Reasonable Transit Pitches

Commuting Boston Student said:
I wasn't aware that the Tremont Street subway ever went farther south than the Pleasant Street Incline.
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It doesn't. The 43 was a surface route off that incline.

Tunnel is sealed and ends right here at the corner of that arrow-shaped garden that points at the ex-Church of All Nations building. The old surface station that used to be there was in a pit, so the sealed portal's below street level. It's still a 4-tracker.

1969 view of the portal and pit. Portal wasn't covered over until '75.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
It doesn't. The 43 was a surface route off that incline.

Tunnel is sealed and ends right here at the corner of that arrow-shaped garden that points at the ex-Church of All Nations building. The old surface station that used to be there was in a pit, so the sealed portal's below street level. It's still a 4-tracker.

1969 view of the portal and pit. Portal wasn't covered over until '75.
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Good to know.

Shifting topics a bit, this is what I came up with for the Mass. Ave. Subway.
 
I wonder if you could split the difference between Mass Ave and Symphony or just put a walkway down there a la Winter St. Then you get the line connections but don't have two stops so close to each other.
 
underground said:
I wonder if you could split the difference between Mass Ave and Symphony or just put a walkway down there a la Winter St. Then you get the line connections but don't have two stops so close to each other.
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The Red Line as we know it today seems to handle making the Park Street / DTX double-stop just fine. I'm not totally happy with it, but absent something absurd like dropping the E-Line entirely and forcing poor F-Line to have to change his name, I'm not sure you're going to do much better - you can't just not stop the train there.
 
Yesterday, Governor Dukakis and a handful of others spoke strongly in support of building the North/South Rail Link at the FRA public meeting.

They want a study to determine the actual cost, instead of the overly inflated estimate done a while back.

Didn't the Dukakis administration drop the N/S link when they had the chance? Also, someone there claimed Gov. Romney was responsible for eliding the rail link, which sounds chronologically unlikely, but I don't know.
 
It would have happened during Dukakis or Weld -- certainly not Romney.
 
Move the MIT stop to Mass Ave @ Vassar. That way it can connect to a future transit use of the Grand Junction line.
 
cozzyd said:
Move the MIT stop to Mass Ave @ Vassar. That way it can connect to a future transit use of the Grand Junction line.
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Although that would be an ideal corridor for an Urban Ring, it seems that the Grand Junction is important for non-revenue moves between the northern and southern services. Even if it doesn't see passengers, it would be foolish to remove it.
 
Matthew said:
They want a study to determine the actual cost, instead of the overly inflated estimate done a while back.
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Keep in mind that the N/S Rail Link would not just be a tunnel project, but it would necessitate for a large underground platform facility to be built in order to make it relevant. Amtrak probably sees value in a link so that they will have united services, and it would also be useful for a heavy rail line on the Fairmount Line and GLX. However, Amtrak would require only a couple platforms for their service, and the heavy rail would be a thru service.
Plus, it's worth noting that New York City's metro area has commuter rail terminating at Penn Station, Grand Central Terminal, Hoboken, and other stations that may be nowhere near the rider's final destination. And they seem to do fine in terms of ridership
So basically we want a multibillion dollar tunnel and underground platform complex, all so that Mark from Melrose and Suzy from Swampscott can ride the train to their financial district offices without risking rubbing elbows with any unsavory characters on the subway? I don't think so.
 
The transfer at North Station is absurdly long and twisty, if you want to encourage ridership, that's not how. Shame, since the subway platform is fairly decent. Using the Green or Orange line from North Station adds about 10-15 minutes to your commute if you work in the densest cluster of jobs downtown.

Moving beyond that though, the ability to run trains through between north and south is a game changer for transit in Boston. Done right, it becomes an express rapid transit system overlaid on top of the subway (given additional urban infill stations -- those will be reasonable using the EMUs that will likely be required by the N/S link anyhow). I do have my doubts about it being done right, however...

Back to the meeting: A spokesman from the Sierra Club claimed that it would remove 55,000 cars/weekday from the roads. He did not cite a source for that number, however.
 
cozzyd said:
Move the MIT stop to Mass Ave @ Vassar. That way it can connect to a future transit use of the Grand Junction line.
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No need.

I place my subway station indicator pins around where I think either the center of the station or its boarding platforms should be. Assume that the actual station itself extends 250~400 feet in either direction up and down the line and therefore, MIT station would also have entrances/exits on Vassar Street and possibly Memorial Drive.

Matthew said:
The transfer at North Station is absurdly long and twisty, if you want to encourage ridership, that's not how. Shame, since the subway platform is fairly decent. Using the Green or Orange line from North Station adds about 10-15 minutes to your commute if you work in the densest cluster of jobs downtown.

Moving beyond that though, the ability to run trains through between north and south is a game changer for transit in Boston. Done right, it becomes an express rapid transit system overlaid on top of the subway (given additional urban infill stations -- those will be reasonable using the EMUs that will likely be required by the N/S link anyhow). I do have my doubts about it being done right, however...

Back to the meeting: A spokesman from the Sierra Club claimed that it would remove 55,000 cars/weekday from the roads. He did not cite a source for that number, however.
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Even done "wrong," the N-S Rail Link frees up worlds of capacity by allowing for both revenue and non-revenue moves easily and quickly between the two stations. South Station, for example, can start tossing as many trains as the trackage will permit up to North Station, which is a lot further away from max capacity. Storing trains at the yards around North Station instead of on South Station platforms is another thing we could do far more easily with the Rail Link, and of course, it instantly downgrades the Grand Junction from 'primary ROW for equipment moves' and lets us have a serious conversation about what to do with that ROW instead.

To your other point, the Sierra Club is also an advocate for Boston Central Station lunacy, so I would've asked him what the number would have been if we didn't drop in Central Station.
 
cozzyd said:
Here's my plan for DMU's to Brighton:

http://goo.gl/maps/oHltU
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Too many stops. RR cars built to freight buff strength aren't nearly as nimble as subway cars, so there's enough accel/decel penalty to make spacing that close impossible to do. DMU's are better than push-pull, but it's still going to take close to a minute to get to full speed. EMU's better still, but still a long way off from subway cars. Fairmount-level spacing would work. And that's about BB, Yawkey, Allston/New Balance, Newton Corner (maybe a Brighton intermediate between the two). 1 mile-plus spacing.

Ditto on the Grand Junction. That's excellent Urban Ring spacing if it were light rail...in fact, pretty much exactly where the proposed stops are. But I think Kendall's all you can feasibly do with RR equipment. The grade crossings would suck balls accelerating from a dead stop on a platform abutting the crossing. You want to be crossing Mass Ave. at 35 MPH, not 2 MPH.
 
In terms of "crazy transit pitches" I wonder which is more reasonable money and benefit-wise: 1) N/S link, EMU's, and infill stations on the commuter rail; or 2) existing subway lines branching into similar areas as 1. Just my guess, but I'd think after the initial cost of the N/S Link, option one would ultimately be cheaper.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Too many stops. RR cars built to freight buff strength aren't nearly as nimble as subway cars, so there's enough accel/decel penalty to make spacing that close impossible to do. DMU's are better than push-pull, but it's still going to take close to a minute to get to full speed. EMU's better still, but still a long way off from subway cars. Fairmount-level spacing would work. And that's about BB, Yawkey, Allston/New Balance, Newton Corner (maybe a Brighton intermediate between the two). 1 mile-plus spacing.

Ditto on the Grand Junction. That's excellent Urban Ring spacing if it were light rail...in fact, pretty much exactly where the proposed stops are. But I think Kendall's all you can feasibly do with RR equipment. The grade crossings would suck balls accelerating from a dead stop on a platform abutting the crossing. You want to be crossing Mass Ave. at 35 MPH, not 2 MPH.
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Those grade crossings already require complete stops by trains (there isn't even a barrier) while the train blows its horn waiting for the cars to get out of the way (especially on Mass Ave), so having stops there doesn't hurt too much.

Could the Grand Junction line use the lighter DMU's similar to the River Line as long as freight / non-revenue moves were prohibited during operating hours? The reason the lines stop where they do in Brighton is because I think there's enough room for a dedicated track there.
 
As long as we are down there digging the N/S link in fantasy world, what would be the added difficulty of having the Green Line run a spur from North Station-South Station, Seaport via Silver line tunnel. Then it could also split from South Station and go the have a portal to do the Green Line down washington street dudley (F-LINE!!). This way you could go from Somerville and NS to Seaport. There should also be a certain route that just goes Dudley to Seaport on this track configuration as well, but maybe that would be better labeled as its own new color rather than a branch of Green.
 
cozzyd said:
The reason the lines stop where they do in Brighton is because I think there's enough room for a dedicated track there.
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There is enough room for four tracks up to Market Street, but only if New Balance/WGBH give up some of the little parking lot in the back to build a tighter retaining wall. I'm sure they would go for it, especially if the station gave direct access to their buildings.

After Market Street the ROW would need a complete rebuilding to fit in anything else. You could throw new tracks on the other side of the Pike next to whatever-solders-field-road turns into, but then you run into issues when you get to Newton Corner. They do need to fix the disaster of an exit there eventually and put in a rail stop of some kind, but were talking a TON of money here, and probably tearing down the hotel.

We talked about this in the A-Line thread recently. I've attempted to draw out how you could cram more rail in there along with a new interchange, and whether you tear out the hotel or not its a damn complicated project.
 
cozzyd said:
Those grade crossings already require complete stops by trains (there isn't even a barrier) while the train blows its horn waiting for the cars to get out of the way (especially on Mass Ave), so having stops there doesn't hurt too much.

Could the Grand Junction line use the lighter DMU's similar to the River Line as long as freight / non-revenue moves were prohibited during operating hours? The reason the lines stop where they do in Brighton is because I think there's enough room for a dedicated track there.
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No, it doesn't require complete stops. There's active protection on those crossings with gates and flashers. You only have to stop and protect when there's nothing but a crossing sign. The 10 MPH freights have to slow up at Mass Ave., Main, Broadway, and Binney because there are no gates. They do not have to at gated Cambridge St., Medford St., and the gated ped crossing by the MIT dorms.

The sale terms for the line from CSX stipulate that the state has to fix up the track to state of good repair and install gates at all the ungated crossings. Freights and MBCR/Amtrak non-revenue moves not only won't have to slow, but they'll probably be going 25 MPH instead of 10 MPH in another 18 months. And, yes, all these gate installations would have separate sidewalk gates to curb the Darwin Award candidates on bicycles, etc. That is standard-issue on all crossings up-to-modern regs where there's sidewalks of any sort of sustained foot traffic.

Every single public crossing on the commuter rail is gated. If the GJ became passenger-rated it would be no different from any other line. Not that there's much run-up space to get to track speed or anything. The shortish straightaway from the bridge to past Mass Ave. is probably the only spot a train's going to even briefly hit 40.


EDIT: I'm not sure a River Line setup would work. Where are you going to go on either end? Can't intermingle with the Worcester Line, can't intermingle with the Fitchburg Line. It's just a bounce-back between Twin City Plaza and BU Bridge (assuming there's even an ADA way to get upstairs to Comm Ave.). That's not useful at all. And the T does need to use it. 5:00pm a few days a week Amtrak swaps diesels between the Downeaster and Lake Shore Limited. T does irregular lash-ups of coaches in/out for servicing and locomotive refueling. And you'd have to relocate the daily freight round trip from Worcester to Ayer and Fitchburg Line because CSX heads out 2:00pm and returns from Everett 6:30 or 7:00. It gets used more than you'd think.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Not that there's much run-up space to get to track speed or anything. The shortish straightaway from the bridge to past Mass Ave. is probably the only spot a train's going to even briefly hit 40.
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I wonder if once the engine house under the pike viaduct is gone if they will increase the curve radii to allow for slightly higher speeds.

If this were the crazy transit pitches thread I would say they should throw in a full flyover and banked curve for a full track speed approach into MIT.

F-Line to Dudley said:
EDIT: I'm not sure a River Line setup would work. Where are you going to go on either end? Can't intermingle with the Worcester Line, can't intermingle with the Fitchburg Line. It's just a bounce-back between Twin City Plaza and BU Bridge (assuming there's even an ADA way to get upstairs to Comm Ave.). That's not useful at all. And the T does need to use it. 5:00pm a few days a week Amtrak swaps diesels between the Downeaster and Lake Shore Limited. T does irregular lash-ups of coaches in/out for servicing and locomotive refueling. And you'd have to relocate the daily freight round trip from Worcester to Ayer and Fitchburg Line because CSX heads out 2:00pm and returns from Everett 6:30 or 7:00. It gets used more than you'd think.
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I always thought on the Worcester Line side it would be perfect for Harvard's dream of a cross-Allston subway. Lechmere-Harvard via Allston could work quite nicely as a GL Branch. You'd have to put the CR in a trench with the GL on top however, which may be impossible depending on how firm the fill is there and of course $$$
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
No, it doesn't require complete stops. There's active protection on those crossings with gates and flashers. You only have to stop and protect when there's nothing but a crossing sign. The 10 MPH freights have to slow up at Mass Ave., Main, Broadway, and Binney because there are no gates. They do not have to at gated Cambridge St., Medford St., and the gated ped crossing by the MIT dorms.
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You'd think I would have noticed the gates on Cambridge St. since I live so close to there... Anyway I've definitely seen the trains stop and wait for cars to get out of the way at Mass Ave and occasionally Broadway.

Do you know if they've built the new crossing by Pacific St. yet? When I lived in NW86 I used to have to hop over parked trains to get to campus...

The sale terms for the line from CSX stipulate that the state has to fix up the track to state of good repair and install gates at all the ungated crossings. Freights and MBCR/Amtrak non-revenue moves not only won't have to slow, but they'll probably be going 25 MPH instead of 10 MPH in another 18 months. And, yes, all these gate installations would have separate sidewalk gates to curb the Darwin Award candidates on bicycles, etc. That is standard-issue on all crossings up-to-modern regs where there's sidewalks of any sort of sustained foot traffic.

Every single public crossing on the commuter rail is gated. If the GJ became passenger-rated it would be no different from any other line. Not that there's much run-up space to get to track speed or anything. The shortish straightaway from the bridge to past Mass Ave. is probably the only spot a train's going to even briefly hit 40.


EDIT: I'm not sure a River Line setup would work. Where are you going to go on either end? Can't intermingle with the Worcester Line, can't intermingle with the Fitchburg Line. It's just a bounce-back between Twin City Plaza and BU Bridge (assuming there's even an ADA way to get upstairs to Comm Ave.). That's not useful at all. And the T does need to use it. 5:00pm a few days a week Amtrak swaps diesels between the Downeaster and Lake Shore Limited. T does irregular lash-ups of coaches in/out for servicing and locomotive refueling. And you'd have to relocate the daily freight round trip from Worcester to Ayer and Fitchburg Line because CSX heads out 2:00pm and returns from Everett 6:30 or 7:00. It gets used more than you'd think.
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I think there's enough room to squeeze a path next to Fitchburg which would get you to Lechmere, but that's still not nearly as useful a destination as NS would be. Maybe the only way transit can happen (without building too much) along the GJ is if the FRA relaxes their requirements for DMU's :(
 
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