of the grid. They might be able to relocate it at great expense, but I doubt there are better alternatives than a rebuild in situ.

I wonder if they could work with a developer on burying it, like Kendall.
 
I thought the Prospect St Bridge was a major electrical interconnect across the tracks, and that is why the substation was there? Wherever you move the substation too, wouldn't you have to run a heavy duty transfer line to as well? Not sure on this.

E: This is related to the idea of moving it entirely to some new location. Obviously they should nudge it a bit over and let the trains pass as part of the rebuild. Especially since, iirc, there isn't that much interference and it would only need to scootch over a bit, right? Plenty of room I think to reconfigure in the current site.
 
Exactly: “Bury it, like Kendall.” You’d think that would be motivation enough to do so! Everyone these days wants to be the next Kendall, right?
 
From USQ twitter. They've cut the fence on Prospect for the entrance to the elevator

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RandomWalk said:
It’s a key part of the grid. They might be able to relocate it at great expense, but I doubt there are better alternatives than a rebuild in situ.

I wonder if they could work with a developer on burying it, like Kendall.
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It's asking for integration within/to a development in this render:

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It can likely fit on the "first" above-ground level and portions of the second level for venting or just be tucked into a corner occupying the first and second levels, while a developer uses the second level, level with the bridge elevations, as its first level/lobby/activation.

If you want to get crazy, perhaps even couple it with the triangle lot across the ROW, build over the tracks, preserving GLX-Porter and CR electrification clearances. You could get a fully copy of the D2.1 tower and a smaller version of it easily on these two lots.
 
I’m guessing that Newton St and Emerson St are going to get subsumed by a mega block, which would give some additional flexibility on placement and redevelopment. However, it sounds like Eversource needs this ASAP, so we will end up with a shiny new substation fronting a lab.
 
@F-Line to Dudley or others - Do you know what the bridge replacement needs would be here? Is it every bridge to Porter or just 1?

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Oh lord a building that spans the track and fills in the whole Prospect/Newton/Webster triangle with a substation in the basement would be incredible.

Clearing out the Newton/Emerson triangle for a megablock on the other hand wouldn't be easy. There is one abandoned home that could easily be taken by eminent domain, and a commercial property that doesn't get much use and seems buyable, but that still leaves you with 7 houses to buy out, and I know some of those folks - they're politically well connected and wealthy enough that they'd be hard to motivate financially. You can see how they represent a little island of NR zoning and are not part of the official Union Square MPD area:

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Vagabond said:
@F-Line to Dudley or others - Do you know what the bridge replacement needs would be here? Is it every bridge to Porter or just 1? View attachment 21528
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Prospect St. they'd punch through the loose fill of the retaining wall with reinforced concrete arches...no actual span mods there. Then the substation equipment would have to be jacked up and moved back 15-20 ft. Webster Ave. overpass is way overdue for complete replacement since it's ancient and has got a posted weight limit; MassDOT for whatever reason simply has nothing scheduled there long-term yet. It's wide enough for 4 tracks on the native Fitchburg ROW because it's old enough to have spanned the last time the Fitchburg had 4 tracks, but you'd have to make the replacement span a little wider because GLX would still be merging back onto the main from the station turnout by that point. All of the other bridges out to Beacon St. should be wide enough, though I'm not sure if the 1982 replacement span for Washington St. was any narrower than its predecessor. *Maybe* Washington needs a touch, but Dane is definitely more than wide enough and Beacon should be wide enough.
 
erom said:
Oh lord a building that spans the track and fills in the whole Prospect/Newton/Webster triangle with a substation in the basement would be incredible.

Clearing out the Newton/Emerson triangle for a megablock on the other hand wouldn't be easy. There is one abandoned home that could easily be taken by eminent domain, and a commercial property that doesn't get much use and seems buyable, but that still leaves you with 7 houses to buy out, and I know some of those folks - they're politically well connected and wealthy enough that they'd be hard to motivate financially. You can see how they represent a little island of NR zoning and are not part of the official Union Square MPD area:

View attachment 21529
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I don't know them but I walk Newton st. twice a day on my commute. They've all put a lot in to their properties and what used to be a bit dumpy is now turning in to a nice little residential area. I cant fathom why that house on the corner of Newton and webster hasn't been knocked yet but I hope it's not replaced with something enormous. The commercial building is/was some sort of working mans club or community center. I've been to a few gigs/parties there over the years.
I'd hate to see a super block here. We've got to be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Prospect St. they'd punch through the loose fill of the retaining wall with reinforced concrete arches...no actual span mods there. Then the substation equipment would have to be jacked up and moved back 15-20 ft. Webster Ave. overpass is way overdue for complete replacement since it's ancient and has got a posted weight limit; MassDOT for whatever reason simply has nothing scheduled there long-term yet. It's wide enough for 4 tracks on the native Fitchburg ROW because it's old enough to have spanned the last time the Fitchburg had 4 tracks, but you'd have to make the replacement span a little wider because GLX would still be merging back onto the main from the station turnout by that point. All of the other bridges out to Beacon St. should be wide enough, though I'm not sure if the 1982 replacement span for Washington St. was any narrower than its predecessor. *Maybe* Washington needs a touch, but Dane is definitely more than wide enough and Beacon should be wide enough.
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That makes Porter GLX sound relatively easy. Park St. is not grade separated though, I imagine it would need to be. Do you know why that was never grade separated when all the other crossings in the ROW are?
 
Badusername said:
That makes Porter GLX sound relatively easy. Park St. is not grade separated though, I imagine it would need to be. Do you know why that was never grade separated when all the other crossings in the ROW are?
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Answering my own question somewhat:

“Planning to eliminate the eleven remaining grade crossings in Somerville, five of which were on the Fitchburg Route mainline, began in 1900.[7] In 1906, the city engineer proposed to raise 1.8 miles (2.9 km) of the line between Beacon Street and Somerville Avenue to eliminate the five level crossings, but that scheme was not adopted.[8] The other four crossings were eliminated in 1908–1912, but the Park Street grade crossing remained.[9] In 1935, the city requested that the crossing be replaced with a bridge as part of a Works Progress Administration-funded grade crossing elimination program.[10] It was not, and the location has continued to see collisions.[11]”
en.m.wikipedia.org

Somerville station (Fitchburg Railroad) - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org en.m.wikipedia.org

This page makes it sound like the last time Somerville pushed to fund a grade separation here was 1935. Pretty surprising to me given the density of the area, and that there was a fatality there a few years ago. The commuter rail horn sounding in that area twice an hour is fairly loud.
 
  1. That was the location of ex-B&M Somerville Station until 1938. The platforms were accessed via the crossing. The station was why elimination wasn't done at turn-of-century, as it was a fairly low-use station (only Watertown Branch trains bothered to stop there) that would be expensive to retrofit under grade separation.
  2. The adjacent ex-factory building was a freight customer until the early/mid-90's. Their freight siding (including the 3-track grade crossing) was extant until only the last 5 years. Foot access via the crossing was needed for spotting freight cars at the factory's loading docks, and business was still busy enough at the factory that the road wasn't eliminated when B&M did its last huge Greater Boston crossing elimination blitz in the mid-1950's that took out a number of other crossings inside 128 on the Fitchburg Line.
Yes...you'd definitely need to grade separate with GLX because 6-minute frequencies are pretty stiff and the road already backs up hellishly at rush. It's arguably going to be nasty enough to eliminate should 15-minute Urban Rail frequencies alone come to the Inner Fitchburg, so I'm sure the City would love to get rid of it at their soonest convenience. It'd be a pretty easy elimination via a Dane-clone overpass because there's a pronounced dip in the road where it crosses the tracks, the ex-factory no longer needs any rear access from the street, and any surrounding building egresses are set back far enough.
 
Ruairi said:
From USQ twitter. They've cut the fence on Prospect for the entrance to the elevator

View attachment 21525
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Anyone see any plans on how they plan to re-configure the lanes on the prospect st bridge? No way that 3-foot sidewalk can remain once there's foot traffic to/from the station. The area is also pretty hostile to bikes and peds (and cars I guess since the bridge is constantly backed up). Maybe they can barrier-separate the entire east-side of the bridge and make a two-way cycletrack and sidewalk in a 20-foot width, while squeezing the two car lanes into 20-feet at the western side?
 
sneijder said:
Anyone see any plans on how they plan to re-configure the lanes on the prospect st bridge? No way that 3-foot sidewalk can remain once there's foot traffic to/from the station. The area is also pretty hostile to bikes and peds (and cars I guess since the bridge is constantly backed up). Maybe they can barrier-separate the entire east-side of the bridge and make a two-way cycletrack and sidewalk in a 20-foot width, while squeezing the two car lanes into 20-feet at the western side?
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If nothing is done before March peds are going to have a bad time on their first trip to Union Square. The Somerville Ave / Prospect St. traffic light timing needs some work as well. The wait times for a walk signal are long, so you’re going to have a train load of people waiting on the corner of the construction site of 10 Prospect for 2+ minutes where there currently is no sidewalk.
 

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sneijder said:
Anyone see any plans on how they plan to re-configure the lanes on the prospect st bridge? No way that 3-foot sidewalk can remain once there's foot traffic to/from the station. The area is also pretty hostile to bikes and peds (and cars I guess since the bridge is constantly backed up). Maybe they can barrier-separate the entire east-side of the bridge and make a two-way cycletrack and sidewalk in a 20-foot width, while squeezing the two car lanes into 20-feet at the western side?
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The city?/developer? built out a curb extension to get around the traffic signal foundations - the rest of that sidewalk is accessible for width -- but not for slope. But, I think the elevator might provide an accessible path of travel for someone who doesn't want to freewheel down the sidewalk toward Somerville Ave. I think a tactical cycle track like that is going to be challenging since there's already a bus lane that would have to be removed if that were to happen.

Sometimes I wonder if Somerville went the wrong way (pun intended!) in removing the Webster/Prospect Sts one-way system. I know that it's en vogue, if one is a Speck-ist, to claim that it's safer, but, I haven't seen much evidence beyond speed issues on one-ways with excessively wide and multiple lanes. Those can be rectified, but, there's some benefits to one-way systems that we've given up when it comes to reallocation of streetspace. I'm worried about access to this GL station not having enough space for hopefully more bike and more bus lanes.
 
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