Next big highway project?

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A new (toll) bridge to Cape Cod proposed to be built next to existing Sagamore Bridge.

Cost: $320 million? Is that realistic?

Also, the current bridge carries 40,000 cars on-season. How does that compare to other bridges? Is it enough traffic to warrant another bridge? (Yes, I know vacationers would say yes, just asking for facts.)

Double vision for Cape Cod Canal bridges
By Patrick Cassidy, Cape Cod Online
pcassidy@capecodonline.com
December 14, 2013

BOURNE — State officials are studying a proposal to build a new bridge across the Cape Cod Canal in what could be the single largest transportation project in the region since the original canal bridges were built 80 years ago.

The idea of a bridge immediately adjacent to the Sagamore Bridge is being explored by a commission created in 2009 to review and recommend public-private partnership opportunities for transportation infrastructure, Massachusetts Department of Transportation spokesman Michael Verseckes said Friday.

"The new bridge would be built along a parallel alignment to the Sagamore Bridge," Verseckes said. "Both bridges would carry one direction of travel — either on-Cape or off-Cape traffic."

The new bridge would carry the on-Cape traffic and have tolls, which would generate the revenue required to pay for construction and maintenance, he said.

"The project would assume a toll collection system that would be all electronic and that would read either a vehicle transponder or capture a vehicle license plate, identify a vehicle owner and send them an invoice or send them a bill," Verseckes said. Traffic would not have to slow down to cross the bridge, he said.

Each bridge would be three lanes, which would relieve pinch points such as the one at the Exit 1 on-ramp heading off-Cape on Route 6, Verseckes said.

The additional lanes, room for shoulders on the bridges and separation of the on-Cape and off-Cape traffic would improve safety, he said.

The added lanes would be eliminated at off-ramps, he said.

In addition to the bridge, a road connecting Route 25 to the Sagamore flyover would help the flow of traffic in the area, Verseckes said.

The total cost of the project, including the connector road, is estimated at $320 million, although that figure could change, he said.

The project is still only an idea, but existing traffic demands demonstrate a need for it, Verseckes said.

The average annual daily traffic on the Sagamore Bridge is 22,100 vehicles per day in each direction.

During the peak season that figure jumps to 40,000 vehicles.

Despite the construction of the Sagamore flyover in 2006, the high traffic volume has resulted in major backups going off and coming on to the Cape, especially during peak travel periods and maintenance work on the existing bridges.

"The state, much to their credit, heard our pleas," said Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce CEO Wendy Northcross, who has been pushing for the new bridge. "We now have a plan that looks like it could happen in the next five to seven years."

There is still work that needs to be done on how much the toll might be and whether there would be any pricing relief for frequent users, but the project is "doable," Northcross said.

The bridge's location next to the existing span offers the additional advantage of allowing traffic to be shifted to one bridge when maintenance work is done on the other, Northcross and Verseckes said.

It is believed another bridge also would help alleviate congestion on Route 25 and the Bourne Bridge, Verseckes said.

To move the project forward, the Department of Transportation would have to file an environmental notification form to kick off a required environmental review, Verseckes said.

That review and analysis of environmental impacts would take at least three years. During that time, the initial design of the project would be created as well, he said.

Construction would take at least three years.

The project could be complete in seven to 10 years, Verseckes said, stressing that the plan is only under consideration at this point.

The Department of Transportation's highway division administrator, Frank DePaola, has worked diligently to come up with a solution that might make sense, said Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority Administrator Thomas Cahir, chairman of the Cape Canal Area Task Force, which was formed in 2009 to study short- and long-term solutions to congestion around the canal.

DePaola testified before the Public-Private Partnership Oversight Commission, which is studying the concept and unanimously supported it, Cahir said.

"I haven't heard anyone who has been opposed to the idea," he said.

Combined with increasing use of the Buzzards Bay Railroad Bridge to bring train passengers to the Cape, a new automobile bridge would go a long way to helping reduce traffic bottlenecks, Cahir said.

Cahir praised the state for listening to concerns about traffic on the Cape and Northcross for championing a realistic plan.

Cape Cod Commission Executive Director Paul Niedzwiecki said that, although he hasn't seen specific designs for the bridge, his agency has generally supported the concept of a third automobile bridge over the canal.

Electronic tolling is a concept whose time has come, Niedzwiecki said.

"We're all going to have to get used to paying for transportation infrastructure differently than we do now," he said, adding that the gap in funding for transportation infrastructure is too big to pay with taxes alone.

When the commission included the concept of tolls to manage traffic on the existing bridges in a routine transportation report four years ago, business leaders blasted the idea.

But the feedback she has received recently indicates people are willing to pay a toll for the convenience of a new bridge versus on an existing bridge, Northcross said.

"I think it's perfectly reasonable to ask people to pay for that," she said.

The commission is expected to continue to study the proposal and report back in February, Verseckes said.

Although the environmental review could uncover obstacles to the concept, Northcross said she didn't think that would happen.

"It's real, and it's moving forward," she said.
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I guess if the tolls can pay for itself. It would also be good if there was some dynamic pricing, i.e. friday at 5pm on the holiday weekend, it could be $5 instead of $3, but overnight it could be $1. This would encourage people to move offpeak.

My main concern would be, does this really relieve congestion or does it shift it further up route 3 and 6. I mean the highway is 2 lanes and the bridge is 2 lanes in each direction, so are you just changing the location of the bottleneck? I know the bridge narrows because it was a pre-soccer mom in excursion world when constructed, but I'm not convinced this solves the problem.
 
I've only ever gone to the Cape by bicycle (yup, rode all the way from Boston) and ferry, but I've heard a lot of horror stories about Cape traffic. If the Sagamore truly represents a bottleneck and this will help get cars off the roads and vacationers to their destination faster, then it will be a real boon to the Cape Code economy. Not that the cape is hurting, but improving one of our premier tourist attractions will boost sales tax revenues either by attracting out of state travels or retaining Bay Staters.

The key ingredient to my mind is the tolling. That ensures that primarily users pay for the bridge and it manages induced demand.
 
I've been caught in horrible Cape traffic more than once, and the Sagamore really is the cause of the problem now that the rotary's gone. Especially getting off the Cape, you not only have to deal with the lanes narrowing, you also have the Cranberry Highway on ramp. Seriously, you sit in traffic for 6 hours, and the road opens right up as soon as you're over the bridge and onto 3.

But who knows what it'll be like 5 years after the bridge is open. Are we going to spend $300+ million on an inducement trap? Would we be better off spending a fraction of that amount on public transit?
 
Give Mitt his due for at least this: he campaigned on the flyover and then delivered it on time and (I think) on budget. 3 South traffic is now rarely backed up past Exit 3, even at peak times, and it's avoidable entirely with a little back-roading effort for those in the know. A new bridge would be an embarrassment of riches for traffic in that direction. There's a distinct possibility that a toll on the Sagamore could shift traffic to the Bourne, but the article isn't clear to me about whether they're contemplating a toll on the Bourne too.

6 West, now that's a different story. I agree with choo that absent a major widening of 3 North through Plymouth, a 3-lane bridge is likely to shift the start of the backup to the mainland side of the bridge. Even if the two left lanes are marked for 3 North and the third for 6 West, it feels like there's a high potential for weaving (especially if the Christmas Tree exit is allowed to stay open). Maybe the extra lane and the standard-width lanes would improve a 6-West-Sunday to the level of a 3-South-Friday, i.e. backups merely to Sandwich and not all the way out to Yarmouth or Dennis. But my gut tells me that's the realistic ceiling. Would be curious about any actual traffic engineering data on this.

In the alternative, it would be great to cantilever the sidewalks on each bridge off the side and give an extra foot to each lane. I understand that the sidewalks aren't built with a road deck underneath, but it would have to be safer than the current setup and it would have to be cheaper than a new bridge, you'd think.
 
Will a parallel span help that much? You still have the Bourne Bridge jammed up, and inferior merging lanes at each end.

Would something like this help more?

https://mapsengine.google.com/map/edit?mid=zpj1M-6TXeFw.kvY4O9IEH4n4

My thought is that it may also encourage Bostonians to load balance more by using 24 and 95 to 495 to get down cape, vs only R 3. (Maybe extend the 495 designation to the canal.)
 
JohnAKeith said:
A new (toll) bridge to Cape Cod proposed to be built next to existing Sagamore Bridge.

Cost: $320 million? Is that realistic?
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If you double that figure, it will be closer to reality. When you factor in all the approach road work, all the mitigation for NIMBYs' real or manufactured concerns, then it could easily hit $640 million or more.

I'd rather see that money invested in improved rail service to the Cape during the tourist season, when the brunt of traffic impacts the existing Sagamore Bridge.
 
If you run more Cape Cod trains from Boston, and reinstate the service from NYC and Providence, wouldn't that eliminate the need for any more highway bridges?
 
Ron Newman said:
If you run more Cape Cod trains from Boston, and reinstate the service from NYC and Providence, wouldn't that eliminate the need for any more highway bridges?
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Only if you also invest heavily in improving transit on the Cape so people can get from Bourne or Hyannis to their actual destinations.
 
Charlie_mta said:
If you double that figure, it will be closer to reality. When you factor in all the approach road work, all the mitigation for NIMBYs' real or manufactured concerns, then it could easily hit $640 million or more.

I'd rather see that money invested in improved rail service to the Cape during the tourist season, when the brunt of traffic impacts the existing Sagamore Bridge.
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The Penobscot Narrows Bridge in Maine is on similarly steep slope and about the same distance to cross but apparently cost $85 million. It is two lanes each way and has a low speed limit however.
http://www.maine.gov/mdot/pnbo/index.htm
 
BussesAin'tTrains said:
Only if you also invest heavily in improving transit on the Cape so people can get from Bourne or Hyannis to their actual destinations.
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Yeah, one of the trickiest things is getting people form the end station on the Cape to wherever they are staying. I'd rather spend the $300+ million on more frequent transit to the Cape and better transit on the Cape.
 
This is a pet theory and ONLY a pet theory...

In Massachusetts, the real reason behind the 1970 moratorium on highways had less to do with NIMBY's and more to do with $$$. Don't get me wrong, the NIMBY's inside of 128 and 495/Metro has a lot to do with the moratorium, but my theory is that the rich people in Cambridge wanted the state to pay them to move out (displace them) before the building/completion of the Route 2 Extension to Boston.

Case in point...

The ongoing "Crosby's Corner" Project in Concord and Lincoln is going to drastically alter time travel at a place that desperately needs it. But as I'm driving through there, I'm glancing at McMansions that I have never seen. These McMansions are now property of MassDOT and are presumably slated for demolition soon enough. But these are gorgeous homes that are most likely not going to be around. But how much money did MassDOT pony up to throw these people out of their homes for the CC Project? And how much $$$ has this set back the taxpayers of the Commonwealth? I highly doubt that the rich folks on Fresh Pond Parkway enjoy the sea of traffic that comes through their front yard and with the right amount of $$$, would gladly give up their homes. But that has yet to happen, and won't happen until someone who travels through there finally raises the issue to the media.

In regards to the subject at hand, does the Cape really need another bridge? Why fix what isn't broken?
 
This gets proposed every few years, and gets beaten back with sticks every time. It doesn't matter if they've got a new gimmick with this sales pitch, because every sales pitch for a 3rd bridge has had its own gimmick.

It's not what's needed because there's so much they haven't done to the existing traffic situation.

-- As noted, Route 3's a ton better with the flyover. The Bourne rotary still needs its Cape-side flyover. They haven't delivered that yet.



-- 6 is incredibly substandard and needs to be brought up to interstate highway spec, at least on the 10 miles up to the Sagamore (i.e. from Exit 5 to all points west).

** Exit 1 needs longer accel/decel lanes equivalent to what the northside flyover got. Eat the center median in favor of a jersey barrier on the approach to carve out a little space for longer exit lanes.

** Those incredibly tight exit ramps need better accel/decel lanes, and some ramps with very tight geometry need to be outright loosened. See the mini-me half-cloverleafs at Exits 2, 3, 4, and 5. See especially 3 & 4 with the >90-degree merges. Simple narrow-profile diamond interchange would work way better here and chew up less land in the process. Whichever of these are the most problematic or unsafe in their current configuration...fix 'em.

** Shoulders need to be widened. 1 accident locks it westbound for 4 miles ahead of the bridge even in the offseason; it happened again today. This is ridiculous. There's 1 foot of pavement on both sides, and if you have to pull out you're in the gravel. There isn't a full car- or truck-width turnout space, so any disabled vehicle blocks a lane. Every time. This is the same problem that locks the SE Expressway solid every day under any disablement. It is the same problem that has been largely alleviated on 128 post-reconstruction with the jersey barrier and ultra-wide left and right shoulders. Interstate highway standards say 10' minimum right shoulders, 4' minimum left shoulders. Recommended for heavy volume roads is 12' left and right, which 128 now conforms to. Eat some center median and get this up to spec. The only bridges west of Exit 5 are ones in the middle of interchanges where the right shoulder (per regs) disappears for the exit lane before widening again after merge, so there are no structural hurdles above or below to a shoulder widening. Do the full 12' treatment at minimum from Exit 2 west, and the minimum 4'/10' treatment everywhere west from Oak St. Barnstable (approx. 1 mile east of Exit 5). That covers all 10 miles to Exit 1 and the bridge at minimal cost because no bridge mods are required, and at minimal EIS'ing because only the center median gets affected.

There. Inexpensive, uninvasive improvements that add no capacity or induced demand but make the road many times more resilient to disablements and slowdowns at those tight ramps and merges.



-- If money is really burning a whole in their pockets, construct that damn Southside Connector already between 6 and the Bourne--with the Bourne flyover--to load-balance the 2 bridges. and keep the east-west traffic from having to backtrack or detour around to get to/from 6 and 25. They haven't been able to round up support for that one either. Not easy to EIS because of the aquifer cutting across the base, but if that's been too hard to push through then they're wasting their time pitching a 3rd bridge (again) because that's impossible.



-- No talk of a 3rd bridge should go on the table until all of the above has been exhausted AND all transit options have been exhausted.

** Commuter rail Phase I to Buzzards Bay...NOW! Full-blown signaled, 80 MPH; won't be hard since the Cape Flyer upgrades already have the mainland track hovering around 60 MPH from Middleboro. Expand existing Middleboro layover (slack space pre-provisioned at the south end by 495); BB won't need a full-blown layover yard if it just has a 2-track turnout for idling. Intermediate parking sink stop @ 195/495/28 in West Wareham behind the Wareham Crossing shopping center; downtown Wareham stop w/the good bus connections at the existing (and to-be-added to Cape Flyer next year) Main St. station if they advocate strenuously enough for it.

** Commuter rail Phase II to Hyannis goes in planning simultaneously, to follow no less than 8 years later. Intermediates at Sagamore (new park-and-ride) and existing Sandwich and West Barnstable stops (which each require only platform upgrades to 800 ft. full-high + electronic signage, as they're otherwise in excellent shape/configuration for daily service). Phase I doesn't get across the bridge-proper, it is cheap and can get done quickly if this project is broken into chunks instead of done years longer in a monolith.

** Phase 1.5 can even be the Sagamore park-and-ride stop +1'd across the bridge and turning there. All they would have to do is get their ducks in a row with bridge opening slots for a full schedule.

** BB extension can also come out the gate with some limited extended commuter runs to Hyannis. Unsignaled territory is exempt from the PTC mandate for up to 6 passenger trains/3 round trips per day (likely to get adjusted up a little to 8 or 10 the next time the law gets amended). So it can legally carry a couple AM/PM commute runs on the slow track in the interim while the full-blast Middleboro schedule stops at BB for Phase I. Long Island RR's longstanding Greenport shuttle works exactly like this, and because it fits inside the exemption will remain the only unsignaled/un-PTC'd regular commuter rail schedule in the Northeast after the mandate takes effect.

** Give CCRTA some love to beef up their bus connections. They're pretty good in-season. With a real CR connection they just need solid infill year-round. CCRTA buses do take Charlie Cards, so Charlie-on-CR is (like everywhere else) the Holy Grail that would really kick the bus-to-CR transfer utilization up a few notches.




Really, they have no excuse for wasting their time on bridge studies with all the small, practical, and for the most part individually low-cost improvements that haven't been done. Eat your peas, MassDOT.
 
I've done the Sagamore -> Cape drive regularly pre+post-flyover (though almost always from North on 25->6). One problem is that the heavily traveled part of Route 6 (Exit's 1..6) is just a total nightmare highway. Needs to be widened, needs better ramps and needs a sane speed limit (because right now nobody is paying attention to that 55 and you regularly have Cape Codders doing 80+ while tourists who do not know any better go 55-60 and it screws up a lot of stuff with sudden lane changes etc.

Anecdotal pro-tip is to take 25 over the Bourne, then take 6A on the Cape side up to 6. I've avoided the Sagamore many times doing that... however, you're SOL if there is an accident on that access road since it's bi-directional and 1-lane each way.
 
How many people go north instead of to the cape? I grew up (and continue) to go to Maine and NH because I don't feel like sitting in endless traffic when I'd rather be relaxing.
 
Maine's fun by boat but I don't see the attraction of the Cape or New Hampshire myself. I'd much rather go somewhere quiet like Sakonnet or Fishers.
 
I trek down to Wildwood, NJ for my beach time. Judging by how bad the backups are to get to the Cape, it may be faster to get to too.


And honestly, I've seen the cape's beaches: not impressed. The water temperature is better down there too, and there are roller coasters.
 
I went to the Cape instead of Maine because Portland's hotels were all booked up :(

But I didn't drive anyway.
 
A Cape Cod Times columnist has more on this today. I hesitate to paste the column because honestly, the guy makes Shirley Leung look like a New Yorker fact checker, but here's the link if you're inclined to read somebody who uncritically believes that a third bridge "is the only viable option."

Anyway, if he's to be believed, the Bourne would be an untolled crossing under this plan. Wouldn't that be a disaster? I don't think you can overestimate the number of locals who would gladly drive 12 miles out of their way to avoid paying whatever the Sagamore will cost (as a recovering Cape Codder, I vividly remember the days of road trips to Buzzards Bay to save 9 cents a gallon on gas vs. on-Cape prices). EZ Pass adoption has got to be the lowest in the state down there, and yes, I know they'd have license plate readers, but my point is that it's a population unaccustomed to bring tolled and likely to take ridiculous avoidance measures in the name of putting one over on Gov. Coakley and the out-of-towners. Would some kind of Eastie/Chelsea break be in play for the year-rounders (maybe tied to the vehicle's registration address) to head off that kind of behavior?

The column also claims that a highway would be built directly from 25 to the Sagamore to bypass the canal roads. This just strikes me as something that would have been done decades ago when they built 25, if it had any political or environmental feasibility to it. But the fear with a connection like that would have to be re-screwing 3 South and overwhelming the flyover. I'm thinking there's enough political power driving down 3 South on Fridays in July to kill that one dead before anyone even knows it's an option.
 
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