MBTA Buses & Infrastructure

Where did the northbound run turn before? Theres no left from Main to Broadway
 
IIRC it went up Ames, took a right on Broadway and looped around onto Main.
 
Hallelujah. That loop around Kendall can add 10-15 minutes - no joke - at rush hour.
 
Looks like a definite improvement. I think it's definitely close enough to the station for anybody wanting to make that connection, and yet is far more useful for people not needing to switch to the Red Line, which I would think would be the larger ridership group.
 
Re: CT2 near Kendall

The CT2 still is one of the worst MBTA routes with respect to not going in a straight line, and it's not really possible to fix that and still have it covering all of the things CT2 does in a single route. There's probably some way to distribute what CT2 does to two or three or four routes that would be an improvement.
 
fattony said:
Abysmal bus service to Kendall is something I would really like to see change with the upcoming bus overhaul. I want a limited number of overlapping bus routes that all get quality treatment and establish a transit corridor. Moving CT2, 85, and EZ Ride to Ames Street establishes a precedent for routing buses away from Kendall Station. What will similar reasoning mean for the EZ Ride or any new MBTA route servicing the relocated Lechmere and Kendall Square? Will new Lechmere have a major bus stop or will people have to walk to bus stops that make the routes work better?
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How did northbound CT2 get to the Kendall subway station? Was it Ames -> Broadway -> Main -> Ames again?

If the MBTA adds a 116/117 variant that instead of going to Maverick Sq takes the Tobin and Gilmore bridges to connect to Community College on the Orange Line, Lechmere on the Green Line, Kendall on the Red Line, and then follows CT2's route from Kendall to the BU bridge and perhaps continues to Coolidge Corner, I'd expect that might get more Red Line transfers than CT2. It would probably justify adding a (possibly bus only) Main St to Third St lane. It would be nice if southbound, there was a Gilmore Bridge to Northpoint Blvd ramp for the buses and everyone else to use; reducing traffic at the Gilmore Bridge / 28 intersection would probably be good for everyone (this would probably take some park space; perhaps that could be offset by eliminating Memorial Drive east of its intersection with Vassar St). And if the buildings just to the east of the Gilmore Bridge just north of Northpoint Blvd could somehow have their functionality moved elsewhere, maybe Northpoint Blvd could get an on ramp to the Gilmore Bridge, too.

There should probably also be some bus lanes in the Kendall area.
 
Dunno if this belongs in Crazy Transit Pitches, but I personally think there's something to be said for extending the MBTA's trolleybus network. There are a few key routes that could be electrified relatively easily -- specifically the 77 (Harvard to Arlington Heights) and the SL3 Busway. Trolleybuses are zero-carbon road vehicles that use proven technology and are already in the MBTA's fleet. From a sustainability angle, they're brilliant machines.

Chelsea is really a no-brainier, as the vehicles already in service are dual-mode. The 77 might be trickier, as there wouldn't be enough space in the North Cambridge carhouse to store the additional trolleybuses needed. A few could be stored in a small yard near the Arlington Heights Loop, but it seems that for the number required for full service some portion of the Watertown carbarn yard would have to be used as a storage lot.

Yes, the 77 does cue-jump frequently, but that might happen significantly less often if the BRT-elements that were so successful on Mass Ave return.
 
Wash said:
Dunno if this belongs in Crazy Transit Pitches, but I personally think there's something to be said for extending the MBTA's trolleybus network. There are a few key routes that could be electrified relatively easily -- specifically the 77 (Harvard to Arlington Heights) and the SL3 Busway. Trolleybuses are zero-carbon road vehicles that use proven technology and are already in the MBTA's fleet. From a sustainability angle, they're brilliant machines.

Chelsea is really a no-brainier, as the vehicles already in service are dual-mode. The 77 might be trickier, as there wouldn't be enough space in the North Cambridge carhouse to store the additional trolleybuses needed. A few could be stored in a small yard near the Arlington Heights Loop, but it seems that for the number required for full service some portion of the Watertown carbarn yard would have to be used as a storage lot.

Yes, the 77 does cue-jump frequently, but that might happen significantly less often if the BRT-elements that were so successful on Mass Ave return.
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Electrifying Galen St., Newton to bring the 71 to Newton Corner to meet a new Regional Rail station there is a no-brainer, especially because the old A Line 600V DC feed is still active under the street as a B Line to 71 electrical interconnect. All you need to do are literally re-hoist the poles, string wire, and plug into the pre-existing underground conduits and you're in business for that one.

The full 77 is a bit of a reach, but since the 79 already covers the Arlington half of the route from Alewife it always seemed like it would make a lot of sense to extend the 77A to Alewife so there was some route symmetry. That would also be a relatively cheap/easy one, as Alewife has a 600V DC substation for the Red Line serving up a power interconnect for the extra 1 mile of TT wire. Only prerequisite would be a build of the mythical Alewife-Mass Ave. busways that have been proposed for ages but never enacted. Bonus: if Cambridgepark Dr. and Rindge Ave. were angled to meet at a single intersection to zap the problematic double lights on the parkway that would set the roadway far enough back of the station busway that you could possibly build some mini- yard facilities on the front of the station facing the parkway to retire North Cambridge carhouse (other TT maint functions can get absorbed by already-wired Watertown carhouse).

The 77-proper might actually be a good reassignment candidate for the Silver Line dual-modes after their Transitway retirement. Ride the extended 77A wire to Alewife Brook Parkway, then change to diesel on a curb cut for the remaining trip to Arlington Heights. Would put badly-needed 60-footers on that route, allow them to route through the Harvard busway, keep them quiet and emissions-free through duration of Cambridge, but save the expense of installing a couple pricey new traction substations in Arlington that probably can't be justified.
 
I can't see how the infrastructure costs for catenary are at all logical when battery-electric buses are so close on the horizon.
 
chmeeee said:
I can't see how the infrastructure costs for catenary are at all logical when battery-electric buses are so close on the horizon.
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Well, it's a proven technology for one, and also one that's a little bit less expensive and one that definitely uses fewer heavy metals.

Also, the two aren't mutually exclusive. A battery bus can use wires to extend its range and charge its batteries while carrying fare-paying passengers (theoretically).
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
The 77-proper might actually be a good reassignment candidate for the Silver Line dual-modes after their Transitway retirement. Ride the extended 77A wire to Alewife Brook Parkway, then change to diesel on a curb cut for the remaining trip to Arlington Heights. Would put badly-needed 60-footers on that route, allow them to route through the Harvard busway, keep them quiet and emissions-free through duration of Cambridge, but save the expense of installing a couple pricey new traction substations in Arlington that probably can't be justified.
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What about Porter Square? I seem to remember reading somewhere that the geometry of that intersection meant that 60-footers couldn't be used there.

Also, I was going to look this up on my own in the old town reports, but I thought there might be the barest fraction of a chance that there would still be electrical infrastructure running under Mass Ave from back in the days the 77 was still a streetcar. If that's still in place, then trolley-stituting the whole 77 might be a bit easier.
 
Wash said:
What about Porter Square? I seem to remember reading somewhere that the geometry of that intersection meant that 60-footers couldn't be used there.

Also, I was going to look this up on my own in the old town reports, but I thought there might be the barest fraction of a chance that there would still be electrical infrastructure running under Mass Ave from back in the days the 77 was still a streetcar. If that's still in place, then trolley-stituting the whole 77 might be a bit easier.
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Doubt the electrical infrastructure is there. The only places it was kept was where it was a useful interconnect to other 600V DC sources. That's why the A Line feed is still active (B to 71/Watertown Carhouse interconnect), why the old Washington St. El feed is still active (Orange booster), why the old E Line feed from Heath to Forest Hills (E to Orange) is still active.

There's nothing out in Arlington needing 600V DC, so all the infrastructure north of North Cambridge carhouse was most definitely torn out and/or left to decay after 1958.
 
chmeeee said:
I can't see how the infrastructure costs for catenary are at all logical when battery-electric buses are so close on the horizon.
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It is when you're plotting the extensions by proximity to existing 600V sources. 71 to Newton Corner plugs back into an active power source. The 2004 PMT estimated costs for the extension at only $1.5M in '04 dollars. That sum included the cost of 1 extra TT vehicle, so lineside costs probably cost on the order of only $750K + inflation. That's a hard bargain to pass up, especially when TT vehicles last about twice as long as your average bus due to their sheer simplicity. That's literally the least costly, highest bang-for-buck option for that route. No battery bus could ever hope to do better given what infrastructure is already present.

It's similar with the 77A to Alewife, because the 1-mile extension would complete a circuit between the Red Line substations at Porter and Alewife. Any power draw increases not already overprovisioned by Red can be distributed systemwide, saving the cost of a new substation. With low capital costs and vehicle cost-over-lifetime being bottom-barrel, that's another one that would recoup its investment handily. Ditto on the battery buses being an inferior replacement...though the full 77 could benefit from a battery bus that charged on the extended TT wire out to Alewife Brook Pkwy.


I do not think you'll find many other TT extensions that'll work besides these two, because they would require outright extension of the 600V grid to new places with pricey extra substations that will defeat the cost advantages driving those 71 and 77A gimmes. Re-wiring the 77 all the way to Arlington Heights would not make any sense unless it was in tandem with a Red Line extension to Arlington Heights that put 600V subs at Arlington Center & Heights allowing the extended TT route to span the subs at Porter, Alewife, AC, and AH. But that's way too many moving parts to count on. You wouldn't mount that effort alone just for the 77.

In all other cases lacking that rock- rock-bottom cost advantage of glomming onto existing electrical hookups, you are better off waiting for electric battery buses.
 
So if the Washington El power source is still there, then I'd add the South End/Roxbury Silver Line to the list of potentially easy conversions. That would especially matter if some sort of through routing were ever figured out for the waterfront side of things.
 
HenryAlan said:
So if the Washington El power source is still there, then I'd add the South End/Roxbury Silver Line to the list of potentially easy conversions. That would especially matter if some sort of through routing were ever figured out for the waterfront side of things.
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LRT conversion, for damn sure.
 
Also, is there any reason the trolleybusses don't have bike racks on them?
 
I can’t believe it, but I don’t think there’s a forest hills station thread... and not gonna start one now that it’s almost finished.

But anyway, the upper level busway is now open. Finishing touches have yet to be completed, but it’s pretty nice already. One complaint is that the signage for the bus routes is too small and poorly lit to see from afar.
 
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