T Geeking: North Station, Lechmere, and Beyond

[dmaze]

In my perennial quest to have covered all of the MBTA transit lines, I've been obligated to ride between Haymarket and Lechmere, in both directions. That, and the area immediately outbound in nearer Camberville, bring some interesting observations...

I like the new North Station subway layout. The upper (outbound) Green Line track feels oddly intimate to me, though maybe it's just the aspect of having a small space in a very large space blocked off for you.

There is, in fact, subway underneath North Station proper, though from the descriptions during construction I had expected there to be more space. There are two stub-end storage/turning tracks between the two through tracks. It looks like there's room for maybe six or eight LRVs at most without blocking the through tracks. Where the through tracks go up towards Science Park, the interior tracks actually head down, though I don't think they go anywhere (yet?).

In an indication of how much the T trusts its drivers, the entire underground section is marked for 15 mph. Then again, the rest of the Central Subway is signed for 25 mph, and 35-40 seems to be the norm. There's an interlocking signal on the descending grade for no terribly good reason (and not the one protecting the storage tracks at the bottom of the grade).

Construction on the North Point development north of Monsignor O'Brien Highway seems to have started, resulting in two big holes in the ground with two big yellow cranes in one of them. ...but wasn't this somehow supposed to be related to the plan to sell Lechmere Station's lot to a developer, who was going to move the whole shebang to the north side of 28, thus enabling the West Medford extension? Or is this going to involve lots of subway, at horrible expense, tunnelling under the Charles and destroying what's almost certainly a historic viaduct?

And one more thing. I'm not sure how to explain this. So if you're going outbound on the Fitchburg line, you pass the Boston Engine Terminal, and you go under a rail bridge just before you cross under 28 where the Grand Junction splits off to the left. Or if you're coming inbound on the Lowell line, if you're on the freight track, it goes straight where the main line turns left through Inner Belt land, goes straight for a bit, and crosses over the Fitchburg line. Well, that bridge is gone. This is largely interesting because, if a developer offered to me to move Lechmere Station north of 28 and I wanted to use abandoned B&M freight lines to head towards Ball Square, I'd want this bridge. Dunno what that means either.

Comments

[coraline]

i assume you've seen this?

[dmaze]

Yeah, ukelele pointed me at it. Slightly dated base map (as was noted in the comments, you can get to BEER TRAIN from A MUSS) but still cute.

[alphacygni]

I've completely lost track of the North Point project since I moved away, and I really want to catch up. I should look around.

Actually, I was at a career fair this week, and one of the firms there had North Point up on their brag board of projects worked. I was too busy being in rapid-fire job-hunting mode to stop and chat about it, except to briefly say that I'd followed its progress when I was living in Cambridge, especially in terms of the pedestrian issues. I think that might have been VHB? I'm sure there are many consultants each tackling pieces of that project.

I'm also curious about the fate of the viaduct. In addition to historic value, I find it beautiful. I may be in a minority on that, I'm not sure. But I'd hate to see it go. I suspect that the uncertainty might be political, and might be tied up with the ongoing development of the green line extension plan. I've heard conflicting things about whether the move across the highway is a prerequisite for certain extension plans, or something that would foil certain extension plans. I need some graphics to look at.

[dmaze]

Looking at Google Maps, there are a couple of options for a northward extension. One is, instead of turning left to go around the loop at the current Lechmere site, go straight. I'm not sure where you go from there -- into the median of 28? a tunnel? -- but there's a little bit of green space that you could run trains through without taking houses. A second option is to build off of the current viaduct but bend right instead of left where it crosses 28 now (and get rid of the terrible overpass where there are three lanes of traffic in a space that only fits two); that option would put you right on to the right-of-way I think you want to be on. The third option is "all subway, all the time, since it worked so well for the Silver Lie connector", but then you could come up anywhere.

...but I guess none of these projects actually involve the North Point project, at least where construction is right now.