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State sees light at end of tunnel
By adamg on Sat, 03/01/2014 - 1:12pm
Matt Conti went on a tour of the Callahan Tunnel yesterday at which state officials said they hope to re-open the tunnel after repairs no later than the originally scheduled date of March 12, but maybe even sooner.
Photo posted under this Creative Commons license. Tagged as universalhub on Flickr.
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Sumner Tunnel drill
Random sidenote: the Sumner Tunnel may be closed on the night of March 22 into the morning of March 23 as they complete a full scale emergency drill. There was recently a request for volunteers to participate.
Why can't they do the drill
Why can't they do the drill in the Callahan while it's already shut down?
A moment's thought generates possible answers
1) they would get in the way of the work going on?
2) they can't do a real drill if they can't run vehicles through?
3) they would rather get the tunnel back in use sooner and schedule the drill for off hours when it impacts fewer people?
The Callahan work might
The Callahan work might finish early.
Everyone's used to that detour by now. It's much better to reopen the Callahan one less day early, than to impose a surprise detour for the Sumner. And usually when major roads are closed for overnight construction in Boston, there's no signs until you're past the last exit where you could have avoided the traffic jam.
The "Just Shut It Down" approach seems to be working
After years of sloooooooooow moving construction projects that inched forward at positively glacial pace, it's nice to see the state giving in to the temptation to just throw up some K-rails / lock the doors and tell everybody to come back later.
Imagine if Arlington and State St. had been just shut down for long enough to throw construction workers at the problem, without having to maintain service?*
* This assumes anybody actually showed up to do work - which was a problem at Arlington, for sure.
Longfellow Bridge
I wonder how long it would take them to do the same thing to the Longfellow bridge. It would have a far greater impact on Boston due to the loss of the 1/2 the Red Line but if they could do the whole thing in 3-4 months instead of 2-3 years....