Skybridges: The Future of Cities

GW2500

GW2500

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You know there are two sides to these tubes, one from the outside, and the other from the people walking inside them. Boston has plenty of cold months, and walking through them, looking down on the street below, while not freezing is kind of nice experience. I walked through the mall for the first time a couple of Februarys ago and I enjoyed criss-crossing buildings and was impressed with the cumulative size it created. That being said they should be kept in moderation.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

You'd think we live on Mars based on the way people like whighlander are assessing the climactic necessity of gerbil tubes. You don't see them in much stickier places, like Singapore. And despite the cold, Minneapolis is hoping to tear these down because they slaughter streetlife and come at the expense of the public realm.

The reason the one cited tube is successful is not only because of the beyond-Houston-level shitty street level experience on Huntington (where a highway onramp literally funnels traffic into the Pike tunnel from the middle of the street), but because the malls are built with their ground floors above street level, making it annoying to traverse between them by descending to and ascending from the street each time.

Of course making the experience of crossing the street that hostile and annoying will result in people opting for the tube.
 
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Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

briv said:
People stay in these hotels for other reasons than to attend an event at the Hynes. Even those who are atteding an event there I'm sure desire to go out into the city at some point rather than spend all their time in a mall which is probably pretty identical to the malls back wherever they come from.

Whighlander, do you go to your local town hall meetings and clamor for more parking, shopping malls and gerbil tubes for Lexington?
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But in Whighlander's defense, when there is an event at Hynes the gerbil tubes are packed with people walking back and forth between Hynes and their hotel. I used to work in one of the office buildings in Copley and would use the tubes to get lunch at the food court in the Pru a couple times a week. If those tubes hadn't existed I would not have gone to the Pru for lunch. The tubes allow the Pru and Copley to function as one mixed-use complex and for that reason I think they're very successful
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

And I wish they'd found a way to connect the Shaw's supermarket to the indoor circulation system. (The old Prudential Star Market that it replaced was connected to the mall.) With that connection, you could go directly from a T station to a supermarket without going outdoors.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

So to recap and review:

The gerbil tubes work really well for the current building designs.

The current building designs are a shitshow. (In term of urbanity)
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

And to some extent unavoidably, as their base floors are above ground level, on top of a highway and railroad.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

Ron Newman said:
And I wish they'd found a way to connect the Shaw's supermarket to the indoor circulation system. (The old Prudential Star Market that it replaced was connected to the mall.) With that connection, you could go directly from a T station to a supermarket without going outdoors.
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That is probably the one major short-coming of the Pru. It's a missed opportunity.

In the cold winter and hot summer, I take the 111 Huntington elevators down to the Orange Level and go through the garage to the Shaw's elevator and come up into the store, avoiding the mess of tourists in the Pru, the Pru's indirect circulation (esp the crooked Back Bay Arcade) and the street-crossing.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

I had no idea that was even possible. It's certainly not a well-marked route and I'd probably get lost trying to follow it.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

I forget, doesn't the gerbil tube from the front entrance of the Copley mall at Boylston Street next to the Legal Seafoods also go over to the Lord & Taylor, which you can then take into Shaws? There's the walkway overhead which goes to an elevator on the other side, but I can't remember if it goes up to Lord & Taylor.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

I don't think there's any indoor connection (unless it's underground) from Lord & Taylor to Shaw's.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

datadyne007 said:
That is probably the one major short-coming of the Pru. It's a missed opportunity.

In the cold winter and hot summer, I take the 111 Huntington elevators down to the Orange Level and go through the garage to the Shaw's elevator and come up into the store, avoiding the mess of tourists in the Pru, the Pru's indirect circulation (esp the crooked Back Bay Arcade) and the street-crossing.
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data -- Excellent -- I like the sense of exploration offered by Gerbil Tubes and the equally interesting Mole Tunnels

Pru to Shaws is great as its not at all obvious
other good ones:
1) Sheraton lobby to Back Bay orange line platform via the tunnel under Dartmouth St.
2) Westin street-level entrance to Hynes street level entrance
3) Park Street Red or Green Line platform to Lobby of the downtown Hyatt Regency and back
a) via the elevator to the Lafayette Corporate Center Parking;
b) hallway to Macy's;
c) across the Macy's floor;
d) and then the entrance to the DTX Concourse;
e) the DTX platforms;
f) and the light in the end of the tunnel to Park Street
although I recommend that the inexperienced spelunker take the route the other-way first

By the way -- Singapore while having only a few Gerbil Tubes has many many underground links (Mole Tunnels) between buildings, and buildings and the transit system

Another place with a lot of pedestrian tunnels is the DC metro area including the DC Metro itself. I have traveled from Alewife to the Crystal City Marriott and back without coming out into a open area without at least a roof over a platform (South Station Boston and Union Station DC)

And of course Montreal with RÉSO -- its massive underground city (a fair amount of which is above ground though connected) where you can literally walk for more than a hour without retracing your path except at nodes
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

As a whole I don't like these bridges either but as the one at Copley/Pru proves sometime they are needed. I would hate to see that volume of people trying to cross at the street level. I know the convention authority use to advertise that the Hynes has the most hotel rooms connected indoors, to a convention center, in the country. A big plus when you are competing against warmer places for winter business.

I hope someday they connect the Hilton Hotel to the Pru Complex and possibly the new development on the adjoining turnpike parcel and also the Christian Science complex if that includes a hotel. Don't forget Hilton use to have a plan for a taller tower behind the current building. I think it had been completely approved so someday it will likely happen. Phase I was completed years ago, phase II is the tower. I've always wondered it that 'door' on the second floor of the Hynes on the Dalton St side was to allow a bridge someday.

Also is there any reason to keep Ring Road as a street. Seems like it would could be better utilized for pedestrian use of maybe more buildings.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

If I see one more thread turn into a discussion of gerbil tubes...

angrysparta.jpg
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

How did this conversation even come about?

Also, can we call them skybridges, like they actually are?
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

It's a cool discussion but really should have its very own thread.

As for Ring Road, isn't that used for either garage access or loading (or both)? I think a couple of MBTA buses use it as well.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

JohnAKeith said:
I forget, doesn't the gerbil tube from the front entrance of the Copley mall at Boylston Street next to the Legal Seafoods also go over to the Lord & Taylor, which you can then take into Shaws? There's the walkway overhead which goes to an elevator on the other side, but I can't remember if it goes up to Lord & Taylor.
Click to expand...

I think you meant Huntington Ave and no it doesn't as that path goes into where CPK is and CPK is across the street from Shaws.
 
Re: Christian Science Church Center Renovation/ New Towers

Lord & Taylor is connected to the end of the Boylston Arcade via the (new) Newbury Arcade which features the Mandarin.

Shaw's is on its own and the Back Bay Arcade/Bridge Court skybridge to Copley Place (Marriott Level 2) blows straight past it.

11_map.gif
 
Re: Commuter Rail to New Hampshire?

Strange that this discussion of gerbil tubes cropped up in the NH commuter rail thread. Many years ago I saw an intriguing proposal, that obviously went nowhere. As things stand now (and then), you can walk from Back Bay Station or the Copley Weston hotel all the way to Dalton/Boylston via a series of gerbil tubes, tunnels, and covered arcades. The proposal was for Pike air rights from Mass Ave. All the way to Kenmore. There were some large buildings on each end, some smaller buildings lining the edges, and a glass covered pedestrian mall following Newbury st., then crossing over to Brookline Ave. I think there was a new Fenway in the proposal, too. I think it would be really cool if something like that had happened, because then would be Copley to Kenmore entirely via winding passageways and tubes.
 
Re: Commuter Rail to New Hampshire?

Umm...how did these posts get moved to NH Commuter Rail?
 
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