Seaport Neighborhood - Infill and Discussion

Re: South Boston Seaport

People who don't know what they are talking about should be so confident when they speak. Boston is now doing more sea shipping than ever before in it's history and the only way to expand without adding thousands of new trucks to the roads is rail. LA/Long Beach ships many of its containers out through LA to an inland port where it transfers them to truck to cut down on traffic. Boston could do the same. The one right thing they did when building the new SB Seaport was to save the rail connection.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

Im pretty confident that if we increase volume capacity we'll get it and then-some. The Boston metro area is what 4 million? Plus when you include the rest of New England, suddenly you're at 6 or 7 million. That is reason enough alone to increase shipping. Also we're a tad closer to Europe than NY, why not save 300-400 miles round trip.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

I wouldn't argue against the fact that upgrading the seaport and cruise terminal, as well as rail lines, would have positive impacts. What worries me is the opportunity cost. The pie of resources is limited - is the port really the best growth vehicle we can imagine?

I'm far from being convinced - although the poorly researched article citing anecdotal barley prices may be adding to my skepticism.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

kennedy said:
'fraid to say it, but Shepard is dead on. Shipping has past us by. The market for cruise ships coming to Boston is small, and the mayor needs to stop imagining that Boston is a true tourist destination. Redevelop it, just like the London Docklands. Potential for some extremely valuable waterfront property. When the economy starts to swing back, the city could sell all that land for a killing.

Now, if they want to talk about improving high-speed passenger rail, I'm all ears. Maybe a better solution would be to make a city like Worcester, Lowell, Springfield, New Bedford, or Fall River a freight center. It would be far less expensive, and create a far greater benefit to the state, for smaller cities to receive the influx of revenue from the shipping trade.
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HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

When you go to Boston, are you blind?? Having a shortage of hotels even with a large number of them = "true tourist destination", there is no doubt that Boston's per capita tourist numbers are among the highest in the nation (besides Las Vegas, of course)
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

Boston is now doing more sea shipping than ever before in it's history
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Really...more than in the 18th and 19th centuries? I find this hard to believe.

Plus when you include the rest of New England, suddenly you're at 6 or 7 million.
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Just FYI for the forum: New England has 14.3 million people. It would be the fifth largest state in the US.

http://www.forbestraveler.com/best-l...009-slide.html
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More people visit Faneuil Hall each year than Disney World!? WTF?
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

czsz said:
Really...more than in the 18th and 19th centuries? I find this hard to believe.
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This confused me at first too, but if you think of it there is a lot more global shipping going on today then in Boston's heyday. So we have a slimmer piece of a much larger pie.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

czsz said:
Really...more than in the 18th and 19th centuries? I find this hard to believe.



Just FYI for the forum: New England has 14.3 million people. It would be the fifth largest state in the US.



More people visit Faneuil Hall each year than Disney World!? WTF?
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No, it doesn't. The Magic Kingdom is not Disney World. Disney World is MK, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, Animal Kingdom, the waterparks and the additional resorts. The Forbes list is misleading since it breaks up Disney World into separate entities. Add up all visitors to all their attractions and it's about 47 million per year.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

czsz said:
Really...more than in the 18th and 19th centuries? I find this hard to believe.
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I don't have the hard numbers but the truth is that containerized shipping is far more efficient than having 50 smaller ships. We think back to when the harbor was full of ships but the reason there were so many ships was that each one held much less cargo than you would think. One modern super-container ship can hold many times the goods one of those old schooners could.

Keep in mind also that many of those ships in the olden days were fishing vessels and I don't include them in my estimate.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

If ever you had a reason to take the harbor walk around the Moakley courthouse. The little picture dealies set up around the walkway have this information written on them, and break it down to millions of tons a year or something along those lines. I believe it will corroborate the above notions. I already went out for lunch today.... so you do it.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

Seriously are we going to start denying that Boston has historic buildings now? Are we so drowned in our own negativity that we actually believe that Boston is not a tourist destination?
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

I don't think anyone could suggest that Boston isn't a tourist destination. It's easy to take what Kennedy said out of context, but I think the heart of the issue is whether upgrading the cruise terminal is a worthwhile investment. To put it in the opposite way that Kennedy did - since Boston is such a tourist destination anyway, is it really worth wooing cruise ships in the grand scheme of things.

For what it's worth, I have a direct view over the cruise terminal from my window in the Pru, and since about April there's been a cruise ship in port here probably 80% of the time. I'm not sure what that says about demand but it does speak highly for utilizaton.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

vanshnookenraggen said:
I don't have the hard numbers but the truth is that containerized shipping is far more efficient than having 50 smaller ships. We think back to when the harbor was full of ships but the reason there were so many ships was that each one held much less cargo than you would think. One modern super-container ship can hold many times the goods one of those old schooners could.

Keep in mind also that many of those ships in the olden days were fishing vessels and I don't include them in my estimate.
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Yup, even 60 years ago a ship would take 2-3 days to unload, now it can be done in a couple of hours.

The super busy ports we think og, with hundreds of people running around was because of how inefficient it was.

Were you shipping in chairs from england? People had to run into the ship and carry the chairs out to a truck or train. Now, a crane picks up all of them at once and dumps the entire container on the train or truck so it can go.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

You two are also forgetting about the massive shuffle of papers, customs, verifying manifests, telegraph, telephone, etc. communications which had to go through all inbound and outbound materials compared to networked bar code scanners today. There was also a much larger need for warehouse space back then when goods had to wait for destinations upon hitting the port. We take it for granted how efficiently USPS, UPS, FedEx, DHL, Speedpost, TNT, AirborneExpress, etc does all of this with a click.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

But does any of that cargo even go through the Seaport? Boston's container ship facilities are in South Boston, next to Castle Island -- completely distinct and unreachable from the Seaport. Connecting it with the existing rail line would require, among other things, building a bridge over the channel separating them.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

I take the boat in every morning, and I can tell you that there is a ton of activity. There were two massive freighters tonight. I have seen 3 ships there at a time (both cruises, and freight) I have looked into cruises out of boston, there are a lot. Most go to Bermuda or Canada. But there are some (and more on the way) that go to the Caribbean and trans-atlantic. I saw a giant Royal Caribbean ship that was the same one I was on in the caribbean 6 yrs ago.

Boston can accommodate these big ships, I think the problem is that the terminal can't (i.e. customs, baggage, and waiting areas) We aren't talking about re-dredging the harbor, its a facilities upgrade to get bigger cruises that go to more destinations. I think its a smart move. The rail will add to this because now trucks must go to allston to get to the rail, and with that facility eventually moving farther out (westborough?) rail will be even more crucial. It will be more efficient, and better for the area and the terminal. All-in-all great use of the money.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

BarbaricManchurian said:
HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

When you go to Boston, are you blind?? Having a shortage of hotels even with a large number of them = "true tourist destination", there is no doubt that Boston's per capita tourist numbers are among the highest in the nation (besides Las Vegas, of course)
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Quite recently, I was trying to convince a few people in St. Louis of the merits of Boston over Washington D.C. to travel. First response was: "What the hell is there to see in Boston anyways?"

Those numbers about Fanueil Hall vs. Magic Kingdom: do they include locals? I'd wager a guess that many more locals and residents 'visit' Fanueil Hall than Orlando locals visit Disney.

I concede that I was wrong about the heyday of shipping having passed, but I'm still not convinced that this is really the most appropriate way to spend the money. And where are these existing rails? I scoured Google Maps and couldn't find any leading to Black Falcon and the immediate vicinity.
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

Fact: Baltimore gets more tourists than Boston does.

Just putting it out there.

kennedy said:
I scoured Google Maps and couldn't find any leading to Black Falcon and the immediate vicinity.
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You must not have looked very well. Tracks, in good condition actually exist all the way to the ocean.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&sou...332,-71.022372&spn=0.000519,0.001206&t=k&z=20

However, what I think theyre talking about is getting these tracks (which could be active, note the recent paint on the street)
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&sou...495,-71.039505&spn=0.001039,0.003433&t=k&z=19

to where the ships actually stop
 
Re: South Boston Seaport

jass said:
Fact: Baltimore gets more tourists than Boston does.

Just putting it out there.
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I think that might be due to the close proximity to DC.
 
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