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BPD shutting roads across city in bid to crack down on weekend ATVers, dirt bikers, partiers
By adamg on Fri, 05/27/2022 - 10:28pm
What began as a shutdown of the roads in Franklin Park Thursday nights through Sunday mornings has now expanded to numerous other street across Boston, BPD reports.
The department posted a list of streets it's now blocking with barriers between 10 p.m. on Thursday, Friday and Saturdays and 5 a.m. the following day, including the roads inside Franklin Park:
Dorchester: Talbot Avenue at Bernard Street. Westview Street at Westview Way in Franklin Field.
Jamaica Plain: South Street in the Arboretum between Washington and Bussey streets.
Mattapan: American Legion Highway at Blue Hill Avenue.
Newmarket Square: Newmarket Square at Southampton Street, Massachusetts Avenue and Theodor Glenn Way.
Roslindale/Mattapan: Canterbury Street from Walk Hill Street to Morton Street.
Roxbury: Hampden Street in the area of Norfolk Avenue and Howard Street. Proctor Street between Norfolk and Massachusetts avenues.
Neighborhoods:
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Comments
What about MBTA buses, and bicycles?
Some of these roads carry MBTA buses, such as #16 through Franklin Park, and #22 and #23 on Talbot Avenue.
Will these all still be open to bicycles? Seems like a good excuse for a Bike Party.
The 16
Does a big detour along Morton St. and Blue Hill Ave. rejoining the regular route around Columbia Rd. With no stops (that I've ever seen) along the detour. And do you really want to cross a public safety barricade to bike thru pitch dark Franklin Park at midnight on a Saturday?
Why wouldn’t it stop at any
Why wouldn’t it stop at any of the bus stops along the detour that serve other routes?
go right ahead
the highway men will have a field day knocking you and your friends off your bikes and disappearing into the night riding ... your bikes.
Road Closures
The road closures are not the answer some think they are to those riding illegal dirt bikes, ATVs, and having large non-permitted parties. They have caused law-abiding folks to have their MBTA buses diverted and then have to walk home at 1 AM. If I want to go out late, am working late, or have to take someone to the hospital and am driving my car, or riding a bus, I should not have to take roads that add an additional 10 to 15 minutes to my ride or cause me to add 40 minutes to walk home. I am not doing anything illegal. I sympathize with law enforcement, but blockades are not solutions. Many of those who are partying are not from Boston; they're from Brockton, New Bedford and Lawrence.
These same riders can be found in the Seaport and Back Bay on Newbury St. I don't see those streets being shut down.
Good
About time they got serious about shutting down these menaces.
Meanwhile, Cambridge City Councilors...
Are tapping foot saying, "wtf BPD, don't you know we have a Saturday closure issue ourselves and this is not helpful "
Adam - did you mean "it's NOW closing"?
.
Gah
Yes, thanks, fixed.
I was wondering why I just
I was wondering why I just woke up from falling asleep after I got home from work. I mean, it was such a REM sleep with no sound for so long I have what appears to be permanent pillow face. The sheets were'nt even moved. Where am I?
how is this doing jack squat about the ATV gangs?
These closures mostly seem designed to keep people away from parks at night. We all know the ATV gangs aren't limiting their activities to parks -- if they were, they actually wouldn't be nearly as big of a problem.
If they want to do something about the ATVs, they need deterrence, and they'll need to spend some money. They should start hunting these guys with helicopters and arresting them one by one, even if they have to chase them all night.
It’s a good start
They are limiting areas where they can congregate out of sight from the police.
If police policy is not to pursue in cars (for the safety of the public…?) then helicopters will do nothing. All they have to do is follow the laws on the books but they’re told not to for reasons that go beyond public safety.
In an effort to clamp down on drag racing, instead of putting up a speed trap on American Legion Hwy they decided to just make it a one lane road because someone was homesick from bizarro world.
Cities across the country have actively decided to allow dirt bike gangs to grow and fester because they refuse to arrest people that break the law in the name of some other greater good. It’s not working.
These riders have shown they will assault anyone they don’t like, from people with their children to the elderly. They truly are a menace to society.
speed trap?
what is that? i don’t think i’ve ever heard of one. is this something anyone has ever tried before?
Kidding, right?
On the off chance you're not kidding, a speed trap is when a cop sets up by the side of the road in a concealed location and aims the speed gun at vehicles passing by.
I think what they've seen in
I think what they've seen in other cities like Baltimore is that chasing them usually just increases the speed, risk, and number of riders. These kids all want to get videos of themselves running from the cops. I saw one video from a helicopter where the police had a huge dirt bike gang closed in from seemingly all sides on a freeway and the riders were throwing their bikes over guardrails and driving full speed into oncoming traffic and offroad to get away. Looked like a nightmare
Surely BPD knows that the "AT
Surely BPD knows that the "AT" in ATV stands for "all terrain" and the "dirt" in dirt bike means the bike can ride on dirt. If these barriers aren't accompanied by actual humans standing watch, ATV and dirt bike users will just go around them and have a party on their new semi-private closed street race track. The only people who will be kept out are regular people in cars, and the cops in SUVs responding to the inevitable disturbances.
Got the best sleep in weeks
Got the best sleep in weeks last night.
Wouldn’t it be really easy
Wouldn’t it be really easy for ATVs to get around a barricade?
Anectdotely the number of
Anectdotely the number of kids who get hurt riding these things is serious. They get broken ankles, burns and head trauma. Its a public health crisis for the young people riding them.
That’s nice.
But when is the BPD ever going to do something about the motorists that regularly speed while texting, run red lights and generally endanger everyone on every city street at every hour of the day?
Never. Because that is the status quo.
Bless your heart
It must be nice never seeing how these dirt bikers drive on the streets and sidewalks of Boston. Because if you have, you’d rethink how well you think the average motorist drives.
I see negligent motorists
I see negligent motorists each and every day of the week. Daily observations of sidewalk parking, bike lanes parking, crosswalk parking, speeding.
I see (well really hear) ATV riders occasionally. Maybe once a week.
Does something need to be done about lawless ATV use? Absolutely. But those ATV riders also drive just as bad as typical soccer moms.
Not even close
You’ve never seen the illegal atv riders then. I’ve never seen a soccer mom do a donut at an intersection outside the prudential while other soccer moms circle her. I’ve never seen a soccer mom block traffic against a red while other soccer moms drive by.
I see negligent bicyclists on a daily basis running red lights, riding through crosswalks, riding up a one way, etc and I would never attribute that behavior to even close to what the illegal atv guys do.
" I’ve never seen a soccer
" I’ve never seen a soccer mom do a donut at an intersection"
Plenty of skid marks in my neighborhood from negligent drivers. Plenty of dead people too.
"I’ve never seen a soccer mom block traffic against a red while other soccer moms drive by."
Annoying? Yes. Dangerous? Not really.
Dangerous drivers are the most present and most dangerous reality of greater Boston's roads.
Ask the school principal that got crushed by an overweight truck down the street from my house last year what she thinks. Oh wait.
Or any of these people
https://www.boston25news.com/news/local/driver-killed-after-crashing-int...
https://www.cbsnews.com/boston/news/milton-crash-brush-hill-road-2-dead-...
https://mspnews.org/2016/03/09/state-police-investigate-fatal-pedestrian...
https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2016/03/09/18-year-old-pedestrian...
Cant even find the other relatively recent driver killing a pedestrian on Brush Hill road. His memorial is still there tho.
Somehow drivers keep killing people in the same area, yet nothing is done. You want me to care about ATVs? lol.
Blocking traffic that has the
Blocking traffic that has the green so your gang can run the red?
Yes, dangerous.
Idiot.
Funeral processions are
Funeral processions are dangerous anarchy!
lol.
Send me your address
I’ll relay it to the biker gangs so they can ‘hang out’ in your yard.
You’re making the argument like I’m ok with bad drivers. I’m not. I’m also not ok with illegal bikers without insurance or any regard for the law. Both are bad and need to be stopped.
That is called corking
Pretty much every group bicycle ride does it, to keep the group compactly together. The group waits for a green light, then everyone goes through, regardless of subsequent light changes. That includes the Ride for Black Lives, last held two days ago in Roxbury and Dorchester.
Stop breaking the law because you feel like you
Own the roads. News flash - you don’t. Bikes don’t even pay registration or use taxes for the roads!
No.
No.
Unless the funeral procession is weaving in and out of traffic with the hearse and the flower car riding the stripe between two lanes of vehicles waiting for the red lights and revving their engines and stunting in front of people and popping wheelies and stands and doing donuts and other things likely to lose control of their vehicle; and Uncle Joe in his Camry up on two wheels with the orange FUNERAL tag hanging from his mirror at a 45 degree angle, then no it is not remotely the same thing.
Soccer moms drive the way they do …
… because their moms were “women drivers”.
Otherwise though, I applaud your post and willingness to respond to hopeless idiocy.
Well said.
Have you ever seen
A minivan driving down the wrong side of a road with a median?
Me neither, but I’ve seen enough dirt bike riders do that to conclude that you and Lee are utterly clueless about the matter.
"A minivan driving down the
"A minivan driving down the wrong side of a road with a median?"
Yes, tho substitute minivan for Tahoe. Soccer moms eschewed minivans 10-20 years ago.
This happens pretty regularly along Comm Ave, actually
In fact, Adam will often post pics of it when the person misses the wrong side of the road and ends up on the Green Line tracks instead.
Not quite the same
That's just confusion over the weirdness of that road.
I've been turning from Warren Street to Commonwealth Avenue and vice versa recently. That is not a fun intersection at all. I get the general idea of the Olmstead design of the road and how it is supposed to work, but from a traffic safety perspective, it's a mess. Let's be thankful the dirt bikers don't head over that way.
I don’t know whether to laugh …
…. or feel pity when I read your silly little scolds.
A bit of both.