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Protesters gather in Dewey Square for march to the Common
By adamg on Fri, 01/20/2017 - 4:21pm
Steve Abreu looked out his window shortly after 4 p.m., when anti-Trump protesters who gathered there began to march towards the Common.
Meanwhile, scores of state troopers traveled to the South Boston convention center this afternoon to go over plans for protecting the much larger march planned from the Common down Comm. Ave. and back to the Common.
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Comments
Ugh
I understand the right to protest, and although I usually don't agree with most of protests over the past few months, I applaud people speaking up for what they believe. However, not saying it is happening in Boston, I don't understanding the vandalism or block the streets for hard working men and women to get home after a long work week. Your upset Trump was elected? That's fine, but don't screw up my life over it, go protest in the Common.
Did you bother reading the story?
That is where they were headed. Dewey is a wide open plaza, too.
Please elaborate....
How is your life being screwed up over this particular protest?
"Uggh, don't throw that tea
"Uggh, don't throw that tea in the water. I wanted to drink it after a long work week."
The streets are made for and paid for by the people. They were used by protesters long before cars were invented. If you don't want to deal with people on foot then stay out of cities, which were designed for people, not cars.
Designed for people?
Or horses?
People
There weren't that many horses, and most were involved in hauling things or for city services or trolley duty. Private horses for carriages existed, but only the wealthy used them.
Most people just walked everywhere or took public transit.
Public transit
Back in the horse days?
Yes, there were horse-drawn streetcars before electrification
and also stagecoaches.
Omnibus!
Horse-drawn Omnibuses, too!
Although I don't know if these were used in Boston, they were the original form of public transportation in 1600s Paris.
Yeah
during the tea party, we didn't have a say on who the ruler was, pretty sure Trump was elected through the democratic process. I voted for Clinton (like most of MA) and don't see the point in protesting because "your" person didn't win.
Please alert the media ...
When you feel like protesting something that bothers you, so somebody can object to how pointless it is.
Your right Adam! My
Your right Adam! My complaining will accomplish nothing, much like these protests, except for getting me home 2 hours later.
That's correct!
It is his right to post about it. Just as it's your right to respond.
Highly impressed
Witty grammar correction in the wee hours- kudos!
These protests are accomplishing plenty
They're demonstrating to Trump and his supporters that his behavior and rhetoric are intolerable to many, in fact to a majority, of Americans.
As long as Trump is spewing un-American and unconstitutional bile like Muslim registries and punishing women for getting abortions I will oppose him with every fiber of my being.
Trump's creepy boasting of sexual assault and legacy of scumbag business practices probably wouldn't get me in the streets (I'm old,) but add it up and there's simply no way allow him to be normalized. He is beyond the pale.
We haven't heard the end of the Russian connection either.
This has nothing to do with my candidate losing and everything to do with THIS candidate becoming president.
The Poiint
It's not about "our person" not winning. It's that the incoming administration has essentially pledged to enact policies that are anti-democratic, destructive to sociallly vulnerable humans and catastrophic to the environment. Putin\Trump need to hear that this is not the will of the majority of Americans.
It you don't know why people are protest
perhaps you should find out.
If you don't know why people are concerned research it.
If you don't know the track record of the people elected makes some effort to learn them.
If you don't understand voter suppression tactics used and implemented by the GOP you owe it to yourself to become informed.
But reaching a simplistic conclusion about why people are protesting without any background info seems a bit illogical.
I'm with you on this. I think
I'm with you on this. I think Trump is terrible, and people should absolutely protest, but I really don't see what the point of disrupting the commutes of hard working Bostonians is.
Do you spend much time in this area?
They aren't disrupting commutes. I have walked through that plaza a thousand times at rush hour. I have worked in the area for almost ten years. It is set up for tens of thousands of pedestrians to get from the surrounding areas to South Station. (that is not an exaggeration - at least 100 at every light cycle, usually more). Take a look at a map - Federal St. is a pedestrian way nearby. There are very few cars using Summer St. because it doesn't go anywhere at the west end. It is a three to five minute walk from there to the pedestrian only area of Summer St. and the mostly closed off area of Winter St - less if the cops are corking the few intersections involved. That's like a single light cycle at most at any of the lights along the way.
To say that they are "disrupting the commutes of hard working Bostonians" is a histrionic stretch of bigly proportions.
They shut down the Financial District
This group gathered at Dewey then marched all over the Financial District before ending at the Common at 5PM.
Nope
I work in that area. No problems. Moved through quickly.
So do I....
So do I - they marched down High St from Federal to Oliver - gummed up Congress St & High St, then marched Oliver to Franklin - gummed up Franklin, then marched Franklin toward Wahington - again gummed up Congress and Devonshire (lots of buses use this). It is rush hour - not off peak or a weekend. Don't tell me it didn't affect traffic. Congress backed up to Faneuil Hall. They were not marching at a fast pace and it was a large group.
Congress and High street?
Who gums that up the other 250 weekdays each year, then?
Oh, right - drivers.
As matter of fact I work In
As matter of fact I work In Boston, and a fly farting could screw up traffic. The protest seems pointless, in my opinion, and to have it before 5 on a workday just serves to screw over the working class even more. I'm sure these protesters have no problems blocking the Expressway or any other major road.
Car traffic isn't the dominant traffic there
People on foot is the dominant mode. Pedestrians outnumber vehicles by about 20 to 1.
Screwing up vehicle traffic isn't an issue - it screws up itself on a daily basis without any help, and there is very little of it in the areas where they marched.
Car travel is unimportant in this area. Very little that would happen could possibly mess up other areas - the Central Artery is what causes surface road backup, not the other way around.
I went through the area just after 5 and nothing was any different than it ever is ... just chanting echoing, but that is pretty common.
Exactly, if anything disrupts
Exactly, if anything disrupts the working man's commute, it's when a bigly VIP repeatedly decides to give speeches in downtown Boston (with side trips to fundraisers in Weston), shutting down the airport, the interstate (both directions), and god knows how many local roads for hours.
At least we can expect fewer of those the next four years.
You want to believe that
Sure. Okay.
I work downtown as well, and
I work downtown as well, and while this protest was not as disruptive as others have been, it was still disruptive. Why march through the streets at rush hour to go to the Common when the protest could have been on the Common the whole time? The vast majority of people I know do NOT say "oh hooray for those protesters screwing up traffic by making their voices heard!" If anything, it just turns people off to whatever they are saying.
Note that I did go to the women's march and thought that was an excellent use of protest in public streets. It was well advertised and held on a weekend, where it's much easier to get around it for people who need to.
Please explain
Exactly where was car traffic disrupted?
How many cars versus how many pedestrians/marchers
Where the constitution specifies a right to drive or not be inconvenienced?
What vandalism?
I was at this event from about 3:45 to 6 pm. I saw no vandalism.
This is how it works.
You absolutely
DON'T understand, nor care or have a reason to protest anything you privileged, entitled d-bag!
Protecting
The march, or protecting FROM the march?
This is Boston ...
Where we still observe quaint customs such as freedom of speech and assembly, so while the cops will, of course, take action if they see violence, their main purpose is to protect marchers from getting run over. They shut intersections and roads as necessary.
Need of the many...
Sorry Adam - but disagree to a point. I am guessing you don't work and/or live in Boston Proper. Many of these protests are technically unsanctioned by the city - i.e. no permit, but police, mayor, or whomever let them protest and take the streets anyway. The point is many of us feel the 1st amendment is important, but your rights should end where mine begin. Protests should have a defined time and a defined route. Rush hour should be off limits in my opinion to any protest. Too much traffic, including transit buses (like mine) also get disrupted. We don't let interstates ever get closed, so why should major downtown streets without any warning be ok? How many ambulances get disrupted on way to hospitals? How many doctor appts get missed? It's not always about convenience, but that should play a role. Occupy Boston days were ridiculous with the constant protests during the height of rush hour. Make them stay on the sidewalks parks, plazas, or make them wait for an appropriate and announced time. The Women's parade is doing this correctly - being held on a Saturday, preset route and the word can get out so people can adjust their commutes and travel with the street closures. I am overall liberal, but these protests causing maximum disruption to all modes of travel is simply wrong and needs to stop or you just create resentment from the masses.
Sounds like the same crap from the 1960s
Asking the perpetrators of unfair government decision making and punitive actions for permission to protest seems counter-intuitive. The purpose of demonstrations and protests is to raise the consciousness of the widest number of people, ergo...
The Freedom Fighters in the 1960s disrupted the institutional racism and discrimination of the South...a whole lot of southerners found them disruptive and were inconvenienced. Do you think change would have occurred without their actions?
It was long ago corroborated that our withdrawal from Vietnam would never has been accomplished when it did if it had not been for the protests and demonstration.
Similarly, it was protests and demonstrations that raised the national outrage of the corrupt and punitive nature of the Nixon administration. He won his last election by a landslide but did so by crooked and illegal methods. It does not go unnoticed that one of the key thing he did was had the DNC headquarters bugalarized to obtain info to be used to disparage his opponent. Sound familiar?
You have the right to disagree and even oppose today's protesters but you don't have the right to prevent their protest or demonstrations - that's democracy - ugly are times but still proven to work over and over again.
This little march
Was incredibly tame. It was more like a flash mob parade. I would estimate the number of disrupted ambulances and missed doctors appointments at exactly zero. I would say the same for Occupy Boston, which truly inconvenienced approximately nobody, unless you had been planning on using Dewey Square for a large ultimate Frisbee tournament.
And that same set of rights
And that same set of rights give me the ability to complain about it, the difference being I try not to interrupt the hardworking people of Boston by contributing to society by working.
And who is stopping you from complaining?
Nobody, as far as I can tell. Your First Amendment rights remain intact.
Another of Boston's customs
Another of Boston's customs is police details for everything. This city and this state are probably #1 in police overtime.
That must explain
Why cops love protesters so much - they're walking boat payments.
How can people protest?
When we do not know what kind of job he is going to do!
Really
Oh, I think we've got a pretty good idea of what kind of job he's going to do.
Poor
non oppressed people. I worked all week so you should find a convenient time to speak against injustice! Spoken like a true, entitled, non oppressed person ie Trump like. This is why the rise of Trump and the always prevalent racist, prejudiced, denying establishment/majority of the people in this state and beyond is no shock to anyone with half a brain.