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Pickup, bus collide at tricky Roslindale intersection
By adamg on Mon, 01/09/2017 - 8:57am
Around 7:30 a.m., Chris found himself stuck behind this collision at Bussey and South streets in the Arboretum. The Globe reports a bus monitor was taken to the hospital for observation and that the one student on board was uninjured.
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Comments
An intersection that
An intersection that residents have asked the city to fix many times to no avail. Even just making it an all-way stop sign would improve it. Sigh.
Agreed.
Drivers fly down South Street there as if they're on I-93. With the City's new 25 MPH default speed limit, a stop sign there (as well as just down the street, at the intersection of South St and Blackwell Footpath/Hemlock Hill Rd, which is a major pedestrian crossing) would go far in passively enforcing the new speed limit.
Been there, done that
There has been an all-way stop posted on and off over many years. People take the signs down or they get knocked down by accidents like this.
The stop sign in the middle of the small island on Bussey has been wiped out dozens of times , and for a while the island itself was removed as a hazard to the people that scream down Bussey St late at night, often a DUI / OUI waiting to be caught.
The broader issue is a lack fo any electrical power at that location. Before the city can install lights they need to install power and, It's not just running an extension cord from a nearby streetlight. We're talking dropping in something from Archdale Rd.
That said, the blind approach from the Forest Hills end of South is one of the other serious problems.
Those roads were never designed to support the traffic that passes through there on a given day. The traffic is the result of urban sprawl, area construction as people seek to avoid gridlocks, and newbies learning the shortcuts.
Last question... why are school buses allowed to be using that very narrow road (South) anyway.
Someone lives there?
This doesn't look like a standard school bus, but a lift-equipped bus (although that may be an illusion of the angle of the photo). Those don't pick up kids at the corner on a major roadway. They have to go to the student's door. South is the only way into that entire area, anyway.
'In the Know'
That intersection has had an all-way stop sign before? When? I don't remember ever seeing that. I only recall a stop sign for drivers on Bussey St.
Even if true, the fact that some signs get knocked down doesn't mean you don't put them up....
Yeah, an intermittent stop
Yeah, an intermittent stop sign would be unbelievably terrible. People would remember the former signs, and would expect traffic on the other street to stop.
Seconded
This intersection has been my commute for the last three-ish years and there has never been an all-way stop here - just the stop on Bussey, which makes things real interesting when someone coming up South from Rozzie wants to turn left and doesn't get that they technically have right of way, since they don't have a stop.
You're making stuff up. Or misremembering.
There has never, at least in the past 25 plus years, been an all-way stop there. When mandated traffic control devices disappear, get taken out, or knocked down, they usually get replaced as soon as possible.
Its a shame that this street
Its a shame that this street exists in the first place. Why is there a road going through a park? Its impossible to get away from cars in this city.
Are you familiar with how these lands were conserved?
Rich people had these estates, and sometimes had sprawling land holdings. It became fashionable to build carriage roads through those lands for recreational riding.
When it later became fashionable to leave those lands for conservation purposes (what happened with the Fells, also), the carriage paths sometimes became the roadway network through the area. Not all of them were conserved like they are in Acadia National Park - some ended up like the roadways along Spot Pond in Medford/Malden/Melrose/Stoneham. They were simply not designed for motor vehicle traffic in the first place - just a slow carriage ride.
In many cases, it isn't as simple as "they put a road through a park". Oftentimes, that was a roadway through farmland that later became a park, meaning the roadway was there first. Some of these roads predate the park by centuries.
Yep, the roads were there first
At least South Street has been there for a long, long time. Bussey has been there since before Old Man Bussey willed his land for what became the Arboretum, as well.
They've also been re-aligned before for safety reasons, specifically, after the Bussey Street train disaster (at the point where what is now Archdale Road meets the current incarnation of South Street).
Also, all of Olmsted's parks
Also, all of Olmsted's parks include scenic, curving roads as part of the design. The first design document was titled "Map of Proposed Arboretum Showing Its Outlines and Local Connections,
with a Study for Public Drive Passing Through It."
Of course there were no cars in 1879. But opening up the site to the public by allowing carriages to drive through was an important part of the original vision.
Providence Road
Considering that South Street is the original road from Boston to Providence, my hunch is that it was laid out by John Winthrop's horse while riding out to meet Squanto or something similar. Probably not a park at the time ; ).
How'd that truck get like THAT?
He must have slipped on ice or something to be in that position and astride a median.
Indeed.
There's no road coming from "pure left" -- it's a three way not-quite T intersection. The back of the truck is practically perpendicular to a stone wall on the other side of Bussey.
Anyone know the play-by-play on this one?
sure, it went like this
"oops"
"aw shiii"
"f*** my life"
Terrible
Terrible intersection for pedestrians especially. Every time i cross there i feel like i'm taking a huge risk.
Why doesn't South Street have
Why doesn't South Street have a sidewalk? Bussey has one, and then it just ends at this intersection.
South has goat paths on both sides, so people are clearly walking there.