North Washington St Bridge

Rosales is a lot more innovative in his bridge designs. As I mentioned earlier, I know someone who has seen the design and I was told to expect arches of some sort.

I believe Rosales will be revealing the design fairly soon.
 
PaulC said:
Nop.

They hired a good architect and I think the city cares a lot more since that piece of crap was built.
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Missed the fact that an architect had been hired ... that's encouraging.

...and can see the rationale for an arch....given what's just upstream of here, would take a lot of chutzpah to go with anything involving a tensioned cable ....
 
Wow, I had no idea there were designs completed for the two MOS bridges.
 
BussesAin'tTrains said:
Wow, I had no idea there were designs completed for the two MOS bridges.
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Me neither. Did anyone else?

This firm needs better PR. The principal gave a presentation with these designs back in May 2013, according to the website: http://www.rosalespartners.com/newsItem.php?proj=news/may2013

So this is old news by nearly 18 months. Crazy. Regardless, good to hear! And the bridges look nice.

Of course, I wouldn't bet the farm this is done in 2016, as they claim.
 
No surprise here:

Miguel Rosales (busy man) has completed a new design for this bridge’s replacement, which will be shared with the public probably in November, said Boston city engineer Para Jayasinghe. Its look will compliment the nearby Zakim Bunker Hill Bridge, which Rosales also worked on. Construction should begin in about three years. This bridge will be multi-modal, said Jayasinghe
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http://northendwaterfront.com/2014/10/downtown-view-the-bridges-of-suffolk-county-2/
 
AmericanFolkLegend said:
Rendering for the bridge?
http://www.keepbostonmoving.org/sort/bridges/
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I hope so. These look great. They seem to have the "little extras" that a project like this needs

A little bit of extra art for wayfinding without competing too much with the Zakim:
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A proper promenade with both good 2-way circulation and some "place-making"
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Better clearance under:
image_4-640x350.png
 
Am I correct in assuming that the arch structure serves no structural purpose? If so, why have it?
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It's keeping with the neighborhood character by echoing the design of the trelis in the Greenway North End Park that doesn't work.
 
underground said:
It's keeping with the neighborhood character by echoing the design of the trelis in the Greenway North End Park that doesn't work.
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It's not that it isn't attractive, but I'm sure there's $100K of something else Public Works can buy with that money...
 
Equilibria said:
It's not that it isn't attractive, but I'm sure there's $100K of something else Public Works can buy with that money...
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I think the trellis is fairly important for making the bridge walkable. It is a long bridge and if it weren't punctuated it'd look intimidatingly empty (like City Hall Plaza), and if it were too enclosed, that'd be bad too. It's fairly hard to get the right balance between too narrow and too wide, and I think this is as decent a try as you'll get while also balancing cost and usability.
 
^ Yes. Bridges of this sort often feel very unsafe to pedestrians. The enclosure and sense of scale really helps here. I like.
 
Only two lanes into the city? I thought this was going to provide for a reopened third inbound land.
 
Calatrava lite? Looks nice, almost like fishbones. I dig those wide promenades on the sides.
 
BPLange7 said:
Only two lanes into the city? I thought this was going to provide for a reopened third inbound land.
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Nope. While controversial, ultimately it just makes too much sense for the City to focus MA-99 (Rutherford & N.Wash) for short-trip modes (bus, bike, walking)

The constituency for a 3-to-5 lane wide Rutherford Ave is primarily commuters from the 'burbs (and Waze, which loves re-routing me off I-93 and onto 99 whenever it can...because Rutherford is so darn empty most of the time). Boston is rightly going to ignore the suburbanites in favor of modes that it can handle (bus, bike, car) and trips that it favors (short Charlestown-to-CBD commutes & tourists walking to/from the USS Constitution).

So 99's future has fewer cars and will focus on re-knitting the streetscape between the City Proper and Sullivan Sq

Besides, longer trips (from my Medford and points north), have a full menu of Orange Line, Commuter Rail, Bus & Express Bus, and Big Dig to get them to Canal St. 99 has basically been too wide ever since I-93 opened (though it saw heavy use *during* the Big Dig, 99 has spent most of the last 40 years obsolete)
 
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I don't love the design but I do love the ped/cycle tracks on both sides. I'll eat my hat if they actually plant trees on it or if they do that the trees actually survive.
 
Arlington said:
I hope so. These look great. They seem to have the "little extras" that a project like this needs
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Yeah, if there was no superfluous arch, it would just be a big, bland, flat bridge. It defines the bridge itself from afar and makes it MUCH nicer. Maybe someday some horticultural society could expand those planters and make it like the Bridge of Flowers in Shelburne Falls.
 
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