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BPDA to spend $400,000 to determine whether Seaport needs gondola to glide through a cloud

The Herald reports.

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Jesus. What we need is a better transit system. Common sense is not too common. As my 97 year grandmother says a lot, "So smart, they're stupid!"

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A Gondola will be greatly needed from the Seaport district to the East Boston waterfront but first make sure the Gondola is filled with brooms and shovels, because the streets are very filthy in Eastie.

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I'll do it for 1/10!

(oh hey look BPDA it's a public open bidding process, you should try it some time.)

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So I'll tell them for $800,000.

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I can tell you right now, it is needed to alleviate the traffic clusterf*ck down on the South Boston Waterfront.

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In this case, it won't really help. For instance, those buses don't go to the EDIC.

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We can laugh all we want, but I work at the Design Center, and have seriously considering looking elsewhere for work just because of how atrocious the silver line has become.

Not only is it well over capacity with sporadic service, but the buses themselves are starting to fall apart, with bus drivers having to get out at Silver Line Way more and more frequently, and a thunderdome-like morning platform that is also horribly managed, usually without any staff in sight.

The ride length seems to get longer by the month, with more and more companies moving in. It regularly takes 35 min to get from the IDB to South Station, which is basically the amount of time it takes to walk.

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This recent Greater Boston ep had a suggestion for the Silver line.
https://www.wgbh.org/news/local-news/2018/06/13/another-day-another-dela...

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We have to ruin the streetscape of Summer Street for your company's real estate decisions?

Before we place a Killington Quad over the Fort Point Channel, a new street car line needs to be laid from the Federal Reserve to City Point.

The street is wide enough, Summer Street is straight between South Station and the entrance to the design center. It is such a good idea that street cars ran down Summer Street for 50 years once.

Some land takings by the Federal Reserve and take away parking along Summer Street in places will make for fast service.

The Silver Line was designed by committee and poorly at that. It should be light rail just like a new Summer Street line should be as well.

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Either that or build a modern slim elevated train on a modular highway like concrete support structure. Reuse the closed portal form Boylston Station at Eliot Norton Park (tear down the Church of All Nations).

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Chicago gets duped by a soon-to-be bankrupt Elon Musk. Boston gets duped by a soon-be-be bankrupt gondola team

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You know Musk is putting up 100% of the upfront costs in Chicago, right? You're not just running your mouth about shit you don't know anything about, right? Right?

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I mean, Elon has never let not knowing anything stop him from running his mouth.

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Still waiting on your Model 3? Look! A squire....er...Spacex!....Hyperloop!....Flame Throwers!!.....

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really is very clever. In fact, he's almost 10% as smart as he thinks he is, which makes him one of the smartest people on the planet.

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Any street car (you mean, like the Green Line?) would run $1 billion a mile, no? This transit solution, on the other hand, would cost $100 million for 3 miles, without requiring land-clearing, etc.

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sounds overly expensive for an in-street line, which is the only LOGICAL way to construct ANY light rail on Summer Street, service on a light rail line can easily expanded to meet additional demand. A glorified ski lift cannot.

It is truly unfortunate that we continue to have such an aversion to in-street running of streetcars, both in Boston and elsewhere. Hundreds of cities overseas manage to provide service with in-street running just fine.

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What advantages does an in-street streetcar offer over buses? To my uninformed eye, streetcar has vastly higher fixed infrastructure costs and zero route flexibility, offset by higher passenger load per driver.

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Your untrained eye is spot on. This is the very expensive, years-late, embarrassing lesson DC learned with their H Street streetcar. The advantages are primarily that streetcars cause less pollution and reassure real estate investors because of their perceived permanence. On all other counts, buses end up being better, especially with dedicated lanes or signal priority. I live streetcars, and I wish we had more, but DC's experience was sobering, and I eventually had to accept that buses win.

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  • Rail is more energy efficient. It's a lot easier to roll steel wheels on steel rails than pneumatic rubber tires over asphalt.
  • Rail is cheaper to operate - because of the energy efficient I mentioned and the driver efficient you mentioned

There's a slight user preference for rail - some people find the rider nicer, some people are class biased against buses. However, in my research people usually just take the first vehicle that up, if both go to the same place. There's a preference, but it's weak.

As for build cost, bus ways are cheaper to build...until you start making them as nice as standard tramways. Overhead electrification, level boarding at nice stations, dedicated rights of way

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That’s exactly what caused this problem. Check out the SBWTC garage. Full to capacity before they’re even done building it.
So stop slinging the BS about people don’t drive and there’s public transportation and plenty of Lyft cars.

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The City isn't proposing this arguably outlandish scheme. A private developer is.

So why should the City foot the bill to do feasibility studies for this proposal?

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or expend the labor to administer the study at all...

maybe generate some new words for the initials?

Boston Private Developer Access

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Making money for private interests.it's what they do.

Remember, this is the brain trust that said they'd be lucky to get $25 million for the Winthrop Square garage until they got called on it and sold it for over $150 million.

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Except they usually don't decide to do the developer's work for them.

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You would be fine. Look it up. The South Boston Piers Transitway, the original, not the Silver Line crap-fest afterwards

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Where's our resident Silverline expert to update us on the state of SL improvements.

I've said this before - underwater tunnels are the answer. Build them above ground, then sink them into the briny depths. Put some people movers in there and voila. No wind stoppage, no views ruined.

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Elmer, Cybah and everyone else is absolutely correct that the Number One priority should be to allow use of the Silver Line Way on-ramp to the eastbound 90 into the Ted Williams Tunnel. It costs nothing.

I subscribe to the T's transit alerts for the Silver Line, and EVERY DAY (not just during rush hour) I receive alerts that traffic in the Ted is causing 15-30 minute delays on the SL1 to/from Logan and the new SL3 to/from Chelsea.

A couple of weeks after the SL3 debuted, I took the line from South Station to Chelsea on a Thursday afternoon. I waited 38 minutes at South Station for a SL3 (the headway is 10-12 minutes), and was dumped at Airport Station before a different bus completed the trip to Chelsea. All told, it took 73 minutes, including wait time. On the way back, it was 75 minutes once I arrived at Chelsea station to return to Courthouse Station. At off-peak times, you could drive to New Hampshire in that period.

While there is little to be done about Ted traffic, short of a separate tube for transit, steps such as the T under D (Street) tunnel to alleviate unnecessary waits at the traffic light, and the Silver Line Way on-ramp will shave valuable minutes from the trip time.

The traffic problems are creating bunching issues in the Transitway. You can sometimes go 10-15 minutes without a bus in the Transitway, only to have a conga line of seven or eight buses parade at once. And when you have hundreds of people building up on the platforms to try and board overcrowded buses, the chaos ensues on the first few buses.

The situation gets worse every day. There are now crowds throughout the day at Courthouse Station in both directions, and most of the buses that show up are full. It is often quicker to walk to South Station from Courthouse, but that is not an option for all, and if you already paid for a monthly pass for other connections, you may as well wait and get your money's worth, even though you will have to squeeze in like a sardine can.

My suggestion -- if we had the money -- is to create a bus lane between South Station and South Boston on Summer Street. Convert the Transitway to light rail and extend the SL2 as light rail to the Design Center. Best-case scenario is to build the Green Line connection to Boylston/Chinatown. Move the SL1 to the Summer Street bus lane to service the Convention center and the under-construction Omni hotel and access the Ted from the D street on-ramp. The 7 can use the bus lane to Southie.

No need for the gondola -- the wind can be strong much of the time in the Seaport area, and could lead to uncomfortable -- if not dangerous -- conditions.

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the article even admits:
"the consultant will look at all ground transportation, including public transit and ride- and bike-sharing, it will also examine ferries and “aerial” options"

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However, the responsibility of preparing that study (and the costs of doing so) should fall squarely on the developer that is proposing this scheme, and not the City.

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It is funded by the developers and represents the developers' interests. That the city has no planning agency of its own and has ceded that role to the BPDA is a structural governance problem of long standing: one that changing the BRA's name to one including the word 'planning' did not fix.

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The article states that the money to pay for this is coming from WS Development. It's money that WS Development is required to pay for other projects.

In a sense, it's still the BPDA's money, but in a different sense, a developer IS paying for it.

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Well, sir, there's nothing on earth
Like a genuine, bona fide
Electrified, six-car {GONDOLA]
What'd I say?

{GONDOLA}
What's it called?
{GONDOLA}
That's right! {GONDOLA}

{GONDOLA}
{GONDOLA}
{GONDOLA}

I hear those things are awfully loud
It glides as softly as a cloud
Is there a chance the track could bend?
Not on your life, my Hindu friend

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDOI0cq6GZM

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Glad to see someone trying to add new transportation infrastructure in Boston as the MBTA is not keeping up with demand!

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I suggest we reset, raize the seaport and restart with the transit first.

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