Old Allignments

Actually the Red Line was not proposed to Arlington, rather to Watertown where it would connect with a high speed rail like the Mattapan line.
 
I'm surprised there would have been community opposition in Needham to a Green Line extension - who would "those people" be in that case, Newtonites? Dedham looks like a more likely candidate for consternation.

I can see how the Needham extension might have been abandoned for practical reasons, though. It's tedious enough riding the Green Line in from Riverside. I can't imagine commuting on it from Needham Junction vs. taking the commuter rail, with much less frequent stops.
 
The argument against the Green Line to Needham is more about time. If they could install and express track on the Riverside line then it would make sense, but given that the Commuter Rail already serves the area it just makes sense to spend the money elsewhere.
 
JohnAKeith said:
Well, the Silver Line may not be better than the El, but Washington Street is (finally) better than what it was, in my opinion.
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There are actually two issues here.

Elevated rail inevitably blights the neighborhood surounding the elevated tracks -- they are simply not attractive places to live or work. It has taken Main Street in Charlestown about 3 decades to come back from the negative impact of the El.

That said, from a transit perspective (only) the Silver Line is definitely inferior to the service provided by the old elevated.

The original proposal back in the late 1940's was for an underground extension replacing the Orange Line elevated (not called that then) out Washington Street. That underground could have started reversing the blight of the neighborhoods decades before the current revival. (Much of Washington Street is too narrow for effective dedicated LRV street car alignments -- you end up with a mixed traffic mess like Huntington Avenue.)
 
Much of Washington Street is too narrow for effective dedicated LRV street car alignments -- you end up with a mixed traffic mess like Huntington Avenue.

Why does there need to be automobile traffic on the South End part of Washington Street at all? There are plenty of parallel streets it could be moved to: Shawmut, Harrison, Albany. You could turn Washington Street into a streetcar-only street.
 
Wow, it really DID look elegant and nimble, at least compared to the elevateds I'm used to in New York. I would not have minded its staying. What we gained in a few condos (some of which may have been built anyway) we have more than lost in both transit accessibility and urban gestalt.

Plus, I'd love to have seen the view of the South End's rooftops. And to have alighted at Northampton.
 
The part where it pulls into a station looks like a disney ride
 
"Much of Washington Street is too narrow for effective dedicated LRV street car alignments -- you end up with a mixed traffic mess like Huntington Avenue."

Actually, all of Washington Street from the Mass Pike south to Melnea Cass Blvd is wide enough for a reservation for light rail separated from general street traffic.

South of Melnea Cass, a one-way couplet, with northbound and southbound light rail going on separate parallel streets to Dudley Square, would enable separation of the light rail from general traffic.
 
But again, you could instead have two-way streetcar traffic on Washington and two-way auto traffic on Shawmut.
 
Charlie_mta said:
"Much of Washington Street is too narrow for effective dedicated LRV street car alignments -- you end up with a mixed traffic mess like Huntington Avenue."

Actually, all of Washington Street from the Mass Pike south to Melnea Cass Blvd is wide enough for a reservation for light rail separated from general street traffic.

South of Melnea Cass, a one-way couplet, with northbound and southbound light rail going on separate parallel streets to Dudley Square, would enable separation of the light rail from general traffic.
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Only if you eliminate all parking from around East Berkeley to the Cathedral area. The street is tight in there. And there are a lot of Valets now who need pull off area.
 
Arguably if the Silver Lie was replaced with a dedicated light rail line fewer residents would require cars and thus free up parking spaces.
 
Between E. Berkley and the Cathedral there are two traffic lanes in each direction, plus a parking lane each side of the street, So, if the two center traffic lanes were removed to be LRV-only lanes, there would still be one northbound and one southbound traffic lane, plus parking lanes on both sides of the street. The location of LRV stations would require elimination of parking on one side of the street at the station location.

North of E. Berkley Street, the buildings are all set back far enough to enable widening the street enough to have the same lane configuration described above.

Eliminating some parking isn't going to kill anyone.
 
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