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New restrooms could be just the start of giving South Station an airport feel
By adamg on Fri, 10/18/2013 - 3:20pm
MassDOT today released a drawing with one idea of what the interior of the new South Station could look like when the postal annex is moved somewhere else.
The llighter, airier feel envisioned by the rendering would seem to rule out the mixed-use tower once proposed to be built atop the station. In a post to go with the rendering, MassDOT's Klark Jessen writes:
MassDOT has listened to its customers - the daily users of South Station - and is now exploring design concepts for an expanded South Station that include more light; more open space inside the station; better connections to surrounding neighborhoods; better services and facilities for passengers; better use of technology for passenger information; and waiting areas that are safe, comfortable, and easy to find. Over time, South Station will become more than a rail station: it will feature a great civic space, public venues, shopping, restaurants, and other amenities. The design team is looking for feedback about what you would like to see in the expanded station.
Earlier this week, the company in charge of retail space inside the station announced airport-quality restrooms would be added to the station.
Back in the old days inside South Station
Old photo from the BPL railroad photos collection; posted under this Creative Commons license.
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Comments
Yes!
Looks great! Although, I'm sure there'll be much more advertising banners.
Can we haz original turn of
Can we haz original turn of the century South Station rebuilt with shed instead of generic modern anywherezitecture?
Great suggestion!
Notice how the old style (around the world) was to have open airy train platforms! Looks to have provided many jobs for window washers too, though today, its an opportunity for robotics.
http://www.flickr.com/photos
http://www.flickr.com/photos/boston_public_library...
http://www.shorpy.com/node/7451?size=_original
http://ia700301.us.archive.org/BookReader/BookRead...
http://ia700301.us.archive.org/BookReader/BookRead...
http://ia700301.us.archive.org/BookReader/BookRead...
why?
it wouldn't accommodate any of the new uses and expanded tracks. You can save that for you miniature train set.
Here's an idea - why can't we have original turn of the century roads where there were still bridal paths and bikeways and trolleys? and more importantly - NO CARS.
South Station had 28 tracks
South Station had 28 tracks originally. That was significantly more than currently exist.
I hope less noise pollution is included...
Presently sitting in waiting area listening to a safety message droning on a loop...there is a high production quality safety video that is far too long, constantly repeats so in terms of being a real public service message it misses the mark since people eventually tune out the droning, though it remains annoying. Keep it short, sweet, then turn it off!
Noise pollution inside and out
Diesels idling on the platform can be extraordinarily loud, especially the ones that seem to be switching engines that aren't the usual commuter rail locomotives.
Great!
Where will they put the platform for the North/South connec.....yeah, no way I can finish that sentence
Thank God it's an airport feel
and not anything that looks like Logan!
Impossible angle?
Supposedly, this would be a view of the new expansion. But the angle would imply a view from somewhere close to Atlantic Ave side of the station, between Essex and Summer. I can't wrap my head around the layout here. Which is important, for passenger flow and all.
Yes
I noticed that too. If you look on the link to the full sized picture, you can see the old SS building on the left. This is definitely where the marble staircase and ramp are that leads into the station from Atlantic Ave. (where all the homeless hang out)
Also remember the Stone & Webster building is unlikely going to move (i'd be real surprised if MassDOT could convince them to move so they could demolish the office building there) so any view from that side really wouldn't have the existing building in it because there's not much of a gap between the S&W building and the NE side of South Station sooo, this view has to be from Atlantic Ave.
Looks like they are going to push the tracks back (toward the bus station) and just enclose a much larger area of the the current track area for the lobby.
And as far as the escalators.. if you read the signs it says "Commuter Trains" and an arrow pointing down, so one would assume that the commuter trains are on the old tracks (if this is a view from Atlantic Ave), and another sign that says "Amtrak Trains" and an arrow pointing up, so one would assume it means go up the escalator (to a walkway) to the new tracks (and possibly Dorchester Ave), most likely where the postal facility is now.
I'm sure its done this way to help keep Amtrak Passengers in one area, and Commuter Rail Passengers in another and give both clear passages from the street(s) to the different track sets.
Also notice how there's staircases connecting to each platform near the trains so one would also assume that much like an Airport where there are secure gates, it would be the same for trains. (I'm sure some of the design is keeping security in mind, as South Station is pretty open right now..)
I'd also like to see MassDOT upgrade the bus station part of South Station too. Yeah the bus station was built in 1995, but its clearly over capacity too these days (yeah I rides buses...) . It needs more berths because of the volumes of new bus services (Bolt, Mega, Dartmouth, etc) that have been added to the bus terminal since the station was built in '95. It just could not handle yet another bus company that required more berths. (of course it did not help that Mumbles required all buses, including the chinatown buses, to use the bus terminal and not city streets (or Back Bay Station).
blah blah blah.. :)
Stone and Webster building isn't going anywhere
Fidelity has moved their headquarters there even though their official address is still 82 Devonshire Street. I doubt the Johnson family is going to give up space for the good of the common people.
No security theater please!
Amtrak will likely always depart from the middle platforms since it can head towards Back Bay with minimal conflict. Also there's no reason to separate passengers. Not that that would stop Amtrak from doing so -- they're notoriously stupid: just look at NY Penn Station.
Airport Security Theater is mostly stupid in airports, and it's extraordinarily stupid in train stations. There is no reason to do it. Again -- Amtrak is stupid, Congress is stupid, the TSA is stupid, so it might happen because people don't know better. But there's no sane reason to do it. Trains are not planes. Trains are on tracks (duh!), they're computer controlled (or monitored, at least), and there's not much a hijacker can do to one. The bigger threat to a train comes from outside the train, along its tracks, not from inside.
Real train stations should permit the easiest and fastest passenger flow between street and platform possible, with least amount of confusion.
Not Necessarily
...If the tower goes above the main entrance, more towards the street. It wouldn't be as open as close, but they could easily do this towards where the escalators would be to bring you to an above the rails concourse which would lead into a large building to the south.
Reconnecting the west side of the fort point channel with Southie would also be a nice development.
A couple of questions
Is a European company building this new station? The clock is in military time (19:53) which seems odd for a rendering of an American building, especially one that is so reliant on time. Side note: If the clock is in military time, it'll be chaos if the arrival/departure times aren't.
Where does those escalators go? Is it a viewing area? Stairway to Heaven?
Where does those escalators
I was wondering that myself. I suppose one could stand up there to get a bad view of the trains.
Supposedly
Crosses over the tracks diagonally and to the current lobby. But see: my previous comment. The angle of the trains is wrong. It looks like we're in the present lobby looking towards the walkway to the expansion lobby.
Let's Hope So
They seem to be so much better at it than we are, at least for the last hundred years. Of course if it's run by the same people who run it now, we'll still have the same issues.
Yes, but will they be able
to still make the place smell like dried urine?
Is it true their plans will
Is it true their plans will include a pastry shop on the second concourse level or is this is just pie in the sky ?
Well, that's pretty awful.
Well, that's pretty awful.
Based on the rendering, as well as the somewhat more helpful cutaway rendering here, which I think corresponds to it, and a non-cutaway rendering at the Globe, I really do not know what the hell they're thinking. (But this would explain why the trains are so far away, and at such an odd angle)
The stupid skyscraper is still there, just pushed off to the side on Atlantic Av. And the ugly-as-sin 245 Summer St. building isn't torn down and replaced with more of the low station headhouse that used to be there, until it was demolished.
South Station's achilles heel has always been that it's a stub end terminal, i.e. there's no connection further north, and the single good thing about that was that it was really easy to get to the platforms because the trains all stop next to the waiting room, on the same level. Well, this design throws that away for literally no good reason, and now everyone would have to go up those escalators, along a concourse, and then down another set to the platforms. Given the MBTA's record for escalator maintenance, and how much traffic South Stn. gets, this would be a disaster. Plus it's inconvenient as hell for long distance travelers with wheeled bags, and long distance train travel is precisely what we need to be working on promoting!
Plus, you just know there's not only no provision in this plan for putting in any North South Rail Link infrastructure while they're doing foundation work anyway (just to make it easier in case they ever build the rest -- preferably with an additional set of four-tracked subway tunnels, while we're at it), but that this would probably manage to kill any possibility of ever building the NSRL without tearing all of this crap out.
Well, that would certainly make it typical for Boston and the T.
If they absolutely must build a skyscraper, they could at least have the decency to build it on the south side of the (also crappy) bus station, where there's plenty of room, there's no real issue with the sightlines in the train station's waiting room and platforms (perhaps it's romantic of me, but I think a good view of the train, ideally in a big train shed, is helpful for getting people to use trains more. The great European stations are excellent examples), and the plans for the NSRL only require a few tunnels in that area, which could be dug along with the foundations, rather than massive caverns to put platforms in. Some sort of entrance at Atlantic and Kneeland could be figured out, I'm sure. Meanwhile, 245 Summer St. could be torn out and, and the station headhouse could be rebuilt and extended to wrap around the rest of the north and east sides of the block. Restored tracks and platforms on the surface would be in the area inside the new perimeter, and the upper floors could be leased as offices. Maybe pretty up the Pike ventilation structure on Dorchester Av. too.
Any mention of
Perhaps making it so that, to get to the bus terminal from the train station, you don't have to walk down the train platform next to Atlantic Avenue? It's bad enough to have to navigate past a loading or unloading commuter train, but there's waste receptacles and scaffolding that make the platform even narrower, especially if you have luggage.
Always irked me that they didn't open up that part right along the sidewalk to make a direct pathway to the bus terminal...
separate entrance
The bus terminal has its own entrance, if you like, close to Beach Street.
more details than you wanted about the trek to the bus terminal
Pick your poison: the crowded walk down the Track 1 platform, or dodging the aggressive panhandlers on the Atlantic Avenue sidewalk.
At least they added a direct staircase from Track 1 to the bus terminal lobby. You used to have to waste time zigzagging down the ramp.
For the first few years after the terminal opened, there was a sign pointing to the Red Line and Commuter Rail, which directed you to a dead end with a great view out the window to South Station. They finally gave up on the plan for an enclosed bridge (or walkway inside the proposed skyscraper over the tracks?), and took down the sign.
So wait, they are moving the
So wait, they are moving the Post office?