whighlander
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Its only a few blocks from the State Orange stop to Downtown Crossing, a pedestrian mall underneath Washington St would be fabulous, like Montreal.
mtnorshore -- I call your attention to the alternative Red Blue passenger connector -- see # 246 in this thread from a bit over a year ago
With modern Logan-Parking-Terminal type moving walkways there is no particular reason that we need to have the intersection between Red and Blue be particularly close together -- in other words leave the subway tunnels as is -- just provide a link for the passengers
Originally like you I thought Orange to Orange and you have the Red-Blue via Orange
Then after doing some walking about between Park and DTX and State Orange to State Blue I thought of a direct link not following a particular line but just a pedestrian tunnel
The key when you look at a map is Otis Street and Devonshire St
You connect to the new Blue Line renovations to State at Devonshire -- follow Devonshire to Otis and then proceed down Otis -- I used to think that there was a lot of additional digging needed to get to the Winter / Summer St Concourse -- but there isn't
This quote from https://web.archive.org/web/20050304093249/http://members.aol.com/eddanamta/abandoned/abanstas.html
Remnants of Abandoned Stations, Tunnels, and Station Entrances found on the MBTA
by Jonathan Belcher
Park / Downtown Crossing / South Stations:
When the Red Line was extended from Park to South Station in 1915-16, the new tunnel featured two levels. The bottom featured tracks for Rapid Transit trains, the top was intended for possible future undetermined use as pedestrian passageways and/or use by surface streetcars. The top level in the Washington Street Station area became a concourse providing direct entrances to the Filene's (1912) and Jordan Marsh (1930 & 1951) department stores. Part of the top level near Dewey Square was demolished when the Dewey Square Automobile tunnel was built in 1955. In January, 1979, the section between Park Street and Washington was opened as a pedestrian passageway. The portion between Washington (now Downtown Crossing) and Dewey Square has never been opened as a public area, and is presently used by the MBTA's Revenue Department as a turnstile repair shop.
So all that we need to do is bore a pedestrian tunnel wide enough for two moving walkways with a central open area for the dedicated hiker from the State T @ 53 State or there abouts down Devonshire to Otis and down Otis to the Summer / Winter concourse and voila
The added benefit -- build a new all purpose T entrance @ Franklin and Devonshire [100 Franklin] where a complete underground complex of T-commuter-useful shops can be developed to help pay for the tunneling work
https://goo.gl/maps/cdoL2g5LtfH2
from the new entrance:
- a moving walkway takes you north to the Blue Line @ State -- where you can
- exit directly @ Dock Square
- take the Blue Line to the Airport and beyond -- by the time this is built you will be able to take a moving walkway from the Airport Station to Terminal E and the rest
- a moving walkway takes you South to the Winter / Summer Concourse
- directly to the and the Orange and Red -- with connections to the Seaport / Innovation District via the South Station branch of the Silver Line
- on the surface the Roxbury branch of the Silver Line
- and via the Winter Street Concourse you can access the Green Line as well