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Arborway motorists getting plenty of time to appreciate how smooth the new road is
By adamg on Mon, 05/11/2015 - 9:27am
Mark shows us the backed up new roadway alongside the old Casey Overpass this morning on the first workday that the overpass is shut towards Jamaica Pond.
Joe reports:
I drove East on Morton at 7:30. Looks like it was backed up to Blue Hill Ave.
The other side of the overpass is scheduled to be shut forever next weekend, so contractors can spend the next seven or eight months tearing the whole thing down to make way for a new set of surface roads.
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Comments
Using GPS apps that look at
Using GPS apps that look at traffic are pretty useful. Waze sent me down Seaver St. this morning instead, showing Casey to JP closed and roads around it jammed up.
Regular commute went from 20-25 min to 30min. So the world didn't end after all! It's not great now, but wait until the new, bigger road finally opens!
Glad it wasn't too awful. My
Glad it wasn't too awful. My nightmare scenario for this project is what happens if the backup down Forest Hills Street reaches critical mass... in the afternoon, traffic backs up down Walnut Ave, waiting to turn right onto Glen Road and then left onto Forest Hills Street. If the situation at the rotary gets noticably worse, that line might extend all the way down Walnut Ave to Columbus/Seaver, and then we're completely hosed, because there's no other way around Franklin Park.
The traffic problems
Stem mostly from Washington St, both directions. It's heavily congested, and narrow(very narrow in sections, then turns into broad blvd from LaGrange St. onwards towards Rt. 1). Then there's FH station and the buses. Adding Arborway traffic to this at street level will only make the situation worse.
Is that markedly worse than
Is that markedly worse than before when traffic would go over the Casey in that direction at 9 am? Not snarking. I don't go that way so I don't know the answer.
I've never seen it back up as
I've never seen it back up as far as Blue Hill Ave before (that's almost a mile and a half), but the area around this rotary is notoriously fickle about creating gridlock. This past winter, and again two weeks ago, I've seen Forest Hills Street back up all the way down to Egleston Square, and Forest Hills Drive frequently has ten-minute waits to get onto the rotary in the morning. The backups don't appear to have any rhyme or reason, but they are capable of jamming up everything from Columbus Ave in Roxbury down to Roslindale Square on a bad day. I'm less worried about what Day 1 looks like, and more worried about whether this becomes the new normal for 15+ months.
Give it a week
Today there are probably a lot of people who are taking an extra second or two to learn the new light cycles, crosswalks (i.e. where you don't yield to pedestrians because Boston) and the like. That compounds pretty quickly. Once people are used to where they can and can't run a stale yellow things will probably work better. The first couple of days should be the worst.
Yeah it was significantly
Yeah it was significantly worse. I've never seen Morton St and Franklin Field Road approaching the rotary that backed up. I was going in the opposite direction and was just amazed at how backed up it was. Complete nightmare.
Circuit Drive backed up just
Circuit Drive backed up just after the curve at the parking lot in Franklin Park. The usual is 2-3 cars stopped at the rotary waiting for the break. Was able to squeeze down to Forest Hills thou.
I count 18 cars in that picture
I wonder if that represents more than 20 commuters
Not a chance. People refuse
Not a chance. People refuse to carpool yet they wonder why traffic is so bad.
Why
Why drive to work with a friend when you can both just text each other from behind the wheel?
Of course
Of course someone who lives north of Forrest Hills in JP has lots of advice for commuters from Mattapan and Dorchester trying to get to their jobs.
Yep
Lots of folks (well) _nortth_ of Forest Hills seem to think this change is the greatest thing ever. I wonder what (tiny) percentage will have their daily lives affected?
I fail to see what that has
I fail to see what that has to do with anything. Carpooling is a smart way to reduce traffic and save on commuting costs yet most car drivers seem to prefer bitching about traffic than finding a way to carpool.
Carpool?
A smart way to reduce traffic is to build new and larger roadways!!!! Us car drivers pay over 40 cents per gallon of gas to repair, replace and maintain roadways! Not to eliminate them! The taxes have been mis-directed to public transit. (how did that work out this winter?). We also pay excise tax each year to maintain roadways. How much do bicyclists pay?
People who advocate car pooling must not have children or jobs where you cannot leave when the whistle sounds! If the school or daycare calls, you have 1 hour to get there!!!!!! Good luck taking the commuter rail back home!
The quickest way to get bigger and larger roadways
...is to move to Phoenix or Houston
Great idea
Yeah, definitely lots of room in J.P. and Dorchester to build new roads.
Nice try.
Nice try.
Drivers pay less than half the cost of the roads
http://www.masspirg.org/reports/map/who-pays-roads
Building Bigger Roads Actually Makes Traffic Worse
http://www.wired.com/2014/06/wuwt-traffic-induced-demand/
Not sure...
Where the idea came from that people who commute by bike don't ever drive. I own a car that I COULD drive if I wanted to sit in gridlock and get stressed out. I pay gas taxes, excise taxes, and property taxes.
I hear you on the daycare and school stuff, but the answer is not conjuring more roadways out of thin air. One of the beautiful things about the part of Boston we're discussing here is the amount of green space, which I'm sure you would agree is great for school-age kids.
It is not a matter of refusal...
When folks worked the old 9-5pm job it was easier to carpool. Now folks work all sorts of hours - hard to carpool when you are leaving at 5:00 or 5:30 and your potential carpool colleagues are leaving at 4:00, 6:30 or later (by way of an example) or may even work from home.
The backup extends past the
The backup extends past the edge of the picture, so we don't know how many cars were stuck in that jam.
Not too bad
I take the 21 bus to Forest Hills. It wasn't bad until we hit the rotary at Shea Circle. It took awhile to get across the rotary to 500 Arborway and then we had to wait through a couple of light cycles. The delays seemed to be due to folks not being used to the new set up and having to figure out which lane to be in. There's now a dedicated left turn lane which was blocked off by people who didn't want to turn left and had to merge right. Once the left lane opened the bus sailed right through.
Hosed-T
I came through there on a #16 around 5 pm on the way to Forest Hills. Circuit Drive was backed up to the Shattuck and we crawled all the way to Forest Hills Station. That took a decent 20 minutes if not more.
The problem is not so much the new configuration, it's the people trying to squeeze into the intersections when there is no room. Then the lights change and it gridlocks. Watched that happen for time we were trying to just get to the station from the surface road.
None of these signals are in sync and the pedestrian crossing cycles when activated make it worse.
The only solution to this will be to place police there at rush hours to manually keep the traffic flowing.
It has begun.
How about synchronizing the
How about synchronizing the lights?
With all the effort that went into planning this project, how did MassDOT forget to do that?
Those anti-car people must be right
Put down some new pavement, and people just get in their cars to go use it for no other reason. ;-)
Best biking day of the year
Mild weather and free breakfast!
Get some of those drivers onto bikes (as they are able) and things will move better.
I suggest you ride by the stopped
cars, knock gently on the driver's side window, and suggest just that. I am sure a hypothetical Mr. Jones, stuck in traffic, who is gently sipping on his coffee drink, will love to see your moral scolding smugness in the am.
????
Where is there moral smugness? She merely pointed out that it was a good time to bike.
Posting this is moral smugness: http://wot.motortrend.com/we-hear-automakers-to-build-cars-to-accommodat...
Why would I do that?
That would make me as slow and foolish as you are for sitting in traffic jams and attacking people for pointing out the obvious (and equating "nice day to bike" with "moral scolding").
This isn't about morals, this is about efficiently getting around a city that was not built for cars, and whose roads were initially paved for and because of cyclists. The best way to promote cycling is to do it. I've had a number of stuck-in-traffic motorists sipping their coffee roll down their windows and ask me about how to get started.
deleted due to double submission
n/t
I like your comment so much...
... that I uprated both of the times you posted it. ;-)
I do what I can, Michael! Thanks.
Swirls and I go way back; we have a complicated relationship. She thinks she knows everything about everything and well, I, tend to disagree (at least 9 out of 10 times).
I try to ignore her postings as much as possible....
... but when she starts pontifcating over MY part of town (when I know this is one place in the world she has not lived).....
Kerpan
LOL Kerpan :)
be nice to swirly. she's a value add to Uhub!
Your Part of Town
You mean Oklahoma?
If you want to play the MY HOOD game, remember that your SSN does not start with a zero, either.
You really are...
... intensely annoying.
That makes two of us, then
You have been extremely annoying today. Exceptionally annoying. Several people - not just me - tried to explain the same thing to you in different ways.
Interesting that you are attacking only me. With Kaz you moved the goalposts at least. I'm sorry if you hate losing arguments, but you have lost this one about sixteen ways - and gone ad hominem.
As noted in thread, you are not the only one living in your neighborhood, and others have successfully skirted the area in various ways.
I have lived in Boston or near it for over thirty years - considerably longer than you. I am quite familiar with the area around the Casey for various reasons (including hauling equipment for health studies between the medical area and various points south).
I was also around when they partially reconstructed this mess before, and was inconvenienced by it, too. There were very possibly fewer cars trying to get through the area then, however.
Hey, now
Mikey has gotten his Roslindale citizenship, while you would rather your city be annexed by Somerville than be a part of the same city where this overpass is causing the agita.
But the only reason I butt in is the last part. I'm still fuming that Waquiot Jr, who was born in the same hospital I was and to whom I had to use the Arborway to visit before he came home from the hospital, was given a non zero SSN. I mean, he's eligible for Irish citizenship but has had 3 generations born within the boundaries of Boston. Yet he didn't get the 0XX- SSN!
Whoh!
#1 and #2 sons got 01X SSNs! They were recycled, though - lower numbers than their grandparents had (born 1922 and 1932).
They must have run out of eligible ones. I wonder how long they have to wait to reuse them? Mine was lower than my mother's, too.
Morning Commute
I drive West on Morton so I had no problem, but East was nasty and it certainly was all the way to Blue Hill Ave. I would suggest that people find another route since it looked incredibly slow this morning. Don't go East on Morton if you can help it.
Finding another route
Some will, others won't.
I'm amazed at how many cars I pass on my regular commute when the road gets blocked up every now and then by something blocks away. People will sit there without considering other options and suffer and complain about how bad traffic was. Meanwhile, I'm one block over with no cars to be seen and rejoining their road after the cause of the backup. There are quite a few places in and around Newton where just learning a few side roads for the bad days would alleviate everyone's problems, but very few do.
But if this is the first week or two of a particular new traffic pattern, it's only a matter of time before more of the people stuck in that traffic figure out what else they could do to go around the problem.
There are not many (if any)...
... real alternatives that avoid the problems caused by this project. The DOT experts were pressed by meeting attendees to identify alternatives -- and they did not do so then -- and still have not done so.
you know why
As soon as they identified a route, everyone would go there and bother the people who live on those streets.
Consider this: why should they have to tell you anyway? There are these things called maps and atlases that work plenty well for finding routes around the deconstruction. You know where you are coming from. You know where you have to get to. They don't.
In any case, a demolition phase would have happened regardless of whether an at-grade or bridge solution was selected. Pinning this on "at grade" or saying "people who don't live here think it is good" is truly absurd at this stage. It had to happen in any scenario.
I suspect you have next to no familiarity...
...with the extremely limited traffic options of this part of Boston -- though I am sure you will tell us how you actually know more about this than any resident of the area.
There are certainly options
I live by the rotary, I entered via Cemetery road, sat in traffic for a few minutes trying to get BACK to Forest Hills Street.
I took an alternative route to Route 9.
I'd rather not state my route, but it was probably only 5 minutes longer than if the overpass had been open.
I suspect we can figure out some options also....
... the problem is that these are not likely to be adequate to deal with a significant amount of added traffic -- so either most folks are going to be stuck in traffic following old routes -- and if one does discover alternate low-capacity alternatives these will also become congested as more learn about them.
Then you need new alternatives
Way to move the goalposts. So, you can't take alternative routes, because they *might* get congested too?
Then find the next alternative. Look, until you're first driving to Canton in order to get to Cambridge, then you're still going to find a route that's better than your current situation. If you absolutely can't, then we've reached peak traffic and you're stuck no matter what you do, so you might as well stay on the Arborway. We're nowhere close to peak traffic.
If picking the best alternative on a day-to-day basis based on which alternative others have already clogged up seems like a chore (it is), then open Waze on your smartphone and let it do the work for you.
I depend on buses....
... and buses have almost no route flexibility. It remains to be seen just what impact this project will have on the bus system over the next 2 (or more) years. However, the reliability of the bus system will depend (in consierable) part on just how well individual motorists are handling things. (BTW -- why do you assume that most drivers have access to -- and know how to use -- Waze?)
good reason to have dedicated
good reason to have dedicated bus lanes
but oh wait, we can't have those because selfish motorists will throw a tantrum if anything is done to help bus riders
20 rich white suburbanites sitting in cars in the picture above are treated like kings, while the people on the bus can't even get an ounce of caring from politicos nor limousine liberals
pathetic
That's just nuts
How many buses along that area per day, given Forest Hills?
They could make HOV lanes if they didn't want an exclusion. That would help the buses and give people a reason to carpool.
Waze access
http://www.waze.com
There, now you have Waze access too.
I didn't say _I_ didn't have ....
... Waze access. I've got it on my phone. But I doubt that my bus driver will change his route based on whatever info I can glean from Waze. ;-}
New goalposts?
So, now the buses are the issue? I thought this started out as a discussion on why all the cars hadn't found a new route yet.
No, the broad topic is....
... the difficulties people are going to have when they have to interact with thecasey Overpass project. This involves drivers AND people taking buses to and from Forest Hills. You see, these are, like, right next to each other...
Can I take this one
Kerpan is affected because once a day he hops on a bus by his house and takes it to Forest Hills, completing the trip in reverse over 8 hours later. His concern is his commute being lengthened 5, 10, 15, or whatever x minutes is on a long term, possibly permanent basis. That none of the drivers of the cars that will be blocking his bus can figure out an alternative route is beyond anything he can do. His bus driver might realize that instead of turning onto Metropolitan Ave, he could go downhill to American Legion Highway, taking a left at Walk Hill Ave, and somehow get to Forest Hills, but the driver is kind of bound to keep on the route that is in the schedule.
There are a lot of non-drivers that will be affected by this.
I don't think bus riders count....
... but thanks for your support. (Screwed-up Washington St. and/pr Hyde Park Blvd traffic can add a half hour or more to the trip -- up until not too frequent, but VERY painful when it does happen).
Also note that if a bus gets
Also note that if a bus gets stuck in 30 minutes of traffic, it doesn't just make the people on that bus 30 minutes late. It screws things up for everyone who will board that bus later on the route, as well as on future trips, potentially for the rest of the day.
Bussey to Alendale?
Can you still take the right on South up by the State lab?
That is also a huge choke
That is also a huge choke point.
It backs by on Centre St and I have sat on South Street for many light cycles...
Not exactly true
But, by all means, persist in your lament about your lost bridge. We can make a country ballad out of it if you get it to rhyme.
I've biked in, around, and through this area on roads that avoid that overpass en route to the South Shore or to join family at destinations in the area after working in the Medical Area, so I know such streets are there.
There may not be streets that you like to drive when you harbor the mistaken belief that having a car means getting to go highway speeds everywhere. However, you can drive them at low speeds, stop at all the stop signs, and get where you are going much faster than sitting in traffic on the most direct route.
This is one of the advantage of being a motorist who is also a cyclist: getting to know the back roads and streets around almost anything within a 50 mile radius. Sorry if that offends your pride in never looking at a damn map, but your comments belie your ignorance without my having to say anything.
My wife knows virtually road in the area,,,
... (not an aptitude I can claim0 -- and she is at a loss as to how traffic can be re-routed/re-directed in anything resembling an effective (and non-painfuil) manner. Maybe you can come down to Roslindale and Mattapan and Hyde Park and teach everyone there how to get around better.
Tell me where you want to go
I'll help you out.
Otherwise, you have yet to explain how the DOT planned to "magic" a bridge into place without the disruption of demolition.
What is going on now has shit-all to do with the final decision for the at-grade solution.
You also haven't explained why you expect me to pay a premium from my state taxes to build and maintain your special vanity sculpture if it has nothing to do with my life.
You really are something
You really are.
My anecdote
I started off with my own anecdote (which is in Newton) because this isn't a problem with Roslindale/Mattapan/Hyde Park. This is something I've observed all over the city (clients always seem to be in the busiest places). People memorize a few routes and then don't give consideration to the fact that if they'd just leave the route (that everyone else has memorized) when things are bad, then they'd get there faster.
Remember, this isn't "what I'd do every day". It's what you do when the option is to just sit in traffic and grumble. The Arborway is absolutely the best way to go from Mattapan to Longwood. No argument. However, if my option for the 5 miles is to crawl at 5 mph for an hour or add 3 extra miles but go at 15 mph and get there in 30 minutes, I'll take the latter, thanks.
From my perspective
the issue today was traffic headed east to west.
There are plenty of ways to take, north and south the overpass, that are less painful than what was experienced by most motorists around there today.
They aren't quite parallel, and they may seem painful, but I'd rather drive 10-20 MPH slower consistently than sit in a stalled traffic pattern.
Forest Hills is a choke point
If you were an invading army, this is a place you would want to control.
To the West, the Arnold Arboretum. To the East, Franklin Park and the cemeteries, mainly Forest Hills cemetery. The main arteries from Hyde Park and Roslindale to downtown converge at this point. And of course the Orange Line ends here. A lot of us might disagree on what the state is doing, but we will agree that the area is snafued most days, with things like snow making it worse and in at least the short term this will not be helping the situation.
Someone going from Mattapan to Longwood could go up Route 28, but that is a very congested route to begin with. And guess what? From Morton Street Blue Hill Ave has Franklin Park as it's left side about the whole length.
Another option, get to Cummins Highway. At the Square (Roslindale's mini choke point) either swing around Adams Park and approach Centre Street that way, which, if enough people choose this, will block inbound traffic due to an odd gridlock coming from a traffic light essentially at a rotary. Conversely, just stay on Washington Street to Archdale and get to Centre going through the Arboretum. That leads to more traffic on a 2 lane road that is dealing with all the problems the construction is causing at Forest Hills, which is the origin of the need for a new route.
Hyde Park to Longwood? Well, just go through the Stony Brook Reservation, which has a 4 way stop sign right in the middle. I once was dumb enough to drive through there during rush hour. I like 4 way stops, but they cause backups.
No way it's true
This isn't the only road between two cities like you might find in the midwest somewhere. This city is a tangled web, but it's still a web. At some point, you're far enough back in the back-up to find a turn off and sitting through the delay will be quickly outweighed by doing 25 mph somewhere else less congested and flowing.
Given two addresses, Waze or Google Maps will tell you your alternative. People either don't know or are too stubborn or are too scared of finding alternatives and instead go with what they know and let it ruin their day.
Example: If you're using the Arborway to get to Longwood, go further north first then hang a left and head through the back side of Mission Hill.
You don't seem to realize....
... that this project is basically going to create a huge (virtual) barricade for anyone going north from Roslindale and Hyde Park at the start of each workday (and vice versa, at the end) -- at least as long as destruction and construction is going on. The best people can hope for is that once it is done in two years (if all goes as scheduled), the situation will return to semi-normal.
Ignoring the point
Given this new situation, people have two choices. Keep using the road even though throughput is completely reduced to near nil. Or, pick a new route that may be longer and maybe even seem in some ways to be pointlessly out of the way, but still gets there faster because throughput is high.
There are MANY north-south roads leaving Roslindale/Hyde Park. This was just the most convenient and fastest for getting to the Fenway/Longwood area and beyond. The park/cemetary/arboretum sure make sure of that. But that is no longer the case. Pick a new road. Until the earth opens up from Needham to the Harbor, there's no such thing as a barricade to get north of Hyde Park.
You will always be right that whatever alternative route someone gives you "won't be as good as the Arborway on a good day". Well, you don't have a lot of good days in your near future. There are other approaches to the area that are better than the Arborway is currently however. That seems to be lost on you though.
Kaz. it's not a matter of "not as good"...
... it's more that any "escape routes" are going to be _much_ longer -- and would work even less well if too many people tried to use them.
Not limited to motorists
The Dig has an article bitching about biking on Beacon St. Somerville, which sucks for everyone right now because it is under construction and they aren't repairing potholes.
However, there are several bike-appropriate ways around the problematic stretch on either side of Beacon, which I have been using since construction started. One need only look at a map, or ask another cyclist and follow. They add maybe a quarter to a half mile - 5 minutes at most.
This wasn't a terribly map literate population in the old days before smart phones, but it seems that GPS has made people blind to the options that a computer program developed in California really can't understand as being valid.
Yeah, Beacon is pretty bad
It surprised me recently after not having driven on it in months. Sigh. I broke my boycott of Cambridge to see Ex Machina at the Kendall. Only some of Arlington's private roads or ones in Everett have been that bad!
dayum...
I just love that bike path next to the cars...empty
the best car is a stopped car (providing of course that there is at least a 30 inch space thru which to pedal...)
Is that fair?
What, people who live in Mattapan, Dorchester and beyond should ride 5+ miles to get the Longwood area or to jobs/classes and the colleges?
Whose bridge is the new whose foods I guess.
So you love you some bridge
Please explain how a new bridge would have been built without this detour and demolition phase.
Also, 5 miles is a pretty optimal cycling commute - 1/2 hour, even for slow geezers like me. I used to ride 10 each way through the core of the city to get to those same places because the MBTA sucked.
As for "people living North of here", well, we'll get ours when they take down that rotting useless concrete mess in Somerville and connect the city back together at human scale.
I'm referring to people in JP
Not Medford.
My comment was not really pro-bridge as much as thinking it was a shitty take by Teric to mock people who are stuck in traffic because they can't ride a bike. I'm willing to wait to see how it works out but I think to insinuate that people are to blame for not car-pooling or biking is to ignore the realities of how this project is going to impact folks. I'll certainly be driving northward through south Brookline more often and hope that this is all sunshine and roses in 2 years.
I think it's really reductive on your part to assume that most people can ride 5 miles with one significant hill in the middle as a daily commute. Bike commuting is great and I'm all for it but I don't sneer at those who can't. Let's not plan urban infrastructure with the assumption that the bike is a cure-all. It's a portion of the solution, that's it.
doesn't have to be everyone
doesn't have to be everyone
if 5% of those drivers sitting alone in their cars switch to bike or mbta then it will probably completely unjam any backups
maybe even 1% or 2% would do
research has shown that it is usually a very small percentage that leads to traffic jamming
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/02/cell-phone-trackin...
of course if conditions improve then people will start driving again and then cause congestion again
funny how that works
was not a mock..
...it is a reality. Look we can keep building roads and bridges to get people from Mattapan to wherever but do you really think traffic is going to get better with more roads?...how do you think it's worked in LA when they added two lanes to the freeways in each direction to create more capacity...guess what: more volume...couldn't have expected that, right?
we don't need more roads and streets, we need more viable alternatives especially for the folks you are concerned about...
anyway my commute on a bike ain't no picnic from HP to downtown: 8 miles via Blue Hill Ave or Hyde Park-Washington (and I'm old): pick yer poison. sure, I love stopped cars: gives me a fighting chance to survive!...no snark there...(and if I have to drive, nothing could be worse!)
too many cars folks, no matter how many roads. and I know lotsa folks who drive but could just as easy take public trans and free up the roads.
Why yes I DO think they should bike 5 miles
I bike 5.5 miles to work just about every day. When the whether is as nice as it is now and the traffic is as bad as it is, it's the most logical thing in the world.
That's actually a temporary
That's actually a temporary sidewalk made of asphalt. There are no temporary bike paths as part of the construction.
Bike Snark
I think most comments suggesting travel by bike may come off as evangelical or patronizing to people who would never think of it as an option. If it's not your thing, I get it. But before you dismiss it outright (or dismiss the idea of finding a slightly longer but less-congested drive) remember that at least it's some kind of alternative option to sitting in gridlock for the next two years until this thing is done.
The debate is over and it's happening, so you can either complain about it or try and think of a way to ameliorate the situation going forward.
From the guy who bikes 9 miles to work most every day to avoid traffic, and doesn't like to enflame the simmering tensions between drivers, pedestrians and cyclists.
Mentioning cycling = moral scolding
Didn't you read up thread?
Just saying "it is a nice day to bike" and noting that free breakfasts are available for cyclists (and cop-lead rides from all directions, too) is equivalent to 10,000 Hitlers!!!!
Internet law check
Did swirly just lose the argument?
I rode my bike today to avoid the gridlock
I normally ride the bus up washington...
I ended up riding through dorchester on columbia - do not recommend - people were really nasty and I had crazy tailgaters honking at me for no reason (seriously - there was very little traffic - there are two lanes plus a bike lane, and this guy was driving in the bike lane behind me and honking when he could have very easily gone around me). I'll be taking the SW corridor from now on - I'd rather deal with obnoxious people on hubways than people who seem to not have legit drivers licenses.
Bike lanes
Not to Zak this topic, but I think possibly the worst menace on our roads today are the people who walk in bike lanes. Not the 'bike lanes' at the Pond, but the actual painted on the street next to the parked cars bike lanes. What is wrong with those people?
you have a right to the road
don't be intimidated
there are assholes out there but he didn't do anything but make noise that can't hurt you
slow down and stop if necessary
either he will pass you or he will stop and continue to be a dick
then you get his license plate number / car appearance and call 911 - don't be shy
his behavior is unlawful and constitutes assault
and if he's driving erratically then also report him as a potential drunk driver
if he gets out of the car don't engage just leave and tell the 911 operator that as well
In 1990 or so
the Casey Overpass was closed for repairs for at least six months. They did repairs and removed bricks from the bridge span to reduce the weight. I remember some gloom and doom conversations about traffic but after the closure, there didn't seem to be a lot of to-do about traffic. The world didn't end.
Unfortunately there are more cars now. But people usually figure it out. There is already a lot more traffic on Centre St. between Murray Circle and the Faulkner. But that has been going on for awhile, and I assume from those who no longer wanted to make the bumpy ride over the Casey.
People should look at a map and devise an alternate route for the foreseeable future.
One key difference
If my memory serves correct- there were police officers directing traffic, so the human element prevented total chaos.
Also, in the end there was an overpass. And if you don't know my view on that, you haven't been paying attention. But yes, the long term is much more important than today or this week or even this month.
I've been paying attention
and know that while I usually agree with you on most issues, on this one we don't agree. I haven't found the issue too divisive among myself and friends who don't agree. We agree to disagree.
So there were no officers directing traffic this morning? Too bad. Just two weeks ago they changed the traffic pattern in front of Landmark Center leaving the city for the Riverway and I found myself in the wrong lane going home. After a couple of days, most people seemed to catch on. I hope they try to help move the traffic at Forest Hills.
No idea on today
But you would hope that there would be some traffic direction.
As for the controversy, I don't mind the disagreement. I just hate the extremists, and yes, that would include Ferris and the "social justice" crowd just much as the people who think that Olmstead's vision of the space between the Arboretum and Franklin Park did not include the giant rail viaduct that was there from the 1850s until the 1980s. Agree to disagree. I hope you're right, but I fear I'll be.
you guys should knock it off...
...yer being wayyy too civil
That's probably because
We never went to any of the meetings.
Ah, JP.
Once
I did go to the first update meeting held in January. (I wasn't part of the planning or working groups.)
I didn't go to the one last week because I couldn't face sitting through all the yelling etc. I'm grateful to Adam for filling us in.
But I think if I was sitting next to Waquoit all would be okay between us. Just a hunch.
Evening rush hour today...
Traffic was backed up in my neighborhood, along the southwest corridor, on Lamartine St. in JP, from Green St. to Center St., and on Amory St., from Green St. to Columbus Ave. Everyone was heading in the direction of Forest Hills which I can only imagine was gridlocked.
I'm afraid it's going to be a nightmare for years!