Reasonable Transit Pitches

BussesAin'tTrains said:
Here's a map compiling rail solutions discussed here that (mostly) seem to be in the realm of "reasonable."

MBTA Build Concepts
Click to expand...

Neato!


Some comments:
  • Green Line, E -- With South Huntington able to be fed from either/or D Line or Huntington tunnel, there's probably no excuse now not to send it all the way back to Forest Hills. Your choice.
  • Green Line, Seaport -- The E St. line is surplus-to-requirement, seeing as how if Green Line to Transitway ends up displacing SL2...the first task will be to make amends at Black Falcon. And second task would be to replace the original SL City Point and original-original GL City Point branches.
  • Green Line, Seaport -- City Point routing along E. 1st fared very poorly as a Silver Line branch. Neighborhood peculiarities may mean this only does well following the 9 down E. Broadway if the neighborhood will allow street-running.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NE -- Unsure if the Airport terminals loop is just repeating the Massport People Mover proposal verbatim. If so, then I guess keep it on the map because that's the closest thing to an "official" proposal. But in reality this would work best as a complete loop because time chewed changing ends would make it less efficient vs. completing the circuit (also would be best if it could be a combo busway that SL1 can use).

  • Orange Line -- Edgeworth station is an official proposal, so I guess worth keeping. But the huge price tag for landscaping around the embankment and residential impacts make it very unlikely this one ever comes to pass. Bus coverage is also very weak compared to adjacent stops.

  • Urban Rail, Fairmount -- Delete "Widett" stop. The access problems are extreme, and there's simply no way to pour an 800 ft. platform without running afoul of some set of interlocking switches.
  • Urban Rail, Salem -- Delete Revere/Wonderland stop. A recurring 'zombie' proposal that'll never get built because the 1100 ft. walk to the Blue Line and all buses kills its utilization.
  • Urban Rail, Waltham -- Delete Alewife. Another 'zombie' proposal put forth again and again by the city. Ridership projections always stink on further review because of the weather-unprotected 1100 ft. walk to the Red Line/busway station entrance, and a few hundred more feet to reach the Red fare lobby. No one's going to use that when Porter is 1 stop away at one conveniently unified facility.
  • Urban Rail, Waltham -- Delete Riverview. It performed miserably on ridership the last time it was a Purple Line stop, and there are flanking bus routes covering the area.

  • Commuter Rail, Fitchburg -- Delete Orchard Hill infill. There's too much freight traffic on the Pan Am Southern mainline Ayer-west, and this is a spot in Leominster that has steep grades so it would do too much harm to the schedule to stop here.
  • Commuter Rail, Foxboro -- Delete the town-center stop. Gillette near the Walpole town line is the only service planned, as the NIMBY's in Foxborough didn't want any more. T full-service proposal has the layover yard next to Gillette, and RIDOT isn't going to fund any full-time service from the other end beyond the Providence game trains.
  • Commuter Rail, Franklin -- Officially studied extension proposals to Milford/Hopedale via Forge Park OR Woonsocket via Blackstone. Milford would've had additional stops @ Bellingham/MA 126 and either Milford Center (for a Milford terminus) or Milford/MA 140 on the Grafton & Upton RR + Draper Mills/Hopedale for a Hopedale terminus. Woonsocket would continue on the old mainline from Franklin Jct., replace Forge Park with a new stop at current Canal St. end-of-track (probably with GATRA's circulator bus flipped around for the station switch), then continue with stops at Millerville/MA 126, cross the Blackstone River on a new bridge, and make a short 1.5 mi. hook onto the P&W main southbound to Woonsocket Union Station. Milford/Hopedale didn't study out too well on ridership, and RIDOT has yet to do its promised re-study of Boston-Woonsocket with updated numbers. Woonsocket probably has genuinely good upside, especially since RIPTA buses are now allowed to cross state lines and would be able to make Millerville the neighborhood stop of the northern parts of the city outside of Union Station's catchment.
  • Commuter Rail, Haverhill -- Plaistow extension is dead on the NH side of the border and will not be revived. The NIMBY's have spoken. Rosemont + layover yard a hair on the MA side of the state line is as far as it's going to go.
  • Commuter Rail, Lowell-Nashua -- The Nashua extension may very well end up adding a UMass-Lowell infill stop, depending on what funds are available to expand track capacity for freights & passenger to coexist. Consider adding.
  • Commuter Rail, Plymouth -- Chances are if RER frequencies and the Downtown Plymouth stop goose utilization on the old mainline they'll aim to discontinue the Kingston stop in the sand pit (but keep the layover yard) and try to site a replacement station either at old Kingston Depot on 3A or shivved by Exit 9 with high-capacity driveways to Main St. I don't know if that's worth noting at all on the map because it's unclear what they'd opt for, but something will have to give.
  • Commuter Rail, RIDOT -- RI is extremely unlikely to use the Middleboro Secondary out of Attleboro for any commuter service. *Maybe* if South Coast Rail served Newport, but that's not even speculation given the chaos surrounding the project. Right now that's chicken & egg where RIDOT says they'll study Newport-state line if MA has SCR funded and shovel-ready (which of course it's not!).

  • Commuter Rail, Manchester & Lawrence Branch -- Dead and rail-trailed on both sides of the state line...never going to happen. Ward Hill infill on Haverhill Line defuses some of the I-93-via-MA 213 PnR demand, better bus frequencies meeting better train frequencies serves downtown Methuen good enough out of Lawrence Station. Even if the tracks were still available, mainline freight congestion Andover-Lawrence would've put severe crimp on achievable service levels juggling with Haverhill RER and Downeaster schedule expansion. Better off directing resources to strengthening the Haverhill Line and connecting buses instead.
  • Commuter Rail, Stony Brook Branch -- Delete...it's extremely busy with Pan Am freight main traffic, and the T doesn't even have trackage rights over it yet. There are RTA buses in Westford that could be expanded instead; too many rubber-tire transit pivots left to make in this area before the Stony Brook is even worth a paper study.

  • Commuter Rail, Worcester-Springfield -- MassDOT is explicit in all long-range planning that Purple Line to Springfield is not in the cards, and that a robust-enough Amtrak schedule is the best fit for that kind of extra-extra- out-of-district travel. Delete everything west of Worcester unless you plan to depict it as an Amtrak route. Palmer is the only proposed Amtrak intermediate.
  • Commuter Rail, Knowledge Corridor -- Southern terminus, if it interlines with the Hartford Line, will be Hartford...not Bradley. Too many I-91 commuters Northampton-south need to get to downtown Hartford. There also won't be any direct passenger rail service on the Bradley Branch, because the meandering path it takes won't beat the Airport shuttle buses ConnDOT is going to start running from the new Windsor Locks train station. Even CT has sort of gotten it out of its head that the Bradley Branch is at all passenger-useful.

If you want some anal retentive map corrections:

  • Blue Line, Kenmore -- Angle the tail tracks a short distance up Brookline Ave. Beacon St. is the C/D tunnel, so provisions for continuation have to go via Brookline Ave. + the Pike/B&A.

  • Green Line, Newton-Needham -- Add New England Business Center stop on west side of Charles River bridge, behind Fremont St. That's in City of Newton's official study proposal, with a circulator bus pinging from there to Kendrick St. around the industrial park.
  • Green Line, Newton-Needham -- move Needham Junction station behind Roche Bros. The wye real estate becomes the yard + turning loop for reversing direction, so stop has to be before that...not at the historic depot.
  • Green Line, Seaport -- Delete the quasi-loop thingy framing Eliot Norton Park in favor of slicing straight through. This would be a 4-track station in-and-out, so no need to have a bad-angle bypass track.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NE -- Orange-Assembly is actually a little closer than it appears to Green-Assembly. Maybe bump the OL placemarker level with Partners Healthcare and move the Green placemarker closer to the start of the bridge so they look like they're same latitude.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NE -- In Eastie the ROW runs along the edge of the East Boston Greenway, so place the line on the other side of the Blue Line. It would cross over underneath all the 1A ramps on one side or the other of Blue-Airport Station.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NW -- Technically the junction is right onto the Union Branch underneath McGrath Hwy., but not sure if that's just a map artifact.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NW -- Add Twin City Plaza infill, as it's got the ridership bona fides with East Cambridge + Brickbottom via a traffic-calmed McGrath and the Somerville Ave. duck-under. Shift Cambridge St. stop to be centered on Cambridge St.

  • Orange Line, W. Roxbury -- Station positions Bellevue to W. Rox may shift 200-500 ft. west away from historic depot sites to re-center on intersections w/bus transfers. TBD.

  • Urban Rail, Reading -- Continue to show the Reading-Wilmington Jct. track connection in purple (without N. Wilmington station), because there may still be a couple daily Haverhill runs chucked here after the schedules divorce when there's an interfering Downeaster slot on the Lowell Line.
  • Urban Rail, Reading/Salem -- Add Sullivan Sq. CR station, since officially proposed.

  • Commuter Rail, Hyannis -- There *are* proposals for adding an infill stop on the other side of the Canal for Cape Flyer, but the various local & state officials are deadlocked on a location. Could by by the Bourne Bridge, could be by the Sagamore, could be in-between. Honestly don't know how you'd represent this on a map, but it is a *thing* under active planning.
  • Commuter Rail, Lowell-Nashua -- City of Nashua officially bought property for its downtown station @ the Crown St. grade crossing. It's now a brand new commuter lot, but the property landscaping literally frames the slot where the platform would be poured. Add this to the map.
  • Commuter Rail, Providence -- Add new Pawtucket stop. All MBTA trains will be using that one.
  • Commuter Rail, RIDOT Intrastate, Pawtucket-Westerly -- If you want to add this 'mercenary' Purple Line service entirely within RI borders, add: Cranston, East Greenwich, West Davisville infills to the existing map. Then extend through Kingston and Westerly.
  • Commuter Rail, RIDOT Intrastate, Providence-Woonsocket -- On the P&W mainline, diverging from NEC north of Pawtucket. Stops at Cumberland, Manville, Woonsocket Union Station.
  • Commuter Rail, Rockport -- Omitted Beverly Farms by mistake. Add that, whack Prides Crossing.
  • Commuter Rail, Stoughton -- Missing North Easton station (behind Roche Bros. on 138) on the extension.
 
Biggest problem, no NSRL. I'd do that before any other expansion project.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
Neato!


Some comments:
  • Green Line, E -- With South Huntington able to be fed from either/or D Line or Huntington tunnel, there's probably no excuse now not to send it all the way back to Forest Hills. Your choice.
  • Green Line, Seaport -- The E St. line is surplus-to-requirement, seeing as how if Green Line to Transitway ends up displacing SL2...the first task will be to make amends at Black Falcon. And second task would be to replace the original SL City Point and original-original GL City Point branches.
  • Green Line, Seaport -- City Point routing along E. 1st fared very poorly as a Silver Line branch. Neighborhood peculiarities may mean this only does well following the 9 down E. Broadway if the neighborhood will allow street-running.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NE -- Unsure if the Airport terminals loop is just repeating the Massport People Mover proposal verbatim. If so, then I guess keep it on the map because that's the closest thing to an "official" proposal. But in reality this would work best as a complete loop because time chewed changing ends would make it less efficient vs. completing the circuit (also would be best if it could be a combo busway that SL1 can use).

  • Orange Line -- Edgeworth station is an official proposal, so I guess worth keeping. But the huge price tag for landscaping around the embankment and residential impacts make it very unlikely this one ever comes to pass. Bus coverage is also very weak compared to adjacent stops.

  • Urban Rail, Fairmount -- Delete "Widett" stop. The access problems are extreme, and there's simply no way to pour an 800 ft. platform without running afoul of some set of interlocking switches.
  • Urban Rail, Salem -- Delete Revere/Wonderland stop. A recurring 'zombie' proposal that'll never get built because the 1100 ft. walk to the Blue Line and all buses kills its utilization.
  • Urban Rail, Waltham -- Delete Alewife. Another 'zombie' proposal put forth again and again by the city. Ridership projections always stink on further review because of the weather-unprotected 1100 ft. walk to the Red Line/busway station entrance, and a few hundred more feet to reach the Red fare lobby. No one's going to use that when Porter is 1 stop away at one conveniently unified facility.
  • Urban Rail, Waltham -- Delete Riverview. It performed miserably on ridership the last time it was a Purple Line stop, and there are flanking bus routes covering the area.

  • Commuter Rail, Fitchburg -- Delete Orchard Hill infill. There's too much freight traffic on the Pan Am Southern mainline Ayer-west, and this is a spot in Leominster that has steep grades so it would do too much harm to the schedule to stop here.
  • Commuter Rail, Foxboro -- Delete the town-center stop. Gillette near the Walpole town line is the only service planned, as the NIMBY's in Foxborough didn't want any more. T full-service proposal has the layover yard next to Gillette, and RIDOT isn't going to fund any full-time service from the other end beyond the Providence game trains.
  • Commuter Rail, Franklin -- Officially studied extension proposals to Milford/Hopedale via Forge Park OR Woonsocket via Blackstone. Milford would've had additional stops @ Bellingham/MA 126 and either Milford Center (for a Milford terminus) or Milford/MA 140 on the Grafton & Upton RR + Draper Mills/Hopedale for a Hopedale terminus. Woonsocket would continue on the old mainline from Franklin Jct., replace Forge Park with a new stop at current Canal St. end-of-track (probably with GATRA's circulator bus flipped around for the station switch), then continue with stops at Millerville/MA 126, cross the Blackstone River on a new bridge, and make a short 1.5 mi. hook onto the P&W main southbound to Woonsocket Union Station. Milford/Hopedale didn't study out too well on ridership, and RIDOT has yet to do its promised re-study of Boston-Woonsocket with updated numbers. Woonsocket probably has genuinely good upside, especially since RIPTA buses are now allowed to cross state lines and would be able to make Millerville the neighborhood stop of the northern parts of the city outside of Union Station's catchment.
  • Commuter Rail, Haverhill -- Plaistow extension is dead on the NH side of the border and will not be revived. The NIMBY's have spoken. Rosemont + layover yard a hair on the MA side of the state line is as far as it's going to go.
  • Commuter Rail, Lowell-Nashua -- The Nashua extension may very well end up adding a UMass-Lowell infill stop, depending on what funds are available to expand track capacity for freights & passenger to coexist. Consider adding.
  • Commuter Rail, Plymouth -- Chances are if RER frequencies and the Downtown Plymouth stop goose utilization on the old mainline they'll aim to discontinue the Kingston stop in the sand pit (but keep the layover yard) and try to site a replacement station either at old Kingston Depot on 3A or shivved by Exit 9 with high-capacity driveways to Main St. I don't know if that's worth noting at all on the map because it's unclear what they'd opt for, but something will have to give.
  • Commuter Rail, RIDOT -- RI is extremely unlikely to use the Middleboro Secondary out of Attleboro for any commuter service. *Maybe* if South Coast Rail served Newport, but that's not even speculation given the chaos surrounding the project. Right now that's chicken & egg where RIDOT says they'll study Newport-state line if MA has SCR funded and shovel-ready (which of course it's not!).

  • Commuter Rail, Manchester & Lawrence Branch -- Dead and rail-trailed on both sides of the state line...never going to happen. Ward Hill infill on Haverhill Line defuses some of the I-93-via-MA 213 PnR demand, better bus frequencies meeting better train frequencies serves downtown Methuen good enough out of Lawrence Station. Even if the tracks were still available, mainline freight congestion Andover-Lawrence would've put severe crimp on achievable service levels juggling with Haverhill RER and Downeaster schedule expansion. Better off directing resources to strengthening the Haverhill Line and connecting buses instead.
  • Commuter Rail, Stony Brook Branch -- Delete...it's extremely busy with Pan Am freight main traffic, and the T doesn't even have trackage rights over it yet. There are RTA buses in Westford that could be expanded instead; too many rubber-tire transit pivots left to make in this area before the Stony Brook is even worth a paper study.

  • Commuter Rail, Worcester-Springfield -- MassDOT is explicit in all long-range planning that Purple Line to Springfield is not in the cards, and that a robust-enough Amtrak schedule is the best fit for that kind of extra-extra- out-of-district travel. Delete everything west of Worcester unless you plan to depict it as an Amtrak route. Palmer is the only proposed Amtrak intermediate.
  • Commuter Rail, Knowledge Corridor -- Southern terminus, if it interlines with the Hartford Line, will be Hartford...not Bradley. Too many I-91 commuters Northampton-south need to get to downtown Hartford. There also won't be any direct passenger rail service on the Bradley Branch, because the meandering path it takes won't beat the Airport shuttle buses ConnDOT is going to start running from the new Windsor Locks train station. Even CT has sort of gotten it out of its head that the Bradley Branch is at all passenger-useful.

If you want some anal retentive map corrections:

  • Blue Line, Kenmore -- Angle the tail tracks a short distance up Brookline Ave. Beacon St. is the C/D tunnel, so provisions for continuation have to go via Brookline Ave. + the Pike/B&A.

  • Green Line, Newton-Needham -- Add New England Business Center stop on west side of Charles River bridge, behind Fremont St. That's in City of Newton's official study proposal, with a circulator bus pinging from there to Kendrick St. around the industrial park.
  • Green Line, Newton-Needham -- move Needham Junction station behind Roche Bros. The wye real estate becomes the yard + turning loop for reversing direction, so stop has to be before that...not at the historic depot.
  • Green Line, Seaport -- Delete the quasi-loop thingy framing Eliot Norton Park in favor of slicing straight through. This would be a 4-track station in-and-out, so no need to have a bad-angle bypass track.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NE -- Orange-Assembly is actually a little closer than it appears to Green-Assembly. Maybe bump the OL placemarker level with Partners Healthcare and move the Green placemarker closer to the start of the bridge so they look like they're same latitude.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NE -- In Eastie the ROW runs along the edge of the East Boston Greenway, so place the line on the other side of the Blue Line. It would cross over underneath all the 1A ramps on one side or the other of Blue-Airport Station.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NW -- Technically the junction is right onto the Union Branch underneath McGrath Hwy., but not sure if that's just a map artifact.
  • Green Line, Urban Ring NW -- Add Twin City Plaza infill, as it's got the ridership bona fides with East Cambridge + Brickbottom via a traffic-calmed McGrath and the Somerville Ave. duck-under. Shift Cambridge St. stop to be centered on Cambridge St.

  • Orange Line, W. Roxbury -- Station positions Bellevue to W. Rox may shift 200-500 ft. west away from historic depot sites to re-center on intersections w/bus transfers. TBD.

  • Urban Rail, Reading -- Continue to show the Reading-Wilmington Jct. track connection in purple (without N. Wilmington station), because there may still be a couple daily Haverhill runs chucked here after the schedules divorce when there's an interfering Downeaster slot on the Lowell Line.
  • Urban Rail, Reading/Salem -- Add Sullivan Sq. CR station, since officially proposed.

  • Commuter Rail, Hyannis -- There *are* proposals for adding an infill stop on the other side of the Canal for Cape Flyer, but the various local & state officials are deadlocked on a location. Could by by the Bourne Bridge, could be by the Sagamore, could be in-between. Honestly don't know how you'd represent this on a map, but it is a *thing* under active planning.
  • Commuter Rail, Lowell-Nashua -- City of Nashua officially bought property for its downtown station @ the Crown St. grade crossing. It's now a brand new commuter lot, but the property landscaping literally frames the slot where the platform would be poured. Add this to the map.
  • Commuter Rail, Providence -- Add new Pawtucket stop. All MBTA trains will be using that one.
  • Commuter Rail, RIDOT Intrastate, Pawtucket-Westerly -- If you want to add this 'mercenary' Purple Line service entirely within RI borders, add: Cranston, East Greenwich, West Davisville infills to the existing map. Then extend through Kingston and Westerly.
  • Commuter Rail, RIDOT Intrastate, Providence-Woonsocket -- On the P&W mainline, diverging from NEC north of Pawtucket. Stops at Cumberland, Manville, Woonsocket Union Station.
  • Commuter Rail, Rockport -- Omitted Beverly Farms by mistake. Add that, whack Prides Crossing.
  • Commuter Rail, Stoughton -- Missing North Easton station (behind Roche Bros. on 138) on the extension.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the nitpicks! That's why I posted it.

Regarding New England Business Center on the Needham line: Is that in addition to, or replacing the Needham Highlands stop?

Regarding the Twin City stop: Is that centered north of Medford Street, or after the junction on the backside of the plaza? Makes more sense at Medford St for access to the plaza, but it's also barely 600' to Cambridge Street.
 
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BussesAin'tTrains said:
Thanks for the nitpicks! That's why I posted it.

Regarding New England Business Center on the Needham line: Is that in addition to, or replacing the Needham Highlands stop?

Regarding the Twin City stop: Is that centered north of Medford Street, or after the junction on the backside of the plaza? Makes more sense at Medford St for access to the plaza, but it's also barely 600' to Cambridge Street.
Click to expand...

City of Newton didn't speculate what Needham would plan for stops in its intracity study and thus put in for NEBC...but Needham has also conceptualized a stop at Highlands for all the TOD around TV Place. In all likelihood it would be both, because the size of developable real estate at NEBC demands it but the lack of parking there makes that stop reliant on the circulator bus (fast-forward a few pages in the linkied report) to hit garages in the office park. Highlands, in addition to having its own TOD bona fides, is much more easily car-accessible from either the Kendrick or Highland exits and thus is going to be the far more opportune PnR stop for Riverside load relief. Stop spacing for NEBC is not a problem because the river and 128 wall it firmly off from either adjacent stop catchment, so a near- no-brainer to keep both.

You can also include the Needham St. stop shown in the presentation since that counts as an official 'ask' from the City, but it's awfully close walking distance to Waban on the D. Since they're seeking rail-with-trail from Eliot & Easy St.'s to the Charles River path, I bet if you extended the Waban-to-Route 9 ped ramps to meet Eliot St. you'd be able to tie that whole north-of-Upper Falls area into Waban's catchment instead. I'd expect the Needham St. stop to be Newton's first compromise when it's showtime.

Twin City placement is obviously speculative, but would work best set back a little behind the plaza so access to McGrath + Somerville Ave. Ext. via ramps and Medford St. via path were more or less equitable. Brickbottom is going to be a significant catchment for this stop, so it can't be entirely Medford St.-facing.



Other miscellany. . .

  • Commuter Rail, Worcester Line -- Millbury was an officially-proposed stop when the intermediates were being planned for the Worcester service restoration 2 decades ago, but the NIMBY's at the time were out in force leaving behind that peculiar stop spacing gap. MPO has kept this on their list, albeit with questionably low ridership projections for the prime location @ US 20 a short distance from the Pike/MA 122 exit and amid a lot of fungible TOD property. In an RER frequencies universe I bet this becomes a much more desirable addition.

  • Urban Rail, Reading -- Your choice on whether you think this is worth trying, but the Rail Vision slides do mention it as an option they may have to study further. The Reading Line is a known problematic square-peg in an NSRL universe because of the single-tracking in Medford and system-highest number of grade crossings inside of 128. Pair-matching anything more than 1 Urban Rail schedule to the existing Urban Rail schedule is going to be difficult without major upgrades, electrification is going to duplicate a lot of already-electrified Orange Line route miles, and Eastern Route congestion escalation post-NSRL makes Sullivan CR station and the approaches to the Reading Jct. split in Somerville potentially problematic choke points.
    • The solution here is probably going to involve some rapid transit construction: Orange to Reading or Blue Lynn-Salem to bail out of the spiraling congestion where the Eastern+Western share track.
    • . . .or, spending obscene sums to widen all of Medford-Malden to 2 tracks (which, as discussed this past week here...isn't a goal in any way achievable by ripping out the OL 3rd track and calling it a day), obscene sums under I-93 widening the shared Eastern/Western trackage to 3-4 tracks, and obscene sums to grade separate a bunch of Melrose-Wakefield crossings and their adjacent stations to make it a serviceable long-haul mainline again.
    • Per Alon Levy (who knows his construction numbers), OL-Reading conversion is going to be way cheaper than tarting up Urban Rail because of the steeper inclines and more compact clearances HRT can do at crossing eliminations, the shorter platforms HRT is required to do vs. Purple Line at the reconstructed grade separated stations, and the yuuuuuge cost savings from not having to turn a shovel anywhere from Somerville to Malden other than extending OL Tk. 3 over the extant CR track to Oak Grove.
    • OL-Reading would also relieve the pressure on doing BL-Salem by solving the Somerville congestion problem with the Eastern Route and buying a lot more time for the Eastern's growth curve. While Reading would be more expensive in absolute terms than Salem, it solves much more immediately thorny problems post-NSRL.
    • Keep in mind that in terms of absolute project priority, OL-Reading today ranks pretty middling...mainly for the high cost of the Melrose-Wakefield crossing eliminations. But this is one of those "be careful what you ask for" dilemmas imposed by committing to build the NSRL at all, where the seismic shift in traffic loads creates some new localized problems amidst the region-wide benefits that will then need immediate high-priority attention. Weigh the pros/cons of this one strictly in "new world order" terms post-NSRL. Something will have to be done with Reading...and the Somerville chokepoint.

  • Blue Line, Salem -- As above, becomes one of the build options for de-choking RER in Somerville once NSRL gets built. On nobody's radar screen today because Lynn hasn't been built, but also offers self-contained benefits for last-mile connections across the North Shore up to Salem bus 'hublet'. Fairly reasonable price for the route miles because of a width-overbuilt ROW, with only the wetlands north of Swampscott posing any halfway tricky issues. Your move on whether this is worth including. Since it's a known MPO Universe of Projects listing and the more speculative (because of the Storrow trade-in prerequisite) Charles-Kenmore extension is on the map, may be worth including as a placeholder.
    • Stops: East Lynn (Chatham St.), Swampscott (swallow CR), Hawthorne Crossing (Danvers Rd. @ Essex St...spacer, speculative/optional), Salem State U. (swallow CR stop), Salem (superstation @ Margin St./Mill St...Blue stubs out on surface, pre-1987 south-of-portal CR stop reinstated with ADA connection upstairs to Blue).
    • Keep or disuse the north-of-portal CR station. Probably a keep because that white elephant garage is sunk cost, and the platforms there have *some* benefit when paired with the south-of-portal platforms at precision-timing tunnel slots very close-packed.
    • Blue changes sides from east side of ROW to west side before Salem Station approach, as the remains of Castle Hill freight yard become new Blue storage yard.
    • NO further passage north; tunnel can't be widened enough to permit it. Peabody will have to remain an Urban Rail line, albeit with faster trip because the superstation quartet of Sullivan-Chelsea-Lynn-Salem will be the remaining stop roster south of the portal. But, pair-matching 3 branches via NSRL undoubtedly becomes a ton easier that way, so I don't consider paring the inside-128 stop roster like that any sort of demerit in the new world order.
 
BussesAin'tTrains said:
Here's a map compiling rail solutions discussed here that (mostly) seem to be in the realm of "reasonable."

MBTA Build Concepts
Click to expand...

What this map really shows me is that when amateur planners don't know what to to do, the answer is always "extend the green line" lmao. That map has the green line going literally everywhere in the city, believe it or not there are other alternatives that don't involve extending arguable the worst rapid transit line in Boston
 
Tremendous effort here!

Chelsea GL branch looping at airport is super interesting. I wonder how many people would stay on it to route through to downtown or Cambridge via GJ - that'd be a long ride. If, more likely, it would be a circulator accessed through Airport BL station, I wonder about the value of it being integrated into Chelsea through-service, just because I'm not sure Chelsea branch headways would keep up with airport circulator demand?
 
Shepard said:
Tremendous effort here!

Chelsea GL branch looping at airport is super interesting. I wonder how many people would stay on it to route through to downtown or Cambridge via GJ - that'd be a long ride. If, more likely, it would be a circulator accessed through Airport BL station, I wonder about the value of it being integrated into Chelsea through-service, just because I'm not sure Chelsea branch headways would keep up with airport circulator demand?
Click to expand...

I question the need for a stop at each terminal. If Massport builds the Logan people mover (monorail), than you would only need one light rail stop. Unless Logan and the MBTA can work togeather to combine the people mover and light rail to Chelsea and Cambridge.

Also not "resonable" per say, but I think a tunnel to connect the Seaport portion of the green and the Chelsea portion of the green would be a good investment.

I'd build that before I'd build the Blue Line out to Fenway. With a NSRL, there will likely be enough capacity for Blue Line riders to switch to Regional Rail to Back Bay/Yawkey or the Green Line. With that the Blue line would be redundant.

Also with electrification speeding up stops on the Regional Rail, I think an infill Revere station would work. Not a wonderland stop, but maybe something near the Revere Chelsea border.

I also question the use of a year round regional rail service to Cape Cod. It isn't a terribly dense area, like Fall River or New Bedford.

I also think a couple of more infill stations in Providence between PVD station and TF Green would be nice. I think most riders south of PVD use the rail to get to Providence not Boston, therefore more infill urban Providence station would increase ridership a good bit.

Also I think moving the Purple all the way up the Lowell line to Manchester would be nice, although I think that NH is too fiscally conservative for that to happen.
 
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BussesAin'tTrains said:
Here's a map compiling rail solutions discussed here that (mostly) seem to be in the realm of "reasonable."

MBTA Build Concepts
Click to expand...

Incredible work here!

One (borderline-)reasonable RIDOT Commuter Rail extension from Providence to Bristol that I've seen discussed uses the closed but functional East Side Railroad Tunnel and the Crook Point Bascule Bridge to run rail service down the East Bay Bike Path route. It'd require a massive amount of money to implement, but the ROW is pretty much preserved.

9D7pJ3B.png
FP7cP02.png
 
HelloBostonHi said:
What this map really shows me is that when amateur planners don't know what to to do, the answer is always "extend the green line" lmao. That map has the green line going literally everywhere in the city, believe it or not there are other alternatives that don't involve extending arguable the worst rapid transit line in Boston
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What this post really tells me is that you are new here and still have a lot to learn.
 
HelloBostonHi said:
What this map really shows me is that when amateur planners don't know what to to do, the answer is always "extend the green line" lmao. That map has the green line going literally everywhere in the city, believe it or not there are other alternatives that don't involve extending arguable the worst rapid transit line in Boston
Click to expand...

The "green" line did used to be much more robust 100 years ago in the days of street cars.

Part of the love for it is that people would rather have light rail compared to buses.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
You can also include the Needham St. stop shown in the presentation since that counts as an official 'ask' from the City, but it's awfully close walking distance to Waban on the D. Since they're seeking rail-with-trail from Eliot & Easy St.'s to the Charles River path, I bet if you extended the Waban-to-Route 9 ped ramps to meet Eliot St. you'd be able to tie that whole north-of-Upper Falls area into Waban's catchment instead. I'd expect the Needham St. stop to be Newton's first compromise when it's showtime.
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I think you mean Eliot here, not Waban. That said, the purpose of a stop at Circuit Ave/Rockland St (which should be extended through parking lots and next to the fire station to meet at the ROW) would be access to the Avalon apartments and Nexus shopping center. I don't think that Eliot is near enough to that market to serve it, particularly the retail element.
 
MjolnirMan said:
Incredible work here!

One (borderline-)reasonable RIDOT Commuter Rail extension from Providence to Bristol that I've seen discussed uses the closed but functional East Side Railroad Tunnel and the Crook Point Bascule Bridge to run rail service down the East Bay Bike Path route. It'd require a massive amount of money to implement, but the ROW is pretty much preserved.

9D7pJ3B.png
FP7cP02.png
Click to expand...

Problem is that once built, it's difficult to tare up a bike path to build rail. People that use bike paths are a vocal group.

And a cut and cover might be too expensive for commuter rail.
 
HelloBostonHi said:
What this map really shows me is that when amateur planners don't know what to to do, the answer is always "extend the green line" lmao. That map has the green line going literally everywhere in the city, believe it or not there are other alternatives that don't involve extending arguable the worst rapid transit line in Boston
Click to expand...

There are two productive kinds of contribution to a place like this: one can submit a pitch like BusesAintTrains or one can provide substantive critiques and useful information like F-Line and others.

You are permitted to make off-the-cuff observations and voice your opinion, but this isn't useful and doesn't give anyone else something to engage with. Consider that you might have instead expressed this as, "I don't think the Green Line is the optimal solution in all of these cases, for reasons xy" and then you wouldn't come off the way you do now, which is not well.
 
It's also a bit of a head scratcher figuring out how to connect the mouth of the tunnel to Providence station, what with the station effectively being underground, and a tower having been built right in line with the ROW leading from the mouth of the tunnel.
 
I think the only hope for rail travel through the East Side Train Tunnel is interurban light rail. Send it as far south/east as there’d be ridership, and then either create a basic terminal east of and overlooking Benefit (at the mouth of the tunnel) and call it a day, or do streetrunning to/through downtown.

I see no hope for putting mainline rail through the tunnel unless you’re willing to dead end it at Benefit St. The curve and elevation change alone would make it challenging to hook back into the Northeast Corridor.
 
Scalziand said:
It's also a bit of a head scratcher figuring out how to connect the mouth of the tunnel to Providence station, what with the station effectively being underground, and a tower having been built right in line with the ROW leading from the mouth of the tunnel.
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Eh...Amtrak thinks it's doable to hook in for one of its NEC bypasses. Though I think their rationale that it's necessary for HSR is flawed because the speed gains via the arrow-straight East Junction Branch aren't big enough to amount to any real schedule savings beyond the margin of error. It would, however, be a useful venture to move AMTK traffic to East Providence if it allowed RIDOT to infill the existing NEC with 2-3 more stations between Providence and South Attleboro and lather up for dense "I-295 belt" Urban Rail schedule with only the Purple Line left to schedule against.

I think the way they envision it is instead of rebuilding the old viaduct from Elizabeth St. @ N. Main, they burrow below from the tunnel portal and plow under Memorial Blvd., which was a new street added on the old ROW alignment before old Union Station was abandoned for the new/current alignment in the mid-80's. Close shave with One Citizens Plaza, but it probably meets technical feasibility. How it would merge in with the current alignment is another debate altogether.


Bristol Branch is an extreme unlikelihood with what RIDOT is personally able to fund. They can't mount de-abandonments to Class 4 passenger track from scratch like a Greenbush. It would take Amtrak choosing a Midland Route HSR bypass on the Washington Secondary with feds fronting lion's share of the $$$ to ever get a sniff at adding a commuter rail line that isn't on the NEC, P&W main, or Fall River/Newport Secondary. As is, they're lucky the out-of-service Tiverton segment between Fall River and Newport is short at only 2.6 mi. of single track to rebuild, and that the replacement Sakkonet River drawbridge only needs to be a 350 ft. single-track span (barely longer than the double-track Gloucester Draw span the T is replacing with redundant double bascules for a relative $40M bargain).

If Amtrak chooses the East Side bypass, look for them to build a new fixed bridge not at Crooke Point but further north by Waterman St. so the trajectory coming out of the tunnel starts angling northbound before crossing and hooking onto an upgraded East Junction Branch.
 
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