I-90 Interchange Improvement Project & West Station | Allston

Any reason to think Harvard will lose interest because of the Rona?
 
None whatsoever. Harvard has been around for a long time and they're perfectly comfortable thinking seriously long-term.
 
Advocates and the Task Force have been challenging MassDOT on this "rule" about the number of lanes since the very beginning. They refuse to budge and just keep coming up with more proposals with the same number of lanes. You talk as if the public has any power here at all. They don't.

Are you suggesting that the Task Force just say "we won't meet with you MassDOT until you show us a proposal with fewer lanes?" Is there some political leverage that they are not using? What do you think MassDOT would do then? I think they would just say "screw it" and move forward with whatever they want to do.
 
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cden4 said:
Advocates and the Task Force have been challenging MassDOT on this "rule" about the number of lanes since the very beginning. They refuse to budge and just keep coming up with more proposals with the same number of lanes. You talk as if the public has any power here at all. They don't.

Are you suggesting that the Task Force just say "we won't meet with you MassDOT until you show us a proposal with fewer lanes?" Is there some political leverage that they are not using? What do you think MassDOT would do then? I think they would just say "screw it" and move forward with whatever they want to do.
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Determining what is People's Pike's stance on the impasse would be a nice start. Lots of speculation going on here about what should be in their heads without any corroborating statements from the official advocacy. What do they think of MassDOT's negotiating or lackthereof? Can you point to any recent media citations shedding light on that?
 
cden4 said:
Advocates and the Task Force have been challenging MassDOT on this "rule" about the number of lanes since the very beginning. They refuse to budge and just keep coming up with more proposals with the same number of lanes. You talk as if the public has any power here at all. They don't.
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Ari Ofsevit's proposal had all the lanes. ABC's proposal had all the lanes.

Ari and ABC put grounding the highway on the table to begin with. MassDOT has changed every single part of this project - multiple times - to placate advocate concerns (including the creative engineering they did to work the Agganis Way footbridge into viaduct plan). There are some areas where they've been unwilling to budge (the layover yard being the big one), and your personal issues might not have been addressed, but don't try to gaslight us on this.
 
The reason why most of the proposals by the advocates had all the lanes is because MassDOT said "we will not consider any proposals that don't have the same number of lanes as today." But that doesn't mean the advocates actually wanted the lanes.
 
cden4 said:
The reason why most of the proposals by the advocates had all the lanes is because MassDOT said "we will not consider any proposals that don't have the same number of lanes as today." But that doesn't mean the advocates actually wanted the lanes.
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Both of those proposals were unsolicited, particularly Ofsevit's. He typically doesn't constrain his ideas to "what MassDOT says they'll consider".
 
Yes but they decided "we should really only present what we know MassDOT would actually consider." And along with that, they figured that "if we show that we can fit everything at grade with all the lanes MassDOT wants, then it is CERTAINLY possible to fit everything with fewer lanes."
 
cden4 said:
Yes but they decided "we should really only present what we know MassDOT would actually consider." And along with that, they figured that "if we show that we can fit everything at grade with all the lanes MassDOT wants, then it is CERTAINLY possible to fit everything with fewer lanes."
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When did they decide that? Citations, please, not mind-reading.
 
cden4 said:
"if we show that we can fit everything at grade with all the lanes MassDOT wants, then it is CERTAINLY possible to fit everything with fewer lanes."
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They didn't think that.

It isn't possible to fit all the lanes at grade and neither design argued it was (the Ofsevit plan involved a rail viaduct, the ABC one filled the river).

Even if they did use that logic, that would represent bad faith: "I'll ask Dad if I can have some carrot sticks, and then I'll take both carrot sticks and cookies because technically I can find both in the fridge."
 
There are two feasible options left: Mass Pike on a viaduct or SFR on a viaduct. I prefer the latter, because when Storrow west of Charlesgae is finally phased out years from now, the SFR viaduct can come down fairly easily.
 
ccole said:
Article just posted on the Globe about the debate surrounding the most recent plans: https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/07...project-strikes-some-critics-too-car-centric/
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This part is such ignorant drivel it should never have been published (Vaccaro knows better, so this is really disappointing):

Still others see an unsubtle message in the state plans for a possible pedestrian connection from the BU campus to the riverfront: a boxed-in, elevated corridor attached to the underside of the viaduct, a design that would literally put people below cars.
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The bridge is below the highway to minimize the elevation change for cyclists and pedestrians. Doing it above the viaduct would be not just worse for the users, but physically impossible.

Credit to ABC for seeing the light, though:

A Better City, a business-backed nonprofit that originally launched to aid in Big Dig planning, has suggested the state should instead promise to study whether it could reduce Soldiers Field Road’s lanes sometime in the future, possibly by adding new ramps to direct traffic to the turnpike.
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Once more with feeling: NEED TO BUILD THIS. SOON. NO TIME TO ENDLESSLY NAVEL-GAZE ABOUT PRIORITIES AND UNICORNS AND PONIES. BUILD THING.
 
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Regarding the number of lanes in the throat; I think there is a valid reason DOT is adamant about maintaining the number of existing lanes that the good people here are overlooking.

It seems the main sentiment here is that because the Pike is 3 lanes up and downstream of Allston, there is no or limited capacity to be gained by maintaining 4 lanes through the throat. But this view intrinsically assumes capacity (and congestion) is determined solely by volume divided by the number of lanes. In reality, merging movements are one of the greatest factors on capacity. Its not a coincidence that the worst traffic bottlenecks in Metro Boston are at interchanges, particularly major ones (…cough…cough… 128 at 93, Newton Supercollider, etc).

To the posters claiming that the 4th lane is just a glorified acceleration lane because it drops at the Pru, you’re 100% right. That’s precisely its purpose. Ever wonder why the Pike drops a lane through the 128 interchange? Its so vehicles from 128 enter on a dedicated through lane that eliminates conflict between the entering and through movements. Yes, most of those vehicles eventually change lanes, but these conflicting movements are dispersed over a mile plus length of roadway where vehicles can take advantage of natural gaps in traffic. Without the added lane, all of those conflicting moments MUST happen at a discrete point, natural breaks in traffic (and the resultant drop in capacity), be dammed.

“But then why can’t the pike drop a lane though the Allston interchange like at 128” you ask?

Well, because of inbalanced demand. At the 128 interchange, roughly a fourth of traffic is exiting to 128, (~30,000 AADT vs ~120,000 total). So while capacity is reduced by a third, overall V/C remains relatively constant. However, at the Allston interchange, demand is heavily imbalanced with relatively few Pike EB to Cambridge St movements (~12,000), so a dedicated exit lane would act more like a defacto lane drop a la 93 in Wilmington.

Speaking of the Newton supercollider, because Cambridge St acts as an extension of RT 2, twice the volume (20,000) enters the Pike EB at Cambridge St compared to Newton’s 10,000. So without the add a lane in Allston, you could expect that interchange to function twice as bad as the Supercollider, except you can’t, because congestion is an exponential function of volume once critical vehicular density is reached as it already is in this segment.

Now after all that, you could still think, “to hell with people from Weston being stuck in extra traffic!” Now THAT is something that could be debated and a POV I personally have sympathy towards; but this post is just to show that there’s a bit more to DOT’s decision here than “MOAR LANES!”



TLDR, Traffic engineering is complicated, and I should probably get back to work.
 
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Highwayguy said:
To the posters claiming that the 4th lane is just a glorified acceleration lane because it drops at the Pru, you’re 100% right. That’s precisely its purpose. Ever wonder why the Pike drops a lane through the 128 interchange? Its so vehicles from 128 enter on a dedicated through lane that eliminates conflict between the entering and through movements. Yes, most of those vehicles eventually change lanes, but these conflicting movements are dispersed over a mile plus length of roadway where vehicles can take advantage of natural gaps in traffic. Without the added lane, all of those conflicting moments MUST happen at a discrete point, natural breaks in traffic (and the resultant drop in capacity), be dammed.
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I appreciate someone passionately arguing these points. That said, isn't making the case for the safety/function of a 7th or 8th lane MassDOT's job? They didn't show paint or any other indication of the lane's function in their presentations, they said that they need 8 lanes to "serve the volume".

I completely agree that weaving and lane shifts are far more important to capacity than number of through lanes, but MassDOT isn't really making that argument. They're saying MOAR LANES (or rather, NOT ANY FEWER LANES).

I want this project moving, but long-term, I'm very happy if we end up with a geometrically-ideal 6 or 7 lane Turnpike rather than a 8 lanes for the sake of 8 lanes (note that MassDOT already compromised the shoulder/safety space in their latest viaduct plan). Same definitely goes for the river roads (Memorial Drive could be 2 lanes with turning lanes and function better than the 4 narrow lanes it has today, for instance).
 
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Probably a combination of it’s a rather technical justification (from a Joe Everyday perspective) and (I may be wrong about this) other than this one thread in this one forum, l haven't heard much pushback about the 8 lanes from advocacy groups that would warrant that justification. Its not like DOT had to make a F-Line style argument for why the (built) Worcester line had to remain two tracks. If you’re in the know, its a “Duh” answer; its not worth spending those meeting minutes and consultant fees on a question no one asked.

But the most probable reason is that in a project with 100 moving parts that needs to get to PS&E yesterday, they don’t want to introduce a 101st moving part. Of course, most of those unknowns are because of DOT’s own project management; but remember, those rusting girders don't care who's fault it was. This project will a be a literal textbook example of "the perfect being the enemy of the good" if the existing viaduct is rehabed for 200 mill to buy us 5 more years to debate about 22 feet. Im not exactly a fan of the current proposal either, but lm less of a fan of lightning money on fire, or god forbid, having an unplanned closure of the current viaduct due to a failed inspection.
 
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EUVOSCREORA7LG7YCN23WQ5XG4.jpg


Sorry if I'm rehashing a point that's already come up, but in the elevated Pike design why can't SFR go under the highway? Seems there's 4 lanes that would stack relatively nicely. But I assume that's the first thing you'd think of from looking at that picture so there's a reason it wouldn't work?

Also, anyone have a good rendering of the "Scheme Z" ramps mentioned in the article? I'm always fascinated to see city-destroying highway designs that never came to fruition.
 
Andrew said:
Sorry if I'm rehashing a point that's already come up, but in the elevated Pike design why can't SFR go under the highway? Seems there's 4 lanes that would stack relatively nicely. But I assume that's the first thing you'd think of from looking at that picture so there's a reason it wouldn't work?
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By the time the EB SFR lanes transition under the Mass Pike viaduct, and then transition out, the actual length of EB SFR being fully under the Mass Pike viaduct is somewhat short, so it's really not worth it.

The dashed white lines would be the EB SFR under the Mass Pike viaduct, and the bright green area is the miniscue park area that would be gained:

50114326336_9848e29309_b.jpg
 
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Highwayguy said:
Probably a combination of it’s a rather technical justification (from a Joe Everyday perspective) and (I may be wrong about this) other than this one thread in this one forum, l haven't heard much pushback about the 8 lanes from advocacy groups that would warrant that justification. Its not like DOT had to make a F-Line style argument for why the (built) Worcester line had to remain two tracks. If you’re in the know, its a “Duh” answer; its not worth spending those meeting minutes and consultant fees on a question no one asked.

But the most probable reason is that in a project with 100 moving parts that needs to get to PS&E yesterday, they don’t want to introduce a 101st moving part. Of course, most of those unknowns are because of DOT’s own project management; but remember, those rusting girders don't care who's fault it was. This project will a be a literal textbook example of "the perfect being the enemy of the good" if the existing viaduct is rehabed for 200 mill to buy us 5 more years to debate about 22 feet. Im not exactly a fan of the current proposal either, but lm less of a fan of lightning money on fire, or god forbid, having an unplanned closure of the current viaduct due to a failed inspection.
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That's fair enough, but given that the Secretary had to know the question was coming after the last meeting, she should have come to that Globe interview with an answer. It took you or I minutes to work one out, and she has both her own professional expertise and advisors to put a justification together. I've heard her pivot technically and convincingly many times in Board and FMCB meetings.
 
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