Green Line Extension to Medford & Union Sq

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I enjoy it too, it’s amazing to see construction projects from start to finish
 
Winter Weather vs GLX?

Since few of us have seen such a combination of (1) Boston climate and (2) big light rail and (3) "final phase" work, I have questions which I think are of general interest.

maybe people know how the Southwest corridor was finalized, or maybe they know from the experience of Minneapolis, Salt Lake City, Denver, or Calgary in building light Rail systems in winter?

What sort of weather does a project like the GLX plan for during the winter?

it seems to me they are nearly done with the most temperature sensitive work namely the concrete footings for the new stations.

How does the cold affect things like laying new track, building the cinder block components to some of the stations and elevators?

What are the "don't lick the frozen flagpole" consideration for metal components, like, support poles, stringing OCS and hooking it up to power? (how much station access will be metal framed and how much will be concrete?)

Is snow...or cold... the real limiting factor for winter season construction?

Are there bellwether elements to look for in the progress? Or macro season considerations like being colder/warmer than usual vs wetter/dryer?
 
Will this line be tested after it is completed, to make sure that things will run smoothly?
 
Jahvon09 said:
Will this line be tested after it is completed, to make sure that things will run smoothly?
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Of course. Testing and commissioning of the line(s) and equipment will likely take eight to ten months, if not longer. Track geometry vehicles will analyze track infrastructure. Syncing of signal and electric traction systems. Coordination with the operations control center at High Street. More than flipping a switch. There is a lot of federal oversight on this project, per the funding make-up, so it will also need to be reviewed and authorized at that level prior to initiating service.
 
Riverworks said:
Of course. Testing and commissioning of the line(s) and equipment will likely take eight to ten months, if not longer. Track geometry vehicles will analyze track infrastructure. Syncing of signal and electric traction systems. Coordination with the operations control center at High Street. More than flipping a switch. There is a lot of federal oversight on this project, per the funding make-up, so it will also need to be reviewed and authorized at that level prior to initiating service.
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The community working group meetings have said 6 months minimum testing on the line. I think someone else said the vehicle testing is happening as we speak because they're running them now on the older line. So probably closer to the 6 month end of the estimates. Though who knows, they're still laying down track and putting up the OCS, there's still some time for some problems to creep into the project.
 
ra84970 said:
The community working group meetings have said 6 months minimum testing on the line. I think someone else said the vehicle testing is happening as we speak because they're running them now on the older line. So probably closer to the 6 month end of the estimates. Though who knows, they're still laying down track and putting up the OCS, there's still some time for some problems to creep into the project.
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I think that the Type 9's will be taken off
the existing branches of the GL & moved over to the GLX. Those are the newest vehicles on the GL to date. :)
 
Jahvon09 said:
I think that the Type 9's will be taken off
the existing branches of the GL & moved over to the GLX. Those are the newest vehicles on the GL to date. :)
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Not likely. The 9's *might* be segregated to Brickbottom carhouse while 7-8's are segregated to Riverside as home maint bases. But it's equally likely they'll be wholly mixed because of how churnover at shift changes ends up scattering equipment across the system. For GLX it's not going to matter any which way because the service will be sourced from both Riverside and Brickbottom as a rule. D's (Riverside-based) will run thru to College Ave.; E's (Brickbottom-based) will run thru to Union Sq. And with C's splitting the difference at North Station (sourceable from Brickbottom) and Reservoir (sourceable from Riverside) they may see run-thru mixture of types even if the maintenance homes are split by type. You will thus see the fullest spread of equipment types from the New Lechmere platform any way it's portioned.

Depending on whether they consider introducing 3-car trains sooner than later, you'll probably see any triplet assignments being exclusively 7-8 mixes because the numbers work better that way and it's a vector for filtering the Kinki > Breda fleet availability disparity to greatest effectiveness. In that case you may definitely see Riverside become an exclusive Kinki-Breda domain because D would be #1 priority for rush-hour triplets and they'd want everything in the yard compatible for that type of lash-up. B would also be more likely to stick with 7-8's too since that's the #2 line most amenable to rush-hour triplets. Keep in mind that COVID recovery pace in '21 doesn't necessarily tip this 'whither triplets?' decision, because we've got a solid half-dozen years minimum left exclusively on these fleets so the subject can be revisited at any time. Plus AFC 2.0 is happening in the middle of this time period, with all cars in the fleet already electronically compatible for One-Person Ops (OPTO)...so if the Green Line gets assigned the new fare system first capacity-by-consist expansion is probably going to be a tandem rollout on the service patterns where it does the most good. They aren't bound by waiting for the Type 10's to arrive for that one.
 
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