Regional Rail (RUR) & North-South Rail Link (NSRL)

Re: North-South Rail Link

whighlander said:
F-Line you've just got to break yourself of the federal Teat -- its going dry -- ween your self and become self sufficient -- Tip is dead and burried -- but he did have one good point -- "all Politics is Local" -- based on the concept of the Ancient Greek City-State -- the Polis
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I'm all for that as soon as the Fed stops taking more from New England than it puts back in. Although, to be honest, I'm not for that. I'm an American before I'm a New Englander. I understand that federal resources are sometimes needed more elsewhere. The frustration for me is that the resources needed to really fix rail transit in New England aren't actually that significant measured against the whole. $10 billion would fund what, two weeks of M.E. war? The issue to me is that spending priorities are misplaced, not that the Fed shouldn't be spending money.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

HenryAlan said:
I'm all for that as soon as the Fed stops taking more from New England than it puts back in. Although, to be honest, I'm not for that. I'm an American before I'm a New Englander. I understand that federal resources are sometimes needed more elsewhere. The frustration for me is that the resources needed to really fix rail transit in New England aren't actually that significant measured against the whole. $10 billion would fund what, two weeks of M.E. war? The issue to me is that spending priorities are misplaced, not that the Fed shouldn't be spending money.
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Yeah, I don't want to derail this thread on ideological grounds because other viewpoints are valid. But there is no structural resource shortage when this is the deficit breakdown: http://static5.businessinsider.com/...-the-day-bush-policies-deficits-june-2010.gif. There's two things they can do tomorrow to make that evaporate to trivial minimum. But then, that whole does leadership want anything badly enough conundrum...

There may not be a solution for this depending on whose zero-sum political game wins, but there will be an answer when this ongoing ideological realignment is done. This is stalling for time while the shift is on, nobody knows what the alignment will look in 2 Congresses, and the patient's delerious and feeling a little dually extremist from high fever. There's a substantive debate to be had on what proportion to address in the couple whoppers on that graph. There is no way to duck that there's a couple whoppers. Gridlocking self with talk of cutting things so insignificant it doesn't change anything doesn't have the legs to last 2 more sessions without a revolt a lot more...caustic...than a few well-behaved demonstrations. That we can be sure of. There is endgame.


Revisit the argument about what funding's going to be available to states and what degree of austerity we will or won't be living in in 4 years. It's impossible to do now. I think flow of money is too near and dear to politicians for them to be immune if that flow gets shut off. Even 1%'ers need liquidity amongst themselves. They can't function if everyone's storing it in jars in the basement, which is now starting to happen. That's why I don't think infrastructure pork will ever get cut back from current unimpressive levels. It might have a short-term example made of it until this realignment is done, but appropriations are political liquidity. If somebody was going to torpedo Amtrak, it would be 25 years dead and buried now. They never call that bluff for a reason.

We might as well find other amusements for 4 years because it's going to be really boring watching nothing happen while this fissure plays itself out. But it always does. Something will start moving second half of the decade when that's settled. We just don't know whether that'll be a good or bad thing. It certainly won't look like today, so I'm inclined to keep an open mind about future options. It would simply be nice if somebody here in a leadership position was thinking about how they could be nimble about pouncing on generic future opportunity instead of setting themselves up to pass on it.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

I was speaking to someone at MassDOT yesterday and the topic of the N/S rail link came up. They said that it was studied around the same time the Big Dig was in the final stages of the planning process (mid-late 80s). The original plan was to have the N/S rail link installed at the same time as the new highway tunnels (because it would presumably be easier than constructing them after). The idea was dropped after studies had the N/S rail link at an estimated additional $8 Billion and it was thought that that figure would make the whole project untouchable from a federal funding standpoint.

This may all very well be common knowledge, but I thought it was interesting. $8 Billion in the mid 80s adjusted for inflation would amount to around $16.5 Billion today.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

Imagine if the Big Dig had NOT been the CAT and instead had been the N/S rail link with rapid transit alongside, and the TWT had a third tube for rapid transit? Maybe, to be fair, the CAT in this scenario would be just a two-lane tunnel alongside part of the NSRL/RT to connect the Leverett to the East Boston tunnels.

Yes, you'd end up with the Zakim Bridge and Southeast Expressway dumping right into city streets, but I don't see that as all that much of an issue. I expect the Lincoln Tunnel carries a similar number of cars to the Zakim while dumping right into midtown. Through-traffic would use the 128 bypass, as intended.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

Lrfox said:
I was speaking to someone at MassDOT yesterday and the topic of the N/S rail link came up. They said that it was studied around the same time the Big Dig was in the final stages of the planning process (mid-late 80s). The original plan was to have the N/S rail link installed at the same time as the new highway tunnels (because it would presumably be easier than constructing them after). The idea was dropped after studies had the N/S rail link at an estimated additional $8 Billion and it was thought that that figure would make the whole project untouchable from a federal funding standpoint.

This may all very well be common knowledge, but I thought it was interesting. $8 Billion in the mid 80s adjusted for inflation would amount to around $16.5 Billion today.
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To be fair, though, the majority of the N-S Link's costs are not tied up in the mainline under-Artery tunnel. It's the Central Station and the portal tunnels that do it. The fact that the state was unwilling to compromise on that design suggests that the transit folks were never all that serious about doing it. Central Station's more of a hindrance than a benefit. The Old Colony, Fairmount, and Fitchburg portals were all egregious mission creep feeding non-intercity or bypass-accessible intercity lines...and the "thru-run every commuter rail line" idea was too much a solution in search of a problem. And they did not seriously consider the rapid transit uses the Link could serve in addition to a RR connection.

All the foresight in provisioning for it was done by the highway folks. And people at Salvucci's level. Hell, that is still the only advocacy it gets. Transit interests never bothered to take their seat at the table. Didn't then. Won't now.

We can thank our lucky stars that the highway folks did have that foresight and left that utility-cleared lower level slurry-walled and ready for re-excavation. At least there's realistic possibility of it if they revisit it with a tighter-focused design that cut Central Station and left all the superfluous portals to later add-ons. We get no such second chance for a rail tunnel to the airport after the transit interests sat on their hands while the Ted got chopped down to size. They were so not-serious about real solutions to that need that they wasted another 15 years trying to convince us that the BRT fairy actually existed.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

Shepard said:
Imagine if the Big Dig had NOT been the CAT and instead had been the N/S rail link with rapid transit alongside, and the TWT had a third tube for rapid transit? Maybe, to be fair, the CAT in this scenario would be just a two-lane tunnel alongside part of the NSRL/RT to connect the Leverett to the East Boston tunnels.

Yes, you'd end up with the Zakim Bridge and Southeast Expressway dumping right into city streets, but I don't see that as all that much of an issue. I expect the Lincoln Tunnel carries a similar number of cars to the Zakim while dumping right into midtown. Through-traffic would use the 128 bypass, as intended.
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You wouldn't end up with the Zakim or the Southeast Expressway dumping right into city streets - you'd end up with any attempts at removing the Central Artery blocked by highway interests.

It's not like the Embarcadero Freeway. There was no way the Artery was ever coming down without the complete Big Dig. Sorry.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

Commuting Boston Student said:
You wouldn't end up with the Zakim or the Southeast Expressway dumping right into city streets - you'd end up with any attempts at removing the Central Artery blocked by highway interests.

It's not like the Embarcadero Freeway. There was no way the Artery was ever coming down without the complete Big Dig. Sorry.
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Not to mention the fact that you'd be eliminating a vital transportation link that carries 250,000+ people a day.

"Highway interests" = majority of region's population.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

Commuting Boston Student said:
You wouldn't end up with the Zakim or the Southeast Expressway dumping right into city streets - you'd end up with any attempts at removing the Central Artery blocked by highway interests.

It's not like the Embarcadero Freeway. There was no way the Artery was ever coming down without the complete Big Dig. Sorry.
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Everybody cites the Embarcadero, but it was not even comparable to the Central Artery. The Embarcadero Freeway was an incomplete project that didn't serve any large market. The Central Artery on the other hand has been a critical part of greater Boston's economy since it was built, and honestly Boston as we know it economically is a Boston with the Central Artery. Not only would no highway link there be impractical politically, it also would cause a disastrous gap with no real high-capacity automobile link.

Plenty of cities do just fine without high-capacity limited-access roads (which is why the myriad of other planned highways within 128 were not built following the Central Artery and Mass Pike Extension). However, once such a link is put in, it is near impossible to remove without wrecking havoc.

That being said, if anybody knows of a critical highway link, in America or elsewhere, that was removed and the consequences were largely positive, then please share it.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Freeway

That was the real highway that was partially boulevarded after the Loma Prieta.

..

We do know what a Boston without a Central Artery looked like, as there was one before it was built.

I'm not convinced that the Central Artery necessarily did good for Boston. Change, yes. Good? Well, Boston peaked in population in 1950, and thereafter saw double-digit percentage losses until 1990. Economies don't grow when people leave. Then there's the 1970s, a period of recession which lasted for most of the decade, not to mention all the civil strife.

Things are better now, population is slowly growing, and it's hard to project alternate histories. But just think about how much of Boston's heritage was destroyed by urban renewal and highway building gone mad. It was a social experiment of a vast order -- to replace the traditional form of urban economy with a new one of concrete and scattered people. But the funny thing is that the sectors for which Boston is known today -- education, tech, medicine, finance -- were already in place back before the 1950s. They were just ahead of their time, and not considered as important as they are now. They were looking to jumpstart the economy back then by doing all that urban renewal, but in the end we just came back to what we already had.
 
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Re: North-South Rail Link

Matthew said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Freeway

That was the real highway that was partially boulevarded after the Loma Prieta.

..

We do know what a Boston without a Central Artery looked like, as there was one before it was built.

I'm not convinced that the Central Artery necessarily did good for Boston. Change, yes. Good? Well, Boston peaked in population in 1950, and thereafter saw double-digit percentage losses until 1990. Economies don't grow when people leave. Then there's the 1970s, a period of recession which lasted for most of the decade, not to mention all the civil strife.

Things are better now, population is slowly growing, and it's hard to project alternate histories. But just think about how much of Boston's heritage was destroyed by urban renewal and highway building gone mad. It was a social experiment of a vast order -- to replace the traditional form of urban economy with a new one of concrete and scattered people. But the funny thing is that the sectors for which Boston is known today -- education, tech, medicine -- were already in place back before the 1950s. They were just ahead of their time, and not considered as important as they are now. They were looking to jumpstart the economy back then by doing all that urban renewal, but in the end we just came back to what we already had.
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I never claimed that the Central Artery did good for Boston. Just that once something like that is built, it is totally impractical to remove it
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

Well perhaps we should move to a different thread as the $384m was the cost of removing the elevated freeway, restoring the river and making transit improvements to replace the capacity. Much cheaper than $15 billion or whatever figure you want to use for the Big Dig. I say it's an example of what we should have done instead of the CA/T.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

8 Billion , how the hell does a project like that cost 8 billion....sigh only in America...
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

mn_octavia_cntrlfwy_chronfile.jpg

The Central Freeway before much of what is in the picture was torn down, and Octavia Boulevard taking its place.

octavia_blvd_06.jpg


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Embarcadero Freeway
embarc_one520x326.JPG


embarc_four525x388.JPG


tumblr_m3lysfmw2O1qco7hi.jpeg
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

why does the NS rail link have to go underground under the central artery? Could a tube in the harbor do the same thing for substantially less money?
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

found5dollar said:
why does the NS rail link have to go underground under the central artery? Could a tube in the harbor do the same thing for substantially less money?
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Cool idea...build steel tube sections, sink them in a trench, connect the sections, pave. That's how the Ted Williams and Ft McHenry (I95/Baltimore harbor) were built.
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

massmotorist said:
Not to mention the fact that you'd be eliminating a vital transportation link that carries 250,000+ people a day.

"Highway interests" = majority of region's population.
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Don't bother. You just frustrate yourself and piss them off. Some people think that cars are a species of animal, competing with us humans for the good stuff.

Some day I'd like to see the anti-highway, anti-auto crowd swear off the benefits of both for a year. By the end of the first week, they'd start going hungry. By the end of the first month, they'd be dying. Or would the supplies for their hospital treatment come by public transportation?
 
Re: North-South Rail Link

JonFrum said:
Don't bother. You just frustrate yourself and piss them off. Some people think that cars are a species of animal, competing with us humans for the good stuff.

Some day I'd like to see the anti-highway, anti-auto crowd swear off the benefits of both for a year. By the end of the first week, they'd start going hungry. By the end of the first month, they'd be dying. Or would the supplies for their hospital treatment come by public transportation?
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"Haha, we destroyed all the alternative methods of transportation that existed, so now if you don't support highways everywhere you're being hypocritical!"
 
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