MBTA Buses & Infrastructure

Very exciting to see!

A few points in response to your comments:

sneijder said:
mass.streetsblog.org

City of Boston Reboots Plans for Bus-Priority Corridor Between North, South Stations

In addition to bus-priority infrastructure and enhanced bus stops, the city is also examining the possibilities for cross-town protected bike lanes and safer, more visible crosswalks along the rout…
mass.streetsblog.org

North-to-South Station high frequency bus was rebooted with initial designs due next year. This feels like a temporary solution to NSRL but I feel this needs some legitimate infrastructure (center-running dedicated bus lanes w/o right-turning cars , signal priority) to make the travel times competitive to get downtown core commuters to switch from driving to CR + bus connection. My sense is that we need <10 min travel times during peak between SS and NS for this to have a large impact on congestion.
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Agreed about the need for infrastructure. But, it's very important to realize: this is not what the NSRL is about. Providing a shuttle service between North Station and South Station is not the point of the North-South Rail Link: the point is to create a unified job market, where northside commuters can access Back Bay and Longwood just as easily as southside commuters can. Creating a direct frequent North Station-Seaport link is very valuable, but still keeps those commuters at a remove; transfering to the new T-7 bus isn't going to be any more convenient than transferring to the Green Line to reach Longwood is right now.

[EDIT: Sorry, I should moderate my tone a little bit. You are right, this definitely will help northside commuters more easily reach the southern end of the Financial District and the Seaport, and will make it easier for southside commuters to reach the northern end of downtown, just like the NSRL would. I just got frustrated because it sounded like you were comparing the NSRL to a North Station-South Station shuttle, which is a bugbear of mine. But I realize you were criticizing this as a poor replacement for the NSRL anyway, so I apologize for the stand-off-ish tone from me. Thanks for sharing the article! This is one of my favorite projects.]

Also, why didn't they propose routing it via atlantic avenue (right over the Central Artery)? Seems to be plenty of ROW Width to run dedicated bus lanes.
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Atlantic Ave is much less direct to where the jobs in downtown actually are; half of Atlantic's walkshed is literally in the harbor.
 
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That T7 proposal is fascinating because it violates the "no through service in the core" bus network philosophy the T has had for decades (if not forever).
 
North Cambridge has been completely emptied out.

NC0.jpg

NC1.jpg
 
sneijder said:
mass.streetsblog.org

City of Boston Reboots Plans for Bus-Priority Corridor Between North, South Stations

In addition to bus-priority infrastructure and enhanced bus stops, the city is also examining the possibilities for cross-town protected bike lanes and safer, more visible crosswalks along the rout…
mass.streetsblog.org

North-to-South Station high frequency bus was rebooted with initial designs due next year. This feels like a temporary solution to NSRL but I feel this needs some legitimate infrastructure (center-running dedicated bus lanes w/o right-turning cars , signal priority) to make the travel times competitive to get downtown core commuters to switch from driving to CR + bus connection. My sense is that we need <10 min travel times during peak between SS and NS for this to have a large impact on congestion.

Also, why didn't they propose routing it via atlantic avenue (right over the Central Artery)? Seems to be plenty of ROW Width to run dedicated bus lanes.
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……or just do the damn NSRL.
 
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The EGE said:
Both. Both are extremely useful. Establishing a BRT spine for downtown routes and establishing through-the-core CR service are complimentary and valuable projects, not competing ones.
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The reality is that they ARE competing - - - the bandaid option will indeed be presented as the solution to the problem. How many instances with public works projects in Massachusetts have we gotten our cake and eaten it too? How's that Silver Line??? What happened to those "non-VE'd" Green Line stations??? What about the universally uncontroversial Blue-Red Connector?????

I'm not going to continue to "Charlie Brown" Lucy Van Pelt's field goal holding again (done it too much in the past).

We all know that the NSRL ain't happening (tragically) and this BRT idea is going to be a bandaid excuse that they've solved the issue.
 
I'm going to say that NSSP and NSRL are *not* competing. On several walksheds that NSSP (the city's name for North Station Sea Port) directly serves demand that NSRL cannot, partly because NSRL ends up being farther away from places simply because it will be so deep under that it imposes a lot of vertical commute time (particularly if they delete Central Station)

Weak Case (where it seems to work like NSRL, but because it depends on where you're going, ends up being complementary)

1) North Station and Haymarket and Government Center Access from the South. NSSP offers a better option than exist today, and for some might remain preferred. For Government Center, NSRL would still require an indirect route from South Station or backtracking from North Station. The new State Street HQ (and any other developments in Bullfinch triangle) probably has a lot of commuters who rely on a CR/SS commute who will want a way to get to Congress@Haymarket via a connection at South Station. This will be good for them, even though, if it has the right vertical circulation, a NSRL could be better (and no connection)

2) FiDi And Leather District from the North. Here again NSSP is better than today, not as awesome as NSRL would be, and for some people the bus would be better even if NSRL existed, because NSRL platforms may be farther/deeper than a surface line on Congress St

Strong Case (where it CLEARLY does things that NSRL wont)

3) Boston Wharf Co, Convention Center, Drydock Ave (the 3 stops on the Summer St Corridor). OK, not technically in the scope of NSSP, but it is exactly where Northside commuters arriving at NS and Haymarket, and Westside Express buses at Post Office Sq need easy connectivity, and that connectivity starts at the curb on Congress St. And, frankly even under NSRL, South Station needs a way to get to the Convention Center, which becomes easier to provide if it is attached to NSSP. (also a great alternative to get to Seaport Parcels N P L5 L6 and vicinity, given a stop at Summer @ West Service Rd

4) NSBL: North Seaport BUS Link. This is where NSSP starts to look like NSBL). Picture the buses that today terminate at Haymarket or Post Office Sq being extended to the Seaport (faves: 111, 92, 93) but really anyplace on the North that there are lots of bus riders who live far from a CR stop.

5) Airport Service. The Silver Line should have some routes that run North Station - Congress St - Airport. Can't do that with NSRL.
 
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If the choice is between a Band Aid or an open wound, I’ll take the Band Aid. There is a real, immediate need for one seat local service to/from North Station to the Seaport with connections to GL, OL, BL, and South Station in between. I agree the NSRL is the most effective solution but it’s not happening and we should embrace solutions that will alleviate real needs in a cost palatable manner.
 
If we take the North Station-South Station politics out of the equation, just from a bus planning perspective, it makes A LOT of sense to combine the 93 and the 7 (which this service concept essentially does). Individually, the 93 and 7 are very short routes, and provided good, but limited transit connections. Merging them together is good service planning and it provides a transfer opportunity to practically every major transit service in the metro area (Red, Blue, Green, Orange, Amtrak, Commuter Rail, etc.). It's a practical but effective game-changer for residents in Charlestown and City Point (and all points in between).
 
WestMedford said:
If the choice is between a Band Aid or an open wound, I’ll take the Band Aid. There is a real, immediate need for one seat local service to/from North Station to the Seaport with connections to GL, OL, BL, and South Station in between. I agree the NSRL is the most effective solution but it’s not happening and we should embrace solutions that will alleviate real needs in a cost palatable manner.
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shmessy said:
The reality is that they ARE competing - - - the bandaid option will indeed be presented as the solution to the problem. How many instances with public works projects in Massachusetts have we gotten our cake and eaten it too? How's that Silver Line??? What happened to those "non-VE'd" Green Line stations??? What about the universally uncontroversial Blue-Red Connector?????

I'm not going to continue to "Charlie Brown" Lucy Van Pelt's field goal holding again (done it too much in the past).

We all know that the NSRL ain't happening (tragically) and this BRT idea is going to be a bandaid excuse that they've solved the issue.
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Did I miss something? What has you saying NSRL is "not happening?"
 
LexSEDotVille said:
Did I miss something? What has you saying NSRL is "not happening?"
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Cynicism, presumably. The Commonwealth does not have a good track record of building useful and necessary transit projects in recent times, and the NSRL is of a scale that would require substantial investment and political commitment that doesn't exist at present. It's not that the project is dead, it's that it getting built would require a sea change in Massachusetts transit politics that we have no particular reason to think will happen anytime soon (if at all) [despite spirited advocacy efforts which have borne some good fruit, and which are necessary to sustain and build support for that sea change].
 
LexSEDotVille said:
Did I miss something? What has you saying NSRL is "not happening?"
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Believe me - - I've been a huge proponent of NSRL. I feel like it should have been done yesterday and it is a terrible failing of our society that it hasn't.

That being said, it has been shown to me time and time again, by He Who Knows Everything on this website, that it ain't happening due to "obstacles" (my read: the short-term thinking and smallmindedness of our leaders).

Hell, do you see any boots on the ground yet for the practical shovel-ready and non-controversial Blue-Red Connector???? Look at the 30 years that it took to Build the VE'd, above ground Green Line Extension. So yes, there is a difference between what SHOULD occur and what IS occurring.

Please, PLEASE prove me wrong. Give me some hope.
 
shmessy said:
Believe me - - I've been a huge proponent of NSRL. I feel like it should have been done yesterday and it is a terrible failing of our society that it hasn't.

That being said, it has been shown to me time and time again, by He Who Knows Everything on this website, that it ain't happening due to "obstacles" (my read: the short-term thinking and smallmindedness of our leaders).

Hell, do you see any boots on the ground yet for the practical shovel-ready and non-controversial Blue-Red Connector???? Look at the 30 years that it took to Build the VE'd, above ground Green Line Extension. So yes, there is a difference between what SHOULD occur and what IS occurring.

Please, PLEASE prove me wrong. Give me some hope.
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We are talking about the same people in charge who kicked West Station out to 2040. Hard to counter your impression of the lack of commitment to transit.
 
JeffDowntown said:
We are talking about the same people in charge who kicked West Station out to 2040. Hard to counter your impression of the lack of commitment to transit.
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Exactly. It's a tragedy of human failure and small-mindedness. I wish it were different :(
 
lainpimicaja said:
If we take the North Station-South Station politics out of the equation, just from a bus planning perspective, it makes A LOT of sense to combine the 93 and the 7 (which this service concept essentially does). Individually, the 93 and 7 are very short routes, and provided good, but limited transit connections. Merging them together is good service planning and it provides a transfer opportunity to practically every major transit service in the metro area (Red, Blue, Green, Orange, Amtrak, Commuter Rail, etc.). It's a practical but effective game-changer for residents in Charlestown and City Point (and all points in between).
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I agree — lots of benefit to linking these two routes. The challenge is going to be the cumulative reliability. Both routes already see delays and bunching — that will get worse with a longer route, but hopefully will be mitigated through the use of bus lanes.
 
Nice! Looks like the high frequency routes will get the unique identifying prefix (of the "T77 to Harvard" from the latest round in the reasonable transit pitches thread), and what looks to be a unique color & bold line on the bus map!
Screenshot_20220516-123823_Chrome.jpg

The full bus map is too big for to be navigable as a PNG or JPG, so here's the direct link to the PDF.
 
What a opus magnum of transit planning. There is an incredible level of detail to wade through, let alone analyze. So while I'm holding judgement on whether these are all "good" ideas, one way or the other this is -- as far as I know -- an unprecedented examination of Boston's surface transit network.

I've done an initial read-through. There are some really interesting, and several quite bold, ideas in here -- many of which have been discussed here at ArchBoston, and a few of which we might have once-upon-a-time viewed as "Crazy Transit Pitches," even if they were still good ideas. Also a few elegant simplifications in there, which to me reflect what appears to be a genuine commitment to avoiding the "we've always done it this way" syndrome.

A few things I noticed, not in any particular order:
  • T39 is rerouted up Brookline Ave and then takes over the 47's corridor, to go to BU Bridge, Central, Union, and Porter
    • Could redirect a number of JP-Cambridge and JP-Somerville commuters, as well as Cambridge/Somerville-LMA commuters, out of the downtown core
    • Is an ambitiously long route though -- I wonder what their analysis suggests for runtimes and reliability
    • Is emblematic of a repeated strategy of extending high-frequency routes through multiple hubs instead of just terminating at the "next" subway station
    • And there are some loooong routes in this redesign
  • Much-wished-for Sullivan-Kendall service comes from T101 -- curtailed at the north to Medford Square (with T96 taking over circumferential service between Malden, Medford/Tufts, Porter, and Davis), extended to the south along the 92's corridor on Main St before hooking west to hit Lechmere and Kendall
  • The T22 from Ashmont is rerouted from Ruggles to Longwood; likewise, the T28 from Mattapan is rerouted from Ruggles to Kenmore via Longwood
    • Likely would eliminate transfers for many commuters going to Longwood (and is reflective of Longwood's importance as a third "downtown" of the city)
  • SL1 and SL3 skip Silver Line Way and are shown on the map turning on D Street and running immediately to the tunnel
    • Unclear how this would interact with the need to switch from overhead wires. Perhaps they believe it can be done within World Trade Center station itself, or perhaps they are banking on the battery buses being available soon
  • SL2 reduced to rush hour only
  • SL4 and SL5 are consolidated and run Tufts Medical Center-Chinatown-Downtown Crossing-South Station
    • The DTX station is near the Otis St (Red Line) entrance -- presumably Orange Line transfers would be done at TMC and Chinatown
    • The transfer to the Green Line at DTX would be significantly longer
    • However, the new T7 is available at South Station, and might serve as an alternative for the Green Line for some passengers
    • (Boy would it be nice from a "placemaking" perspective if this consolidation/simplification could happen)
  • The 60 -- long terminating somewhere in Chestnut Hill (for over a century) -- is extended the "last mile" to Newton Centre station
    • Believe it or not, this, and other extensions like it, represent some of the last vestiges of the competing territories of the old streetcar companies finally being eliminated
  • The 116/117 is simplified to the T116; the southern branch that the 117 offered is picked up by a circumferential T110 that runs to Wellington via Woodlawn and Everett
    • On the face of it, this is one proposal I'd want to see a bit more data on; unique ridership on the 117 wasn't enormous but it wasn't trivial either
    • This route -- with a pair of northern branches -- has existed for over 100 years, with very consistent demand to Maverick; a peak-only 117 might be valuable to maintain the one-seat to Maverick
      • (From what I can tell, most other such one-seat rides throughout the system have been maintained -- but again, I haven't looked closely)
    • As I said, I'd want to see a bit more data one way or another
  • Winthrop sees integrated bus service, possibly for the first time ever?
  • "Multiple all-day high frequency services replace Route 47" -- this is the understatement of the year
    • The redesigners clearly recognized that Kenmore-LMA-Ruggles-Nubian (and BMC and Andrew/Broadway) is sorely underserved, so it is good (though not surprising) to see such a heavy focus there
  • The 55 -- the quirky descendent of the Ipswich Street car lines which pre-covid paralleled the Green Line as it ran into downtown -- is rerouted to Kendall via Hynes on the north, and extended just slightly on the south to turn at LMA
    • This is actually pretty clever from a design perspective -- it provides a one-seat connection between Kendall and LMA without getting bogged down in Kenmore Sq, while maintaining transit access to the Fenway neighborhood, which is surprisingly inconvenient to reach from the Green Line
    • During covid, the 55 has already been cut back to Copley, so this reroute's impact is less than it might've been two years
    • The 55 always had somewhat light ridership, so it would've been hard to maintain as a purely radial route -- again, I think this is actually pretty clever
  • The 43 is sorta the same story but with a different outcome -- it looks like the low ridership, combined with duplicating 2-3 radial routes nearby and not being able to integrate into a larger route, led them to maintain the service but as a reduced frequency. This is the outcome the 55 is able to avoid by being stitched into something larger
  • The 86 (rightfully so, in my opinion) is broken up; the 86 itself is condensed to Harvard-Reservoir, while the eastern half becomes part of T109 -- an Everett-Sullivan route that is then extended to Harvard
    • I think breaking up this route makes sense, as it will allow better alignment between service frequency and demand/density, with a focused Sullivan-Harvard link
  • In general, we see significantly improved suburban circumferential service in this redesign, especially on the north side: Arlington-Waltham-Riverside, Woburn-Stoneham-Melrose, Melrose-Saugus-Lynn, etc
  • I've previously argued for combining the 7, 4, and 93, and so I'm very pleased to see the T7 proposal here
  • The T12 (Brookline Village-LMA-Andrew-Seaport) is probably the most creative proposal in here, and I think it's really exciting. Again, the redesigners took the 47 and basically built an entire subnetwork on its skeleton. I'm not sure I've posted any here, but I've been crayoning BRT from LMA to the Seaport (bypassing Nubian) for a while now, so am quite pleased to see this
  • The Charlestown/Somerville maps are probably the most striking, showing a night-and-day difference before-and-after, and I think do a good job of encapsulating many of the overarching philosophies of this effort
  • Unsurprisingly, the CT designations are eliminated -- in name. But in practice, enhanced all day frequencies on longer routes is exactly what was proposed for the original (larger) CT system back in the Urban Ring days -- and on many of the same corridors identified here (but, I should highlight, this redesign includes many more corridors than the CT proposals did)
 
("A 'few' things I noticed", lmao...)
  • Again, there are some clever redesigns tucked in here and there; one trend I noticed was that awkward "triangular" routes were often broken up and incorporated into a combination of radial, and sometimes circumferential routes
    • The erstwhile 201/202 circuit and 26 circuit are good examples of this
    • The 201/202 is redistributed into higher-frequency radials that criss-cross forming two of three legs: Fields Corner-East Milton-Quincy Center, and Ashmont-North Quincy-Quincy Center. By stitching those legs into longer radial corridors, the redesign can provide higher frequencies on a corridor that was otherwise somewhat awkard and isolated from the network
    • A lower frequency 20 covers the third leg and handles more of the "circulator" service, meaning -- as far as I can tell -- that almost no one loses their one-seat ride to Fields Corner, except for a short stretch of Gallivan where riders will need to walk two blocks; on the other hand, all riders on the 201/202 corridor maintain a one-seat ride to the Red Line, even if redirected from Fields Corner to Ashmont
    • The 20 also helps simplify the 26's circuit, where a similar strategy is deployed:
      • Washington St maintains the one-seat ride to Ashmont via the 20 (now without the looping service pattern)
      • Gallivan maintains the one-seat to Ashmont via a beefed-up 21 from Forest Hills
      • Northern Norfolk St maintains low-frequency access to Ashmont via a new 29 route, that also provides low-frequency access to Franklin Field Housing
      • Norfolk St overall sees a frequency boost by being tied into a longer route between Mattapan and Fields Corner, via Blue Hill Ave, Norfolk St, Codman Sq, Washington St, and Geneva Ave -- which overall creates a novel north-south route in this section of Dorchester
  • Some routes get a (possibly surprising) promotion -- a number of the new high-frequency routes were never part of Key Bus Routes previously. These include
    • the T16 Forest Hills-Andrew via Columbia Rd (which historically sat a little shy of 15-min headways at peak, and was close to 30-min off-peak),
    • the 65 Oak Square-Brookline Village-Kenmore (another historic Ipswich St line) becoming part of the T15, and
    • the South Boston routes, which historically had very high peak service but only modest off-peak service
  • One can only hope that this redesign will also see significant expansion of bus lanes
    • A number of the longer routes will suffer significantly if forced to run in mixed traffic
    • A number of the redesigns "bank" on being able to transfer to nearby high-frequency spines as an alternative to present service; this will make the need for bus lanes more acute to ensure reliability
  • Boy oh boy would it be fun if this bus network rework kicked off a fundamental redesign of the subway map
Again -- this is an absolute treasure trove of proposals here. I'm extremely impressed with the level of detail, and with the willingness to abandon "this is how we've always done it". I'm sure there are imperfections here, and I'll be keen to hear what the feedback from riders and community members is. But for now, my jaw is still on the floor from having dropped three hours ago.
 
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