Re: What would you do to get the T out of its financial mess?
How have I denied the effect of the interstate highway system? I've been decrying some of the effects (namely the degrading effect of urban freeways). Of course it had a major effect.....
I made an economic point about stimulus being ineffective during non-recessionary times. This isn't a controversial point. Justifying the IHS on the basis of "stimulus" is simply incorrect....
And remember this discussion started over how to make public transit profitable. I pointed out that with the government subsidizing urban freeways, it is impossible for transit to be profitable. Regardless of whether urban freeways lead to other problems, this will be true.....
On the other hand, the North End, which had similar characteristics, managed to evade the "slum"-clearing bulldozers. It remains one of the most successful city neighborhoods, drawing a tremendous amount of activity, despite being hemmed in by the Central Artery (now Green-scar). This, along with many other examples, strikes me as a condemnation of urban renewal and also a condemnation of the various fads that fall under the category of "landscape urbanism."....
I think that if we agree about suburban zoning having bad effects, then we probably largely agree about everything else. I should probably clarify that I'm not terribly interested in "diffuse-to-diffuse" flows. That is "sprawl" and yes, it is the majority of the United States. I'm interested in cities, which by nature occupy only a small portion of the land....
As for "voting with your feet", none of those places you listed offer less regulation or imposition on private property rights in cities. For example, someone mentioned Houston. Well Houston may nominally not have zoning, but it has something called "restrictive covenants" which serve the same purpose. Different name, same effect.
Mathew -- I'm starting to understand your perspective on things -- especially the " As for "voting with your feet", none of those places you listed offer less regulation or imposition on private property rights in cities." -- my point was that in " NH, Texas, Montana, Nevada " and some other places you can go an hid from the planning and the cities -- you and your cult, you and your disciples, family, etc can go off and do your own thing
In Massachusetts because the history of settlement -- it is much harder to create your own private paradise (I guess a couple of private islands still exist) . This settlement pattern also bothers F-Line from a different perspective.
Consider Lexington the town that I've called home for more than two decades – and the Post WWII effect of Rt-128 – the mother of all local stimuli to the economy.
Lexington began as an extension of Cambridge in 1642 -- providing some people who didn't have a chance to get much of a claim on Cambridge to have some land near by. By 1691, having enough permanent residents it was permitted to incorporate as a separate parish, called Cambridge Farms with its own church and minister -- but still was a subsidiary of Cambridge. By 1713 the people living in Cambridge Farms felt that they needed more autonomy and so they petitioned and the Great and General Court (official name for the Legislature) assented and Lexington as an independent town with its own town meeting was created. Note the origin of the name is unclear -- but may have to do with a failed land development deal.
Lexington prospered as an agricultural and small manufacturing settlement as there was lots of good land, good water and an abundance of water power for mills provided by the now mostly buried Vine Brook a tributary of the Shawsheen River and a couple of smaller brooks. At the time of the Revolution, Lexington consisted of several small farming hamlets and the core of the downtown sitting on a main road into Boston from Concord and beyond. Farmers shipped livestock and produce to Cambridge and Boston as well as some manufactured products and cattle began to be driven through Lexington on what is today the ROW of Concord Avenue and parts of Rt-2, Rt-2A. Paul Revere and William Dawes rode the night of the 18th and the British marched to / fro on the 18/19 along what is today Massachusetts Ave. So you could say that even by 1790 that Lexington was a suburb of Cambridge / Boston though the trip was still arduous under certain conditions -- the best travel was horse drawn sled in the middle of the winter.
In the mid 19th Century -- the Lexington and West Cambridge Railroad was built through the town to the Bedford line and regular service began in 1846. Today this ROW is occupied by the Minuteman Bikeway. With rail and then later street railway access to parts of Lexington -- Mansionization began in the late 19th Century as many quite magnificent estates were built on what had once been intensively farmed areas (such as the estate of Charles Ponzi of the eponymous scheme). By the early 20th Century while the population of the town was still small compared to today (about 30,000 now) quite a few people were commuting from Lexington by the Train and some taking the street railways and a soon a number of private buses were operating. Still as late as 1940 the town would lease the Green to farmers for haying.
*1 “By the 1920s, Kruh pointed out, “Boston was in perpetual gridlock … [and so if] you lived north of the city and wanted to get to Cape Cod, or lived south of the city and wanted to get to New Hampshire, Kruh explained, you had little choice but to fight your way through Boston.”
In 1925 the Commonwealth DPW (Highway Department) began to lay out several numbered routes about including a circumferential route around Boston called it Route 128 about 12 to 15 miles outside of Boston in places such as Lexington along the streets of the town including Rt-128 which passed by the Town Hall and turned at the main intersection in the center on the way to Waltham.
Waltham: High Street, Newton Street, Main Street (U.S. Route 20), Lexington Street
Lexington: Waltham Street, Massachusetts Avenue (Route 2A, now Route 4/Route 225), Woburn Street
Woburn: Lexington Street, Pleasant Street, Montvale Avenue
However, by the 1930s, downtown Lexington and Waltham were getting so overrun with traffic and downtown Boston was still beset by people trying to drive through on the city streets – so William Callahan (aka the Tunnel King) proposed as a six-lane highway 16 miles outside Boston to replace the street-by-street Rt-128. Callahan began in Lynnfield and worked around as money was available until WWII interrupted such projects for nearly a decade. Construction restarted in 1949 and by 1951 a 22 mile section of Route 128 from the Wakefield-Lynnfield border to the Wellesley-Needham border was completed and opened. – 50,000 cars jammed the northern portion on the first day it opened. “Before the southern portion was completed.” Kruh added, “stretches of the northern portion were already being widened from two to three lanes [in each direction].”
Gerald Blakely of the development firm of Cabot, Cabot and Forbes invented the then suburban industrial and now office and r&d park – as essentially college campus type environments complete with opens space, nice buildings and plenty of parking. As there was a lot of now available farm land to be developed this became a very popular model and was widely copied along Rt-128. The first was built in 1948 in Needham near Route 128 followed immediately by Northwest Park in Burlington. – today beginning to be renovated by its long-time owners into “ *an estimated $500 million... project that aims to create a Kendall Square-like campus of high-end housing, retail stores, outdoor cafes, and office space. “
*2 “ The ultimate goal: a complex that will attract a new generation of tech companies and workers demanding more amenities from suburban office developers and landlords, the company said.... “We’re trying to create something that gives office workers a reason to linger around longer after work,’’ said Todd Fremont-Smith, senior vice president of development at Nordblom, a family-run business that has owned Northwest Park for more than 50 years. “We’re trying to build a neighborhood. We’re not trying to build another shopping mall or office campus.’’ “
Also in 1948 Polaroid introduced its first “instant” film cameras later to be built on Rt-128 and Brandeis University founded in Waltham near to Rt-128. Much later – Olin College was chartered and after $400 M was invested by the F.W. Olin Foundation, it became the U.S.A's newest engineering college – first small class graduating in 2006. Olin is located in Needham not far from Rt-128 and adjacent to the older Babson College founded in 1919 as a practical business school.
These kind of developments began to make a name for Rt-128 so that in 1955 *3“Business Week ran an article titled "New England Highway Upsets Old Way of Life" and referred to Route 128 as "the Magic Semicircle". By 1958, it needed to be widened from six to eight lanes, and business growth continued. In 1957, there were 99 companies employing 17,000 workers along 128; in 1965, 574; By 1967, Kruh said, there were 729 commercial enterprises located along the highway employing 66,000 people – in 1973, 1,212 companies including Raytheon, DEC and HP were located along or immediately adjacent to Rt-128.
Built in 1968, Burlington Mall expanded and grew to today's over 150 stores and 1.2 M sq. ft.
In 1971,*Lahey* Clinic announced that it was moving out of Boston: *4"Over 2,000 Burlington voters, the largest number ever to attend a regular or special meeting in the town," overwhelmingly voted in favor of the construction of Lahey Clinic Medical Center in Burlington.
The completion of the rock cut in East Lexington and Arlington Heights allowed the Interstate-class section of Rt-2 to carry many cars into Cambridge – essentially reestablishing the historic link between Cambridge and Lexington. Rt-2 to the west and Rt-3 to the NH border spread the Rt-128 culture and the minicomputer industry into the NW suburbs – creating the “Computer commuter.” Over the last couple of decades despite the demise of DEC and the rise and fall of the Dotcom/ Telecom Bubble – Traffic volumes continued to soar until today 200,000 cars course through Lexington everyday at Rt-2A near to Hanscom AFB.
In addition to the growing industry, the location close to Boston, but yet in the suburbs, provided the ideal location for the returning G.I.s and later others to settle and Lexington became a major bedroom community. Farms and old estates fell to the housing developer and population in Lexington and Burlington grew rapidly during the 50's, 60's and 70's. In Lexington, the population has been roughly constant for the past couple of decades at about 30,000 – currently there are 11,110 households, and 8,432 families of which 37.8% had children under the age of 18 living with them, and 12.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.66 and the average family size was 3.10. The median age was 44 years median income for a household in the town was $122,656, and the median income for a family was $142,796. The per capita income for the town was $61,119. About 1.8% of families and 3.4% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.2% of those under age 18 and 3.4% of those age 65 or over. Property values in the town soared, mansionization returned and the school system established a reputation for national excellence – used by Lexington Realtors to promote property values further and by the town bureaucrats to promote tax increases.
Some additional Rt-128 history that is relevant:
1945 Percy Spencer at Raytheon [Waltham downtown] patents the microwave oven.
>1946 Harvard professor and World War II US Army General Georges Doriot, fresh from his work for the Army Quartermaster Corps, which boosted quality and efficiency of Army supply efforts, returns to Boston and launches American Research & Development (ARD), world’s first public venture capital fund. ARD begins to provide money to Boston-area start-up companies.
>1947 North Shore Shopping Center; designed like a New England village, becomes first shopping center on Route 128 and first on the east coast.
>1949: Raytheon becomes first company to offer commercial transistors [Waltham] dominant maker of transistors in the world through mid-1950s; Claude Shannon at MIT builds the first chess playing computer; “Project Lincoln” – later Lincoln Lab [Lexington and Bedford] – is established by MIT to begin studies that harness radar technology and Whirlwind computer. Effort will lead to SAGE air defense system.
>1951 With funds earned from a computer memory invention, Dr. An Wang, an immigrant from China, starts Wang Laboratories; Bleachery and Dye Works close in Waltham; Raytheon buys plant.
>1952 Successive approximation analog to digital (A/D) converter commercialized by Bernard Gordon at EPSCO. Technology becomes key to many emerging scientific and industrial products and eventually even music on CD-ROM; Inspired in part by the work of General Georges Doriot, US Army establishes Natick Lab to research improvements in clothing, food and equipment.
>1954 High Voltage Engineering moves to Burlington on Route 128. Company, established after World War II with funding from Doriot’s ARD, pioneers use of radiation to treat cancer, develops tools for research in atomic physics; Waltham Watch Company, pioneer of mass produced time pieces in the 19th century, ceases manufacturing operations; Polaroid completes construction of its first plant on Route 128 in Waltham.
>1956 Ohio-based Clevite buys Boston-based Transistor Products and establishes Clevite Transistor in former Waltham Watch factory to manufacture germanium transistors and diodes.
>1956 Transitron founded [Wakefield] – becomes high-flying maker of transistors; Thermo-Electron founded in Belmont [today's Thermo-Fisher in Waltham] by MIT researcher, Dr. George Hatsopoulos, to develop thermionic energy technology – the direct conversion of heat to electricity.
>1957. With $70,000 venture capital investment from ARD, Project Whirlwind and SAGE veteran Ken Olsen starts Digital Equipment Corporation in former Maynard woolen mill; Honeywell's Electronic Data Processing Division (EDP), originally formed in 1955 as a joint venture with Raytheon, introduces its first computer, the Datamatic 1000, based on vacuum tubes.
>1957 Lexington-based Itek founded with help of Rockefeller investment, acquires assets of Boston University Optical Research Laboratory, delves into wide range of futuristic technologies and begins secret development of Corona, the first spy satellites for US government.
>1958, MITRE, a non-profit defense research lab with roots at MIT, is launched near Route 128 in Burlington, Mass., to absorb SAGE personnel from Lincoln Lab and continue this and other defense-related developments.
>1960 General Radio moves to new factory near train station in West Concord. Employees in Cambridge, Belmont, and Waltham can commute by train or car; Clevite moves to new 128 facility near Trapelo Road in Waltham – facility eventully becomes home to Honeywell Electronic Data Processing (EDP) division.
>1963: First specialized graphics terminals developed at MIT Lincoln Laboratories (Sketchpad), beginning the computer-aided design (CAD) era. Sketchpad uses the first light-pen, precursor to the mouse, developed by Ivan Sutherland.
>1967 Thermo-Electron tapped by National Institute of Health to develop power source for artificial heart.
>1968 Digital Equipment Corporation goes public with an initial public offering value of $37 million, earning a 101% annualized return on investment for ARD.
>1969 General Radio introduces first commercial computer-controlled logic circuit analyzer – creating the automatic testing industry; Cambridge-based Bolt, Beranek & Newman [today part of Raytheon] builds thefirst “nodes” of the ARPAnet in California using computers made by Waltham-based Honeywell. Within a year, ARPAnet expands across the country and becomes the eventual basis for the Internet.
>1970 Honeywell merges its computer business with General Electric's to form Honeywell Information Systems.
>1972 Polaroid introduces SX-70 Single Lens Reflex instant color camera. Dr. Edwin Land is on cover of Life magazine. Company continues expansion along Route 128 with film and camera manufacturing in Waltham and Norwood.
>1976 As older industries continue to falter, Massachusetts unemployment rate briefly exceeds 12 percent. Rising taxes and energy costs add to “misery index.”
>1977 Walter Gilbert and Allan Maxam at Harvard University devise method for sequencing DNA using chemicals rather than enzymes, accelerating growth of biotechnologies sector in region.
>1979 VisiCalc, the first computer spreadsheet, is developed and marketed by. Harvard Business School student Dan Bricklin and partner Bob Frankston; EMC founded by Richard J. Egan and Roger Marino in Newton, Massachusetts. Initial products are add-on memory for minicomputers.
>1986 Digital Equipment Corporation founder Ken Olsen named “America’s Most Successful Entrepreneur” by Fortune magazine; With $3 billion in revenue and 30,000 employees, Wang Laboratories ranks 161 on the Fortune 500.
>1988: The first graphics supercomputers are announced by Chelmsford-based Apollo and its competitors – including Sun Microsystems [located for a while on Network Dr. in Burlington eventually acquired by Oracle with locations on Rt-128 in Burlington next to where High Voltage Engineering once existed]; 1988 Digital Equipment Corporation employs 120,000 people, roughly half of them in Massachusetts, achieves market value of $24 billion and ranks 38 on the Fortune 500.
>1992 Two years after the death of its founder, Dr. An Wang, Wang Laboratories seeks Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection; Board of Digital Equipment Corporation forces Ken Olsen to leave the company he founded.
>1998 Digital Equipment Corporation purchased by PC-maker, Compaq for $9.6 billion; EMC software revenue reaches $445 million, making EMC the world’s fastest-growing major software company Total revenue (including hardware) nears $4 billion, more than $1 billion from Europe.
>1999 EMC purchases Data General for $1.1 billion.
Note unless indicated all quotes are from *1 and all > history is from *3
refs:
*1
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...uEmz3iNLeI0YSHveQ&sig2=o5ctUEEdL9Moli-ngXksQQ
*2
http://articles.boston.com/2011-09-...office-buildings-suburban-office-office-space
*3
http://www.route128history.org/id8.html
*4
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...UGCmJolmELqpucZdw&sig2=soyWZumrO8ELV9XjdNTvww
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Route_128
http://massmoments.org/moment.cfm?mid=246