Traffic Disaster Looming in BOSTON

Wtf. Can we not? Please.

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We will keep having threads like this until we impose congestion charges.
 
Arlington said:
We will keep having threads like this until we impose congestion charges.
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I'm not even commenting on the fact that this thread exists. I'm commenting on the fact that the same exact sequence of posts were made 3 hours apart.
 
TheRifleman said:
Whats the most important factor in life? TIME.

I sure don't want to spend my TIME sitting in traffic.
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I have an easy solution to that don't drive places walk or take the T and unless your on a bus and bam you aren't sitting in traffic.
 
citylover94 said:
I have an easy solution to that don't drive places walk or take the T and unless your on a bus and bam you aren't sitting in traffic.
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Most people don't have that option. Most people work from 9-5 in or around the city. I grew up in the area and I would like them to focus on the people's needs & what would create an efficient transit system.

Like I said--- I value my time---

The only thing I see is building after building being built --but no real vision on infrastructure needs
 
citylover94 said:
I have an easy solution to that don't drive places walk or take the T and unless your on a bus and bam you aren't sitting in traffic.
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Taking the T will take twice as long unless you live and/or work near downtown. Anything North of North Station, South of South Station or Northwest of Kenmore or Kendall or Southwest of Ruggles... take a car. Even with traffic.
 
It's a long shot, but that whole section between the Fresh Pond Plaza and BB&N (Buckingham, Brown and Nichols) is prime for grade separation one day. And something needs to be done badly between Alewife and Storrow/Memorial Drive. It's a mess. We have Sen. Brownsberger to thank for the bungling of 2-3-16 @ Alewife.

I'll never forget, last spring, when I had just moved back to the Commonwealth (Lowell), I was going into Cambridge to meet up with two friends for dinner (Harvard Square) and wanted to park at Alewife. Took me twenty minutes just to get from the off-ramp and into the garage. This was on a Wednesday night. Traffic galore. More office parks in that section won't help.
 
Vancouver BC has built an extensive and attractive (in my opinion) elevated rail system, not monorail but conventional rail, that is obviously a fraction of the cost of tunneling. The only thing stopping that from happening around Boston is provincialism. I mean, there are plenty of wide corridors an elevated structure could be built above without casting excessive shadows on buildings.

Here are a few potential elevated rail routes to access underserved areas.

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Not sure we even need to build new lines for those corridors. Allston-Waltham and Assembly-Chelsea can both be served by pre-existing commuter rail if we ever got off our buts on the Indigo buildout. Even JP-Mattapan is probably better served by full build on the Fairmount, which has been an embarrassment of a roll out so far. Then throw in an extension of the SL-Dudley, which has had it's own issues. Again, rather than build new stuff, if we would just actually build out stuff we already have like we already know we should (Indigo-ing and implementing real BRT instead off all this half-ass-ing we've been doing), then we'd be all set for Transportocolypse. But we won't, because Boston, MBTA, MassDOT, etc.
 
Charlie_mta said:
Vancouver BC has built an extensive and attractive (in my opinion) elevated rail system, not monorail but conventional rail, that is obviously a fraction of the cost of tunneling. The only thing stopping that from happening around Boston is provincialism. I mean, there are plenty of wide corridors an elevated structure could be built above without casting excessive shadows on buildings.

Here are a few potential elevated rail routes to access underserved areas.
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This will be a tough sell since we just knocked down the money pit of an Elevated Green Monster running through the city.

I would like to see plans for both Tunneling and Conventional Rail Expansions.
A Monorail from the Aquarium over the water to the SEAPORT could do justice also.

TROLLY in the middle of the road ways down the Seaport could be unique.

Are they coming out with innovative transit IDEAS or just waiting for Katrina of Traffic to hit? Since the Seaport is the Innovation District.

That Cambridge/Belmont Area is a MESS.
The Redline does flow nicely in the community through Cambridge but its just becoming too congested driving around that area.
 
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Building transit has the same issue as building roads:. If you build it they will come. Demand management should be playing a bigger role in the discussion. Put some limits on growth until the infrastructure is in place.
 
tangent said:
Building transit has the same issue as building roads:. If you build it they will come. Demand management should be playing a bigger role in the discussion. Put some limits on growth until the infrastructure is in place.
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The city already has a housing shortage. We shouldn't stop building near the core.
 
Except mass transit has a capacity a couple orders of magnitude larger than roads, so the same induced demand argument doesn't really apply.
 
tangent said:
Building transit has the same issue as building roads:. If you build it they will come. Demand management should be playing a bigger role in the discussion. Put some limits on growth until the infrastructure is in place.
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You are ignoring geometry. If you build it and "they come" from less geometrically efficient means of transport (i.e. an automobile), than you have increased the geometric efficiency of the system and are now able to move more people than before. Keep in mind, traffic jams are caused by geometric inefficiency. Improving geometric efficiency is the answer.
 
davem said:
Being from around he NY metro area this stuff never ceases to crack me up. The traffic last month when that garbage truck caught in fire in the tunnel is what I'm used to every day.

I also have little sympathy; I just like traffic on Seaport Blvd doesn't need to exist because of access at B St, soooooo many backups I really are caused my massholes outright refusing to merge. When two lanes drop to one drivers would rather put the other guy into a wall than just loose one car length. This is then further compounded by I'll timed traffic lights.
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But what do expect THERIFLEMAN to do when some ASSHOLE is driving in the spot where he wants to put his CAR?!! Just be POLITE and SHARE the road?!!

Edit: needed to add in a list of major developments because it's the in thing to do:

111 federal
1 bromfield
GE HQ
South Station tower
Millennium Tower
The Petronas Towers
that place being built next to that house I used to party at in Allston
The Empire state building
Etc

They are ALL going to cause more TRAFFIC!!!!!!!!!
 
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bigeman312 said:
You are ignoring geometry. If you build it and "they come" from less geometrically efficient means of transport (i.e. an automobile), than you have increased the geometric efficiency of the system and are now able to move more people than before. Keep in mind, traffic jams are caused by geometric inefficiency. Improving geometric efficiency is the answer.
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Move them where? The road network is far more efficient from a geometry standpoint.
 
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