Green Line Extension to Medford & Union Sq

[Equilibria]

the irony being that the original gilman square station (and plenty others) looked quite like this.

And the truth being that the HH Richardson buildings at Newton Highlands and Newton Center aren't Green Line stations. They're old railroad stations adjacent to Green Line stations. They have no Green Line function.

The "other Green Line stations" that are relevant are places like Woodland, Beaconsfield, the new BU stations, etc.

 

[RandomWalk]

They appeared to be pouring the northern bridge seat at School Street today. The work on the two bridges in the area has seemed to be moving at a glacial pace.

 

[bakgwailo]

You would think that by 2021 we would have figured out how to have a T station actually protect customers from the elements and be reasonable efficient to maintain. This is not Southern California!

Or at least not actively make them worse (looking at you, Kenmore Square surface station). It couldn't have been that hard or more expensive to make these new stations have a bit more cover from the elements.

 

[The EGE]

At some point, the MBTA seems to have forgotten how to make shelters that actually protect against both wind and rain. The D Branch shelters built in 1959 are sturdy, simple, and effective. Modern, longer versions of these - a back wall with benches, periodic cross walls to block the wind, and roofline at ~8 feet rather than ~12 feet - would be a substantial improvement over the recent GLX and CR designs. The high roofline of the GLX shelters, combined with the upward slope and lack of windbreaks, means that it completely fails to protect from precipitation if any wind is blowing.

 

[Riverside]

To be very very cynical, I suspect that the lack of protection is by design, and for the same reason that park benches have armrests going down the middle of them, and why buildings with overhangs will put spikes and/or fencing on the ground below: to discourage people from sleeping there.

 

[bigpicture7]

To be very very cynical, I suspect that the lack of protection is by design, and for the same reason that park benches have armrests going down the middle of them, and why buildings with overhangs will put spikes and/or fencing on the ground below: to discourage people from sleeping there.

To be even more cynical, hence why we see them in Brookline and Newton but not in the city : (

 

[Jahvon09]

At some point, the MBTA seems to have forgotten how to make shelters that actually protect against both wind and rain. The D Branch shelters built in 1959 are sturdy, simple, and effective. Modern, longer versions of these - a back wall with benches, periodic cross walls to block the wind, and roofline at ~8 feet rather than ~12 feet - would be a substantial improvement over the recent GLX and CR designs. The high roofline of the GLX shelters, combined with the upward slope and lack of windbreaks, means that it completely fails to protect from precipitation if any wind is blowing.

At some point, the MBTA seems to have forgotten how to make shelters that actually protect against both wind and rain. The D Branch shelters built in 1959 are sturdy, simple, and effective. Modern, longer versions of these - a back wall with benches, periodic cross walls to block the wind, and roofline at ~8 feet rather than ~12 feet - would be a substantial improvement over the recent GLX and CR designs. The high roofline of the GLX shelters, combined with the upward slope and lack of windbreaks, means that it completely fails to protect from precipitation if any wind is blowing.

Better yet, put one of THESE there that are fully encolosed, heated & sealed off from the elements of bad weather all together!!! Put 2 Charlie machines in the back through a hole!!

 

[BostonTrainGuy]

Sorry to say but different culture. I have first hand experience dealing with people who make bus shelters their temporary home. Difficult people. You don't want to make the shelters very inviting. You just can't.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Sorry to say but different culture. I have first hand experience dealing with people who make bus shelters their temporary home. Difficult people. You don't want to make the shelters very inviting. You just can't.

Why is the transit agency the last in line to deal with a major societal harms reduction problem? Sorry...that "can't" logic just does not wash. The people who build transit shelters have one design job: keep the weather out for waiting passengers. If design is being shaped by anything other than that, then something is fucked.

 

[BostonTrainGuy]

Why is the transit agency the last in line to deal with a major societal harms reduction problem? Sorry...that "can't" logic just does not wash. The people who build transit shelters have one design job: keep the weather out for waiting passengers. If design is being shaped by anything other than that, then something is fucked.

Actual waiting passengers will not even use a shelter if there is a person taking up temporary residence or laying down on the floor or bench. Just not worth the hassle. Some of these people are dangerous. Transit agencies can't change reality.

 

[bigpicture7]

Why is the transit agency the last in line to deal with a major societal harms reduction problem? Sorry...that "can't" logic just does not wash. The people who build transit shelters have one design job: keep the weather out for waiting passengers. If design is being shaped by anything other than that, then something is fucked.

The scene in City Hall where social workers and a transit officer are discussing how the homeless were ending up at South Station in growing numbers says it all.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Actual waiting passengers will not even use a shelter if there is a person taking up temporary residence or laying down on the floor or bench. Just not worth the hassle. Some of these people are dangerous. Transit agencies can't change reality.

Where is this such an overwhelming problem in Boston? We aren't effing New York in level of pervasiveness. Name some locations instead of painting the broad brush that this should...steer writ-large systemwide SHELTER DESIGN in a direction of utter engineering FAIL for righteous reason? Seriously. This isn't a discussion that can be had in total generica.

 

[bigpicture7]

F-Line, from a how "how things should be" standpoint, I agree with you. In the example I just gave, above, a (delayed) multi-agency effort largely resolved the issue (at least for a time). Coordination like that can work. I personally do not have comprehensive data to answer your question, and do not purport any broad-brush claims. There are particulars that stand out, such as the longstanding bus shelter at Mass Ave/Newbury across from the Hynes stop (now being retired, thankfully, due to the air rights parcel development over the pike).

 

[Ruairi]

Why is the transit agency the last in line to deal with a major societal harms reduction problem? Sorry...that "can't" logic just does not wash. The people who build transit shelters have one design job: keep the weather out for waiting passengers. If design is being shaped by anything other than that, then something is fucked.

something is fucked

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

F-Line, from a how "how things should be" standpoint, I agree with you. In the example I just gave, above, a (delayed) multi-agency effort largely resolved the issue (at least for a time). Coordination like that can work. I personally do not have comprehensive data to answer your question, and do not purport any broad-brush claims. There are particulars that stand out, such as the longstanding bus shelter at Mass Ave/Newbury across from the Hynes stop (now being retired, thankfully, due to the air rights parcel development over the pike).

It's not a "how things should be" issue at all.

The job of a transit shelter designer is to design a structure that shelters from the elements while providing par boarding/alighting access to the transit vehicle. Literally any outside force telling them to "do a worse job sheltering from the weather because reasons" is an intentional design failure. Intentional design failures shouldn't be the default engineering expectation because other enforcement and/or harms reduction arms of society aren't doing their jobs, or a problem is acute in this couple of spots but not these 50 other spots.

It's asking the wrongest questions and shifting onus to the wrongest places to shove this on the backs of the shelter designer who's only truly got one job in life. But that's apparently where we are. Our transit shelters--systemwide--are now designed as a set of buck-passing excuses for being born to fail at their stated jobs. That's simultaneously wasting money and degrading quality of service while not in the slightest addressing ANY of the problem we're sold-to-believe was the cause of the defectiveness-by-design in the first place. It takes a particularly rancid set of institutional groupthink to conclude that systematically degrading the weather-sheltering abilities of transit stops is somehow a forward-moving thing. It's corruption, it's brainrot.

Societal harms reduction is a whole enormously larger ball of wax of shared responsibility. How exactly did this buck get institutionally passed to frigging bus shelter designers with only one job to do? As "addressing the problem" goes that's like staging the solutions discussion over a Game of Telephone..."build worse shelters because that homeless exception that proves the rule" being the proverbial "purple monkey dishwasher" answer-back at the end of the chain. Sheer madness.

 

[bigpicture7]

It's not a "how things should be" issue at all...

Huh? I am specifically agreeing with:

The job of a transit shelter designer is to design a structure that shelters from the elements while providing par boarding/alighting access to the transit vehicle.

You seem to be aggressively disagreeing with my agreement with you. Apologies if my agreement was insufficiently clear. Just because I gave a couple of examples that things aren't working flawlessly yet doesn't mean I disagree with your principle quoted immediately above.

EDIT: to further clarify: the "things not working flawlessly" mentioned above are with regard to other agencies and social institutions.

 

[Ruairi]

I actually don't think they are shaped like this to discourage homeless people. I think it's the cheapest way to build a shelter when you have to factor drainage in.
You want shelters, ok, these will cost x and these y.
Great, we'll take x. doesn't matter if they aren't that effective.

 

[Jahvon09]

Sorry to say but different culture. I have first hand experience dealing with people who make bus shelters their temporary home. Difficult people. You don't want to make the shelters very inviting. You just can't.

I can't even BEGIN to tell you how many cold & bitter winters that I've had to spend waiting for a bus or trolley here!! it is really no fun at at all!! Summer isn't too bad, but if you never had to do it, then good luck to you. At least waiting for a train underground in the tunnel is kind of warm.

 

[BostonTrainGuy]

Where is this such an overwhelming problem in Boston? We aren't effing New York in level of pervasiveness. Name some locations instead of painting the broad brush that this should...steer writ-large systemwide SHELTER DESIGN in a direction of utter engineering FAIL for righteous reason? Seriously. This isn't a discussion that can be had in total generica.

Now you are really going down a very slippery slope. My personal experience was in Roxbury/Mattapan if you must know. From people sleeping to overdosing in bus shelters. I saw dead bodies in the street in Egleston Square. So should the T build really nice shelters in Brookline and Newton because the people there are "different"? Seriously? Simply can't do that now can you?

To bring this back to the Greenline Extension, perhaps if the stations were "paywalled" (with turnstiles/faregates) the shelters could have been more user-friendly. I don't know if anything has changed but the last I heard the stations are going to be free access and that will bring the problems.

 

[shmessy]

Now you are really going down a very slippery slope. My personal experience was in Roxbury/Mattapan if you must know. From people sleeping to overdosing in bus shelters. I saw dead bodies in the street in Egleston Square. So should the T build really nice shelters in Brookline and Newton because the people there are "different"? Seriously? Simply can't do that now can you?

To bring this back to the Greenline Extension, perhaps if the stations were "paywalled" (with turnstiles/faregates) the shelters could have been more user-friendly. I don't know if anything has changed but the last I heard the stations are going to be free access and that will bring the problems.

....and, by the way, in Newton and Brookline, if you had the shelter shown in the Seoul pic plunked down there, there would also be plenty of people making that their home. Yes, even Newton and Brookline.

Let's just get good fully covered open air shelters without stupid open/inverted roofs.