MA Casino Developments

PDF Page 19 of the McGrath grounding study says that the Wynn Casino is expected to generate the following increase in traffic on Washington St, Somerville:

Friday PM:1,332 SOV trips
Saturday PM: 1,756 SOV trips

and describes this as a +4% increase.
I'd say the key thing to note is that these come at non-rush hour times (Friday PM rush is more spread out that other days because many people either start the weekend early or linger "in town")

Obviously, this is just one street segment, and that one can expect similar increases on other "spokes" that point at the Casino hub. Point is, these are manageable volumes at manageable times.
 
Arlington said:
PDF Page 19 of the McGrath grounding study says that the Wynn Casino is expected to generate the following increase in traffic on Washington St, Somerville:

Friday PM:1,332 SOV trips
Saturday PM: 1,756 SOV trips

and describes this as a +4% increase.
I'd say the key thing to note is that these come at non-rush hour times (Friday PM rush is more spread out that other days because many people either start the weekend early or linger "in town")

Obviously, this is just one street segment, and that one can expect similar increases on other "spokes" that point at the Casino hub. Point is, these are manageable volumes at manageable times.
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Oh---OKAY---
 
No one ever believes studies. ..... Stoopid math.

The good news is, there are finally some actual follow up traffic increase results for urban casinos. So far they have proved..... The conservative numbers used in preconstruction studies are indeed conservative. Actual numbers typically call below those in studies. Like most engineering, we look at worst case and design for it, knowing full well that peak will likely never happen.
 
bolehboleh said:
I like Walsh's views on just about everything but I wish he's just leave this one alone.
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Bolehboleh -- Walsh should focus on finding out whose stealing the treasures of the BPL and fix the management problem forthwith-- that's something that a mayor is supposed to deal with not tilting at casino windmills
 
Reznor said:
Religion often poisons minds, but the opposition was not solely coming from them. Trust me, if East Boston is considered your backyard, Everett is across the street.
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They thought about all of the supposedly BAD things about the casino & gambling. They never once said anything good about it!

They were even trying to stop it from being built in Everett! They need to just go kick rocks & get over themselves. I've only got one thing to say to them; Deal with it. :mad:
 
SeamusMcFly said:
No one ever believes studies. ..... Stoopid math.

The good news is, there are finally some actual follow up traffic increase results for urban casinos. So far they have proved..... The conservative numbers used in preconstruction studies are indeed conservative. Actual numbers typically call below those in studies. Like most engineering, we look at worst case and design for it, knowing full well that peak will likely never happen.
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I hope we invent flying cars when this casino gets built. That will ease traffic concerns.
 
I was going to ask you, SeamusMcFly, to clarify which way "conservative" cut?

I read you to mean "engineer's conservative" where "the bad thing" (traffic) is over-stated and over-prepared for, meaning that even the forecasted 4% increase is probably unnecessarily alarmist. Or to put it another way, the traffic will not be as bad as even these numbers say

I suspect TheRifleman read "PR-guy conservative" where the forecasted numbers are downplaying the carmageddon. From this the Rifleman may have believed you were saying "the traffic will be worse than the numbers say"

Here's a challenge for TheRifleman: can he propose actual data for us to look at? Like a "before" benchmark and how bad the "after (casino)" numbers will be to know that he, TheRifleman, has been proved right? Or are we just going to have to take TheRifleman's word for it that he's stuck in traffic and he's sure they're all casino-goers.
 
Arlington said:
I
I suspect TheRifleman read "PR-guy conservative" where the forecasted numbers are downplaying the carmageddon. From this the Rifleman may have believed you were saying "the traffic will be worse than the numbers say"

Here's a challenge for TheRifleman: can he propose actual data for us to look at? Like a "before" benchmark and how bad the "after (casino)" numbers will be to know that he, TheRifleman, has been proved right? Or are we just going to have to take TheRifleman's word for it that he's stuck in traffic and he's sure they're all casino-goers.
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Arlington It's common sense at this point. I know we live in a data driven environment that you need actual proof. I just go with gut instinct. The infrastructure is outdated around the area to host a billion dollar gambling facility next to a major city. We need another highway with direct access to the city: 93 Sucks on Saturdays, morning & evening commutes. MBTA is still the same since the 70's with some car upgrades on the Greenline.

We need ideas to relieve this congestion or massive capital investment.
 
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Cars and common sense don't seem to work out very well. Common sense says more lanes solve congestion the reality more lanes available equals more people driving in most cases which means congestion in large and dense metro areas cannot be solved. Period. There is nothing that will solve it unless everyone stops driving other than a select few. There is no way around that so traffic should be an expected and accepted consequence of living in a large and vibrant city.

I go on gut instinct for some things but traffic has been well studied and is well understood so there is no need to go on your gut.

Just read about induced demand and it will become clear that no matter what Boston does unless it suddenly becomes rural traffic will continue to exist and slow down driving.

You could always try the T.
 
citylover94 said:
Cars and common sense don't seem to work out very well. Common sense says more lanes solve congestion the reality more lanes available equals more people driving in most cases which means congestion in large and dense metro areas cannot be solved. Period. There is nothing that will solve it unless everyone stops driving other than a select few. There is no way around that so traffic should be an expected and accepted consequence of living in a large and vibrant city.

I go on gut instinct for some things but traffic has been well studied and is well understood so there is no need to go on your gut.

Just read about induced demand and it will become clear that no matter what Boston does unless it suddenly becomes rural traffic will continue to exist and slow down driving.

You could always try the T.
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I don't believe that. You invest into Massive capital investment into the MBTA along with massive expansions and focus on making the MBTA so Clean, Efficient, Secure making people want to ride the MBTA. That is the key. The problem is we have not had any real investment into the T---We have had the opposite happen: The hacks hooking up hacks with pensions the T could never afford--An Efficient T back in the 70's we need to get something in the 21st century.
 
So how is traffic in Tokyo then or how about any major european city? Paris, London, Barcelona? As far as I know they all have congestion issues or they implemented a congestion zone charge.
 
citylover94 said:
So how is traffic in Tokyo then or how about any major european city? Paris, London, Barcelona? As far as I know they all have congestion issues or they implemented a congestion zone charge.
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Boston still has the same infrastructure since the 80's. Besides the BIG DIG. The MBTA Transit still looks the same: Route 1, 93, 95, MassPike suck-

More cars, more people and Boston continues to build on outdated infrastructure. I remember riding around in the 80's thru 90's. the only traffic was early and evening commute. Saturday's and Sundays were fine.
 
It's OT, but I might as well post it here. People in cars can go fuck themselves. With the way the city is rejuvenating, we don't need people commuting in. If you want a job in Boston/Cambridge, then live somewhere transit accessable. If not, then too bad. Automotive infrastructure costs too much, physically and metaphorically, to invest any more into it. Boston doesn't need commuters to sustain itself, so I see no reason we should continue to handicap ourselves for them.
 
davem said:
It's OT, but I might as well post it here. People in cars can go fuck themselves. With the way the city is rejuvenating, we don't need people commuting in. If you want a job in Boston/Cambridge, then live somewhere transit accessable. If not, then too bad. Automotive infrastructure costs too much, physically and metaphorically, to invest any more into it. Boston doesn't need commuters to sustain itself, so I see no reason we should continue to handicap ourselves for them.
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Really? Cause cars and the sales tax from people that drive cars subsidize your overgrown train set where it takes twice as long to get anywhere. If you don't need cars then stop taking our money to subsidize your bar hopping.
 
We have the whole rest of the forum to talk about general multimodal issues. (Where it has been demonstrated again and again that an increase in supply of free stuff like roads just encourages hoarding and overconsumption--new roads make traffic worse by encouraging "free" trip-making. (There are lots of examples--in Houston, widening the I-610 from 8 to 23 lanes caused trip times to double (average speeds halved as people adjusted their living patterns to use what they thought would be a fast road)

What's wrong is to try to pin huge metropolitan-wide multimodal issues on any one use (particularly a non-commute one like a casino) The problems we have are bigger, older, and caused by a million commuters, not 10,000 casino goers.

Widen the roads around the casino, and all you'll do is attract cut-through commuters who heard 16, 99, 28 and 38 "got better" and then they'll look for back streets to tweak their access.
 
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