Western Avenue Corridor Study & Rezoning

[KCasiglio]

Pieces of this (particularly the transitway) were talked about when the first presentation was made a couple months ago, but the draft report was published tonight (linked here).

Lived here 2013-2015 until getting priced out exactly because there wasn't forward thinking planning like this before the Boston Landing development brought tons of jobs into the area with minimal housing. The increased density is very welcome and I think it's great to get ahead of further development coming by ensuring there will be room reserved for a transit way. Though the public meeting going on rn is full of people apocalyptic about it.

(Could not find an otherwise appropriate thread for this, mods feel free to move if I overlooked)

 

[Urban_Hermit]

I’m pleased that the transitway is still part of the plan. The Q&A session had a mix of thoughtful questions, airing of grievances, and panic about change.

One of the first questions got to my main concern which was, if one of the two buses that uses this transitway (86) remains low frequency and cut short (as is the plan), does that undermine the transitway?

the response from the presenter was basically, we hope not/if you build it they will come.

 

[Wash]

Also, the transitway is designed to accommodate a green line branch I think.

 

[KCasiglio]

Spoke

I’m pleased that the transitway is still part of the plan. The Q&A session had a mix of thoughtful questions, airing of grievances, and panic about change.

One of the first questions got to my main concern was, if one of the two buses that uses this transitway (86) remains low frequency and cut short (as is the plan), does that undermine the transitway?

the response from the presenter was basically, we hope not/if you build it they will come.

The impression I got speaking privately with a BTD employee afterwards is that the transit way isn’t being proposed for the sake of current need and is barely factoring in things like the bus network redesign. They’re seeing the long term future of lower Allston and want to make sure there’s room for scaleable transit. The silver line through seaport was specifically cited: “at the time it was built it was more than the area needed, then we’ve quickly seen how it was actually way too little for what we knew was coming and it’s not easily scaled up, we don’t want to make that mistake again”

 

[Urban_Hermit]

Spoke
The impression I got speaking privately with a BTD employee afterwards is that the transit way isn’t being proposed for the sake of current need and is barely factoring in things like the bus network redesign. They’re seeing the long term future of lower Allston and want to make sure there’s room for scaleable transit. The silver line through seaport was specifically cited: “at the time it was built it was more than the area needed, then we’ve quickly seen how it was actually way too little for what we knew was coming and it’s not easily scaled up, we don’t want to make that mistake again”

That’s good to hear. Did you get a sense of how confident they are that the transit way will make it through to the end? The amount of pushback last night was not insignificant.

 

[KCasiglio]

That’s good to hear. Did you get a sense of how confident they are that the transit way will make it through to the end? The amount of pushback last night was not insignificant.

Very confident, when I brought that up I was told it was very similar at the start of the Columbus Ave project and that the meeting last night was…not run to this persons liking.

 

[Teban54]

I’m pleased that the transitway is still part of the plan. The Q&A session had a mix of thoughtful questions, airing of grievances, and panic about change.

One of the first questions got to my main concern which was, if one of the two buses that uses this transitway (86) remains low frequency and cut short (as is the plan), does that undermine the transitway?

the response from the presenter was basically, we hope not/if you build it they will come.

To me, that's an issue with how the redesign handled 86, not a lack of demand.