Green Line Reconfiguration
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F-Line to Dudley
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Yes. The Big Dig reserved that slot for Silver Line Phase III. The hook-in to the Transitway must go via the final 2 blocks of Essex.
How you get to the west side of Surface Rd. @ Essex is fair game for crayoning.
I have been following the progress of Earthgrid.io, who has developed plasma tunnel cutting and is moving towards transit in the near future. They could revolutionize transit. And they can create station cavities cheap too. Transitway connection would be a first test.
Brattle Loop
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Yes, because what the Green Line needs is another massive structure's foundations uncomfortably close to a 124-year-old tunnel. (And that sketch notably omits the 1960s-era Government Center loop which almost certainly wasn't built to have anything built on top of it, meaning it'd have to be bridged.)
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I'm sorry that my nearly-off-topic GC tunnel-outline post here turned into a clearly off topic "should be taller" Can I try having the last word? If not, I'm going to moderator-move the last couple posts to the How tall...should they be taller thread.
FAA limit on city hall plaza is 750' above Mean Sea Level, so maybe you'd get a 720' from street level.
the wild rover
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In a world with a D-to-E connector at Brookline Village, would trains from Kenmore be able to turn "hard left" down Huntington, or are we only talking about Riverside/Needham trains going down Huntington? (forcing riders from Kenmore to change trains at BV?) From Google maps it looks like Pearl Street could be used to get to rt9/Huntington
More than anything, it will depend on how the connector is built -- some designs allow for Kenmore <--> Huntington, and others don't. I personally think it would be a valuable component to maximize flexibility on the network.
Also keep in mind that Riverside and Needham trains don't need to follow the same routes: Needham trains could for example go via Kenmore while Riverside trains go via Huntington. Some riders would still need to transfer, but many would not.
HenryAlan
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I would route Needham trains via Huntington, and Riverside trains via Kenmore. D-Line riders would get the same route they have now, and Needham (G-Line?) riders would potentially still get a direct one seat ride to South Station, assuming this project also includes a Stuart St. subway.
There's a case to be made that neither the Riverside or Needham sub-branches west of Newton Highlands need full frequencies (especially if Indigo to Riverside happens). Splitting that service between the Central and Huntington subways would probably require some kind of headway booster to Reservoir.
It's so annoying when crayoning because... yes, Needham probably does not need 6-min headways, and Riverside maybe doesn't either if there is Indigo service. But... they probably merit something more than half service. If the core takt is kept at 6 minutes, then maybe half-frequencies of 12 minutes could be workable. But if that takt increases to 7 minutes, then you're at 14 minutes, which is no good.
Sending Needham vs Riverside to Kenmore vs Huntington has arguments in all directions. Maybe send Riverside to Huntington and let travelers who need to get to Kenmore take Indigo instead. Maybe send Needham to Huntington to maintain access to similar areas as the current commuter rail, as @HenryAlan suggests. And then there's the question of sending Huntington trains to Park vs South Station, and doing so while maintaining legibility and show-up-and-go frequencies for each destination pair. (i.e. Don't build a 6 tph frequency cake to Needham with 2 tph to Kenmore-Park, Huntington-Park, and Huntington-Seaport with 30 minutes between each train.) Like I said -- so annoying.
My take is to run each branch at three-quarter frequencies, into a single trunk line (I prefer Huntington, built as a modern LRT subway, able to take maximal advantage of supertrains and the mostly-sealed ROWs to Riverside and Needham, and boosting headways along Huntington); if there are concerns raised about service reductions between Riverside and Kenmore, then layer on a half-frequency Riverside-Kenmore short-turn that doesn't through-run.
That would give 4-5 minute headways east of Newton Highlands (probably a little high for the stretch west of Brookline Village, but not too much), and 8-10 minute headways on each branch -- more than adequate for Needham, and workable for Riverside.
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It's not just Indigo to Riverside. The Highland Ave. park-and-ride in Needham is going to siphon a lot of cars away from Riverside and Woodland, so the ridership at both stops can expect to decline even if frequencies stayed stet. Even moreso if Indigo went to Waltham/128 on the Fitchburg Line, because that would divert a lot of Pn'R from the north.
Even just better service (and more rational pricing) on the B&A to Newton, Wellesley, and Natick will probably siphon off riders there who drive to Riverside/Woodland today.
I've always kind of guesstimated that the Needham sub-branch would have higher ridership than the Riverside one (unless that ToD project at Riverside ever gets built). Newton Upper Falls and a new stop by the office park development in Needham would be better located than Eliot or Waban. I know it hasn't been popular on this board, but it's why I'm kind of in favor of short-turning most Riverside service at Kenmore.
Is there a proposed site for this? I was kind of surprised that the T didn't buy the Ford/Chevrolet dealer when it went up for sale.
F-Line to Dudley
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Gould St. since there's a lot of TOD that could go there, it has the easy access from the highway, and there are multiple abutting parcels (Channel 5, the financial services complex) whose parking lots could be traded up for station-serving garages. The Muzi dealership property wouldn't necessarily be the station lot; that has a lot more value being upsized into TOD density.
Parking sprawl would've definitely been a bad idea here. I'd be fine with a compact vertical garage with several hundred spaces, but this site really should be encouraging TOD density and not be going too far overboard with car storage. The SW quadrant of 128 won't be at a loss of Pn'R options if :30 Regional Rail implants itself in Waltham, Dedham, and Westwood in addition to GL Needham and Riverside.
Each time you mention this, I am a bit more convinced
More specifically, I see it as a later-stage option, once a number of other pieces are built. (Such as a branch from Kenmore to Harvard.) I don't think it's viable on "Day 1", or even "Day 1,001", but after a few years when riders are more used to traveling via Huntington (which I believe in general will come to be preferred by many riders), I think it could be a useful option to consider.(The "Riverside High Speed Line," running quaint Type 9s!)
Exactly, the only real reason to do it is to open up Kenmore through-running slots to do something else more valuable to the system like Harvard or A restoration. Riverside-Eliot only has one third of the C's ridership.
Riverside RR is a fever dream. A flat junction would screw up Worcester service. Using the dead space in the 128/90 interchange and a Weston infill is a much more likely outcome. In fact, it should replace Auburndale and West Newton should be moved a little west, with Newtondale moved east closer to NC
Brattle Loop
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I get that they're different modes, but the Green Line's Central Subway has run with, what, 40-45 TPH with the flat junction at Copley (not that that's anyone's idea of a good junction), would a junction off Worcester to serve Riverside really have that major an impact even at Regional Rail frequencies? (And it's not as if the existing CR system doesn't have any flat junctions of its own *cough*Reading Junction*cough*)
Wellesley Farms (and the current Auburndale stop) are only about a mile each from Riverside. Another CR stop doesn't really make sense, even though I believe Auburndale is being moved east.
But neither of them would be possible P&R spots RIGHT OFF THE PIKE