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As everybody flees snow, rush hour becomes crush hour on the T, local roads

Crowded Green Line trolley

Extreme snowy-headed smushing on the Riverside Line. Photo by Ari Ofsevit.

T riders and drivers alike reported hordes of people and crowds of cars going nowhere fast. T riders trying to get into their cars at the ends of lines reported slogs just trying to get out of garages and parking lots.

Haven't moved out of my parking spot in 30 minutes.

Abigail Taylor reports:

Snowly Moly! It just took me 50 minutes to get from Central to Somerville Ave on the 83. It's bad out there!

A.P. Blake commiserates:

25 minutes ago, my MBTA bus left the Haymarket busway. We have yet to reach the Charlestown Bridge.

Around 6:30 p.m., a car and a trolley collided at Central Avenue on the Mattapan High-Speed Line.

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Comments

What is the point of this? Things would have been far better if everyone just left work at their normal time. What is everyone fleeing from? As of right now it is snowing here in Boston, but it is certainly navigable and it is certainly not a blizzard, nor is it predicted to become one. Right now it's not even a storm. When did all this hysteria become the norm?

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The tweet was specifically for the Park St green line station, I took the red line and commuter rail home around 5:30pm and all seemed pretty much normal. As for traffic, snow is going to slow things down. Nothing unusual about that.

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I left at 5pm and the snow intensified as I headed home. It took me over an hour from Fort Point to Medford, largely because the traction was getting very bad on I-93, not because the traffic was much heavier than usual. The traffic was not keeping the roads clear and it was starting to pile up.

I have my doubts that you have been out in this at all. It was coming down quite fast during the 5-6pm time frame.It was difficult at times to keep the windows clear of snow as the wipers kept icing up (and this was true of other vehicles, not just mine).

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It's one thing for the weather forecasters to predict snow, and they do have the ability to tell if the potential for a major storm is there, but when they sensationalize it, like they always do, it gets way out of bounds.

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I mean, maybe not at this time, but this is pretty typical crowding on the north branch of the Orange line and the Red Line at 5:30 pm. It seemed to me that all the snow did was shift rush hour to about an hour earlier.

How was your commute last night?

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Poor AP.. I feel your pain. I get out of work at 4 and did my usual walk -> bus -> green line -> Haymarket connections pretty quick. My 111 LEFT at 4:25ish, but we didn't get on to the onramp for the Tobin bridge until 5:10, so 40 minutes to go maybe a 1/2 mile. I can't imagine what it was like at five or later.

Kinda glad I work an earlier shift sometimes. I can't wait until tomorrow morning though.. not.

(this is also why I gauge traffic before i leave work and head to the blue line, if its bad enough, I will walk from Wood Island or Maverick to Chelsea)

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I considered taking the Blue Line and catching a 119 or 411. But I always check the traffic maps whenever there's a chance I need to take the Blue Line. "Bah, Rt 1 doesn't look so bad, I'll take the 426!" Yeah... Rt 1 wasn't too bad because you couldn't get *TO* Rt 1!

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Any details? At Central Avenue - car hit trolley, or trolley hit car? Injuries to occupant(s) of car? I'm assuming the trolley occupants were safer.

Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com

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The southbound side of RT. 93 coming out of Boston is at a stand still. Looks like 1978, all that is missing is Shelby Scott

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My husband has been trying to get out of the Quincy Adams t garage for over an hour!

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Went out at 9:15 to Whole Foods near MGH. People are WF have nothing to do other than shut the store down early.
Lots of milk on the shelves! No cars on Cambridge St. Sort of looks silly to have a parking ban when there is just 3 inches of very fluffy snow. Snow fall is reduced to flurries.

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I was on that train! (Oh, I took that picture.) It actually moved perfectly fine; I just had in interesting vantage point of snowy heads after we picked up passengers at Longwood. By Reservoir there were seats to be had. 35 minutes from Park to Riverside, someone driving did it in 1:20. The T wins again (if you don't mind being a sardine for a few stops). Everyone was happy not to be driving or standing outside, it seemed, too.

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Transportation, both public and getting out of the city on the interstates, is getting so bad that my office now pretty much has a > 6in WFH policy. Two or so snoapocolypses got corporate to make this unwritten policy that sweeps the office every moderate storm now.

Pretty sad state of affairs.

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porno for the T gropers.

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Inbound from North Quincy to South Station from 8:00 to 9:00am..

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I got extra early and left extra early thinking it would be slow going... to my surprise. No one on the T, the roads are in pretty good shape, and I think the most frustrating thing was having to wait 10 minutes for the next bus at Lechmere (because I missed the other one by minutes..)

Of course I am at work over an hour early.. meh.

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I understand that some people must leave early to accommodate things like child pick-ups, but for the many others, why the hell do people continue to leave early and create these crush situations (we had one earlier this year, and the classic one in December of '07)? Why not just park yourself in a cozy pub with some cottage pie and a Guinness and chill for an hour or 2?

I left my office at 8 last night (no pub nearby, so I just worked) and sailed home on 128 and Rt. 9 at about 50mph. People who left my office at or before 5:30 just sat in ridiculous traffic (not one of them had a compelling reason to go home at that hour).

Incidentally, this morning was the best. commute. ever. The only thing that stopped me were two lights. Let's hear it for the weather people who scared the bejesus out of everyone and made life easier for the rest of us (of course, the next storm will be under-hyped and the knuckleheads will all get stuck in it again).

Lastly, I'm sorry to say that Mayor Marty is looking a little silly (and not like a strong New Englander) for cancelling both school and an important trip to D.C. today. I understand that you have to act on the best info you have, but I don't think he got the best info. This storm shaped up precisely how I expected it to, and I am not in the weather forecasting business.

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I doubt it was cancelled on his end. The whole eastern seaboard was involved and a lot of events were cancelled in DC for today. If he was flying to DC, his flight may have been cancelled - I know my boss shifted a flight to earlier in the day because the weather was likely to keep the plane from leaving Newark if he waited (this started earlier to the south).

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Try idiotic junket instead.

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As I recall, the meeting was of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, who were all there to say to the federal government something like, "hey, Jerkoffs, we represent the places where the vast majority of the people in this country live, and we need more resources to do things like repair badly neglected urban transit systems so that they can support continued economic growth." I'd hardly call that an idiotic junket (and, seeing how it is only a trip to D.C., not very expensive).

Also, when you are the (very) new kid on the block in your industry, you had damn well better get to know some of your similarly-situated colleagues or you're not going to have a chance in hell of getting any traction on the big issues facing cities around the country (and particularly in the northeast).

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Good thing I live within walking distance to work!

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