See if you can figure out which neighborhoods are underserved by subway service
By adamg - Fri, 05/23/2008 - 2:32pm.
Gareth posts a map showing T subway/trolley stops with half-mile circles around them (as part of this discussion on restoring Arborway trolley service).
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I'd love to see this with 1
I'd love to see this with 1 mile circles as well. Thanks in advance to the person whose more tech-savy than me who will put this together.
You're welcome
And thanks all for the props, which I so don't deserve for this. Here's the map with 1-mile circles (i.e. everything blue is within 1/2 mile of the T).
BTW, I recommend playing with Google Earth. It's wicked easy to do something like this.
Southie Needs Transit
Poor thing, out there all naked yet close and dense.
Gareth, I don't know if you
Gareth,
I don't know if you are already reading archboston.com, but they have a transit section of their board that you should post this to; they'd all be very interested in it.
I'm not
It looks like another login for me to lose. If you're already on there, and have an idea of a good location to refer to them, feel free to post the map URLs.
I'd love to see..
how many poor minorities will still be robbing people who ride the public transit in their area? Fool yourself all you want, the orange line after 8 pm is still scary..not as scary as some of you people's detachment from reality, but still scary! hey why don't the state seize the foreclosed propeeties and build new rail lines there? rawwking!
It is?
Have you actually been on the Orange Line after 8 p.m.?
Actually
I think the Orange Line is much scarier from about 2:30 to 4:00 PM than after 8.
The B, C, and E lines
The B, C, and E lines make me a sad panda...
Then you think of all the overlap those lines have with available busing and it makes me even sadder.
Thanks a lot, Gareth, now I'm going to stew on this all weekend.
It part of the reason for
It part of the reason for the numerous delays, and horrible long ride times.
45 minutes from packards corner to park street, which is only 4 miles, is not worth it. Especially when other multiple buses run the route/s
It's light rail, not a bus line, stops need to be removed.
Traffic Lights Can Be Timed
There is existing technology that can coordinate the traffic lights with the trolley. This would be great on B Line and C Line. Trolleys would not have to stop at red lights, making an "Express" run a true express.
Brookline wanted to do this with the MBTA. The MBTA said no.
The MBTA said 'no' because
The MBTA said 'no' because Brookline wanted the MBTA to pay for it.
Not quite
The MBTA said no because they wanted to do a study first to see if it would be useful. Brookline couldn't just sit on fixing Beacon while the MBTA did a study so they finished their road. The MBTA then finished its study and decided to go ahead with getting into the synch pattern. Brookline said, "well hell we've already finished and you'd have to go in and do a lot of reverse engineering and tearing up what we just finished to do it...thanks a hell of a lot for taking so long to make up your minds".
That's the last I heard on it.
Not true
No reverse engineering needed. The MBTA just needs to plug'n play to get the trolley thru those red lights. No rocket scientists are required.
There should be a balance
Between saturation and speed. The reason the north Brookline area is so saturated with lines and stops is that Brookline, unlike other metro Boston neighborhoods, was built around the streetcar lines, not the other way around. It's efficient for particular parameters of efficiency, which apparently take walk distance into greater consideration than rapidity of transit.
I'm sure it's annoying, and could be improved, but it could also be worse. At least you don't live in Somerville, Mattapan, or Chelsea, where there's no T line.
Mattapan has a T line
Mattapan
Ron:
I'm sure what was meant was that, outside of the one stop actually in Mattapan (Mattapan Station), there is little coverage other than bus lines.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
re: the total abyss surrounding Blue Hill Ave
Ouch.
I recommend the study of
I recommend the study of history. Dorchester and Mattapan had streetcars. Dorchester is one of the classic streetcar suburbs. Streetcars ran from Egleston sq. up Seaver street to Blue Hill ave.
Me too!
Dorchester had streetcars at one point, as did the rest of Boston and surrounding neighborhoods, but the current density of service in Brookline is the historical legacy of the way the city was built up -- around the streetcar lines, rather than vice versa.
This is why there is a right-of-way for the trolleys in the middle of Beacon and Comm, rather than the trolleys running on the same road along with auto traffic. A separate right-of-way has a lot to do with those trolleys still running.
Railways and Rights-of-Way
Medford has several roadways that have medians where they used to have streetcars. Other areas - including a lot of Somerville and other "underserved" areas have abandoned rail beds or rights-of-way that are used by abutters but never belonged to them.
That is what is sad about how the transit has been handed out ... many places do retain the corridors, but lack the transit.
Well, now, in Medford
I hear some folks out there don't want a rail line...
Yeah, I agree it's sad. It's also peculiar how current rail service misses some sections and saturates others. There are usually historical reasons, even if they're not good reasons.
One of the strangest things about that little map I ginned up is that you can see rail beds where trains would logically go in Dorchester and Somerville.
Dorchester rail lines
Like the Fairmount line?
indeed...
Regarding those in Medford who don't want the Green Line - there are many of us in Somerville who feel the same way. Consider a mash-up of your (awesome) map with real estate values. It's immediately apparent to me, anyway, that I couldn't afford to rent almost anywhere within the 1 mile circles. And that's fine with me - my location is well served by multiple bus lines, it's walking distance to virtually all amenities I could desire, and the time it takes to get downtown is comparable to almost anywhere on the B/C/D/E lines. In short, my neighborhood is doing *just fine* without T access, and I fear that the arrival of the T-crowd will finally push my rent beyond my reach. Then I really *will* be banished beyond public transportation range - how does that make sense?
Compare Medford Hillside with Malden Center/Oak Grove
The reason rents are high in the Medford Hillside/Somerville Teel/Ball Square area is ... students! Otherwise, why would a neighborhood of Medford and Somerville, some distance from I-93 and not within 1 mile of rapid transit, have property values and rents higher than the area around Malden Center and Oak Grove ... the latter being very tidy and much closer to 93 and to amenities like large grocery stores and more single family residences???
That's why I think the "oh but my rent will go up" is a bit of a ruse ... the factors pushing the real estate values in these areas (colleges, bus service, schools, colleges ...) eclipse the availability of transit and highway access when you compare them with areas that have similar types of real estate or even more single family homes, more amenities, closer access to the highway, and are on the Orange Line.
The lack of transit is a regional problem. It needs a regional scale focus. It is about economic growth and vitality in an entire area, not about what you believe despite stronger factors in evidence.
Trolleys ran down the median of Blue Hill Avenue
exactly the way they now run down the medians of Beacon Street, Commonwealth Ave, and Huntington Avenue today.
Now you're
Telling me something I didn't know.
Okay, Mattapan was robbed. That is such a logical place for a trolley it's a disgrace there isn't one.
Chelsea and Everett
Its amazing how close to downtown Boston Chelsea and Everett are, yet how relativly far away they are from any form of subway on the MBTA system. If you look at that map no other area so close to the epicenter of the subway system (The "square" in the middle of the MBTA map where all the lines intersect each other) is so void of subway stops.
They got route 1/Tobin Bridge and route 99/hub cap capitol of the world, running through their back yards. So they get all the traffic, and none of the mass transit.
Everett
There is a major shopping big box mall in Everett, right near the Earhart Dam.
Wellington Station on the Orange line is on the Medford side of the Malden River just opposite.
There is a ratty sidewalk and a narrow strip of broken concrete leading from one to the other. Meanwhile, the mall itself is a traffic planner's bad acid trip. Extremely bad set up to get in and out of the mall.
There is also no Orange Line service to Assembly Square, although it is said to be planned. The orange line runs right beside the mall.
Better access to either the renovated Assembly Square or the newer mall in Everett would be no brainers, one would think ... yet these link ups do not seem to have been planned into either development.
Dont even get me started on
Dont even get me started on the state of planning in Everett, especially in that area. You think that shopping center is bad, check out the new Best Buy. There was obviously little thought to the neighberhood which abutts directly to the parking lot. Considering it was built only a year ago it just doesnt make sense. Most communities, even Revere and Chelsea at this point, would have had a better mitigation plan for that area.
It's pretty clear that large
It's pretty clear that large parts of Boston could use a lot more T service. There are big empty spaces in Roxbury and South Boston for sure, but what about Hyde Park, Roslindale, West Roxbury, and Charlestown?
I'd vote for extending the Orange Line to any or all of these communities before I spent a dime building a tunnel under Centre St. in JP. As a more realistic alternative, I'd put up trackless trolley wires in every one of these neighborhoods.
I agree
At least, if you're going to build a tunnel to Aborway, why not continue it down Washington St or Hyde Park Avenue into Hyde Park and/or Roslindale.