Green line to Somerville/Medford

[Cotuit]

Is that the old Centre street line that they stopped way back when?  JP would benefit alot from restored service along Centre Street.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Yup, you can learn more at Arborway Committee.

[Benhamin]

They need to build this line, and fast. I would sue the state too, if I lived there.

Cotuit, why would you move back to Mass if they put gay marriage on the ballot? Are you gay, or do you just believe in this so much?

[Cotuit]

Cotuit, why would you move back to Mass if they put gay marriage on the ballot? Are you gay, or do you just believe in this so much?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I am gay, and my boyfriend and I were both born in Mass. and I'm pretty pissed that Romney is blocking us from being married in our home state just because we now live in Rhode Island.

[knuckle50]

Environmental group to sue state over unmet Big Dig promises

By Steve LeBlanc, Associated Press Writer | January 11, 2005

BOSTON -- A top environmental advocacy group is planning to file a federal lawsuit Wednesday charging the state with trying to abandon several key transit projects it promised a decade ago as part of a deal that helped pave the way for the Big Dig.

The Romney administration is holding a series of public hearings to take a second look at the projects, which include an extension of the Green Line to Medford through Somerville and a Red Line/Blue Line subway connection.

The lawsuit by the Conservation Law Foundation, to be filed in federal court, seeks to force the state to complete all the promised projects.

"This lawsuit is a last resort, but here we are a generation later, and hundreds of thousands of Boston-area residents are still waiting for the improved transit the commonwealth promised them as part of the Big Dig," foundation president Phil Warburg said.

When the Big Dig was originally proposed, the group threatened to sue under the Clean Air Act to stop the project because the increased traffic in downtown Boston would increase air pollution. In a settlement, the state agreed to a series of improvements to the public transportation system.

The state has completed many of those projects, but missed deadlines on others and is considering dropping the final three: the extension of the MBTA's Green Line from Lechmere Station through Somerville into Medford; the Red Line/Blue Line connection; and Green Line street car service along Centre Street in Boston's Jamaica Plain neighborhood.

The three projects were the subject of a noisy public hearing at the Statehouse in December with residents urging state officials to build the projects.

At the hearing, state Transportation Secretary Daniel Grabauskas said the state has already spent $3.4 billion on the first 23 projects agreed to as part of the Big Dig mitigation agreement, but wants to take another look at the final three to see if they still make sense.

He said the state wants to make the smartest use of taxpayer dollars while still meeting the Big Dig's clean air requirements and that no final decisions had been made about the fate of the projects.

A call to state highway officials Tuesday seeking comment on the lawsuit was not immediately returned.

-Boston.com

[CITY-TRAFFIC]

Oh yes, hopefully this will get built. Somerville has long been underserved, not only physically by the T; but maybe also conceptually (conjecturally) by urbanists & urban historians too? (I wondered when the last trolley to Somerville was removed. S.B.Warner' book mentioned Somerville only once: There was a streetcar built in 1852 between Harvard Sq. & Union Sq Somerville.)

(This is my very first post - just testing to see if I really can.)

[Cotuit]

(This is my very first post - just testing to see if I really can.)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Yes you can, welcome!

[CoreyPortlandME]

Yep, an extension would be beneficial.

Last summer while touring some colleges in town, my dad and I stayed at the Holiday-Inn in Somerville and we had to take a bus from North Station to Lechmere and then walk out to the hotel. It was only about a 10 minute walk, but I image that a Somerville stop would cut down that walking time.

[Ron Newman]

Actually, to get to that hotel, you should take the Orange Line to Sullivan and walk from there.

[mabeladdis]

There is a critical meeting to discuss this topic tonight at the Somerville High School on Highland Avenue. It runs from 6:30 to 8:30.

This project would be a tremendous boon to commuters and the quality of life in Somerville. The proposed alternative is a bus system.... which would add even more pollution (high particulate matter in the exhaust of diesel bus fuel).

Sorry for the late notice. By the way, the Aldermen of the city will be taking emails and calls about this until Wednesday, the 16th.

MabelAddis

[Cotuit]

Thanks for the update. I've heard that this project is not mentioned in the Governors most recent announcement about transit planning. Thoough there are many high priority projects that need doing in the state, I think this one is terribly importants.

[LeTaureau]

There is a critical meeting to discuss this topic tonight at the Somerville High School on Highland Avenue.  It runs from 6:30 to 8:30.

This project would be a tremendous boon to commuters and the quality of life in Somerville.  The proposed alternative is a bus system.... which would add even more pollution (high particulate matter in the exhaust of diesel bus fuel).

Sorry for the late notice.  By the way, the Aldermen of the city will be taking emails and calls about this until Wednesday, the 16th.

MabelAddis

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks for this notice! I'll be sure to express my opinion to the city government by email, I was unable to attend the meeting. Are you going, and if so, can you give us a brief summary of what transpired?

[Cotuit]

State seen readying plans for Green Line extension

Transit project list expected

By Mac Daniel, Globe Staff  |  May 12, 2005

The state is expected to announce plans soon to build the MBTA's Green Line extension through Somerville and West Medford, one of the transit projects legally required as part of the Big Dig, said state and local officials who have been informed about the plan.

The state's plans are also expected to include adding stations on the MBTA's Fairmount commuter rail line in Dorchester, Mattapan, and Hyde Park; doubling the capacity of commuter rail service from Worcester and Framingham to Boston; and increasing parking at some commuter rail hubs, the officials said.

...

The final roster of projects is not expected to include two sought by environmental activists: the restoration of trolley service into Jamaica Plain or building a connection between the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority's Red and Blue subway lines, the officials said.

...

He and others in Somerville have been pushing for years for the extension, which is projected to draw between 10,000 and 14,000 additional boardings a day. The Green Line now has about 225,000 boardings a day.

In 1990, the state promised to expand and modernize the Boston area's transit system to offset the pollution caused by the Big Dig and the congestion resulting from its construction.

That agreement called for the Green Line extension, the connector between the Red and Blue Lines, the Arborway trolley through Jamaica Plain, and several other projects. Some, including the Silver Line bus service and the Greenbush commuter rail line, are under construction.

...

The Green Line now stretches from Boston's western suburbs to East Cambridge. The different routes being examined to extend it into Somerville and Medford range in price from $340 million to $438 million. The final route and station locations are being studied. Curtatone and others have insisted that the extension needs to stop in Somerville's Union Square.

Recent projections on ridership and air quality for the Green Line extension were better than expected, according to members of an MBTA advisory committee.

...

Continue reading at: Boston.com

[LeTaureau]

This is great news! I'm surprised to see this moving forward so quickly. I wont believe it however until the first shovel pierces the ground.

[paperback]

ahhh i can't wait. this, along with many other expansions should have been built 20 years ago. there's so much more to somerville than just davis square and i can't wait to get my car-less butt up there to explore, by way of the green line.

[ezcheese]

i was reading about the extension this morning. the green line extension is definitely long overdue.

however, the green line has so many branches already, i wonder if they couldn't find a better way to extend the line and still include union station without having to branch it again.

[Benhamin]

^ I recall that there was a proposed route running from Lechmere to Union Square back up towards Lowell St, with the Gilman Square Station and Washington Square Station excluded. Maybe this is they route they decided on or they just excluded it, but it was studied.

[atlrvr]

Only one of the green lines goes to Lechmere currently....correct?

[ezcheese]

i think all the outbound trains go to lechmere.

[pdxstreetcar]

$770m transit plans announced

Somerville branch would add $100m

By Mac Daniel, Globe Staff  |  May 19, 2005

State officials announced yesterday that Somerville's Union Square would get a separate branch of the Green Line extension, adding $100 million to the cost of transit projects promised to offset the environmental impact of the Big Dig.

The list of commitments totals $770 million and calls for building stations on the Fairmount Line, which runs through Hyde Park, Mattapan, and Dorchester; doubling service on the Worcester-Boston commuter rail line; and adding 1,000 parking spaces at as-yet unspecified commuter rail and transit stations throughout the Boston region.

The roster of projects does not include two on the original 1990 list: restoring the Arborway trolley service in Jamaica Plain and building a connection between the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority's Red and Blue subway lines.

Their absence has upset some environmentalists, who say they will continue to pursue a federal lawsuit seeking to force the state to follow through on the original list of transit commitments.

''What we're really concerned about is that we're getting one transit commitment, as opposed to the package of transit commitments the Commonwealth has long promised the people of Boston," said Philip Warburg, president of the Conservation Law Foundation.

The new list now goes to regional planners and to state environmental regulators for their review. The projects would be funded by a mix of state and federal money.

The largest of the projects by far would be what officials are calling the enhanced Green Line extension, which would include branches with trolley service to both West Medford and Union Square, similar to the various Green Line branches in Boston, Brookline, and Newton. At an estimated $559 million, it would be one of the largest MBTA expansions since the mid-1980s and is scheduled to be completed between 2011 and 2014.

''We hope and expect to make that schedule," Secretary of Commonwealth Development Douglas I. Foy said. ''I think we've got a package that is overwhelmingly impressive as an investment. . . . This is a clear winner."

Foy said the plan nearly doubles the air-quality benefits and transit-ridership increases required under the 1990 agreement, which he helped develop as president of the Conservation Law Foundation.

The state promised the projects to avoid a lawsuit over concerns that the $14.6 billion Big Dig ''would consume and become all of transportation in Massachusetts."

He said the new project list offers ''the most bounce for the ounce" on improving air quality and luring more commuters to transit. The Green Line extension, for example, is predicted to draw between 10,000 and 14,000 new transit riders a day.

Foy unveiled the list before enthusiastic crowds at Union Square and then at Dorchester's Four Points neighborhood near a proposed Fairmount line station.

''Most of us today just can't quite believe we're here," said Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone of Somerville, who said that the proposed Green Line extension would bring faster service to a section of his city that now depends on buses and that the project could spark an economic revival.

Somerville officials say the extension would encourage development of several hundred acres of underused land and eventually add $4 billion to taxable business real estate.

Medford officials, however, have several concerns about a Green Line branch ending in West Medford. That could become a key sticking point, because state officials say that without the extension reaching into that community, both the air quality and ridership numbers drop, making the project less attractive for federal funding.

''Quite honestly, we want to see public transportation expanded, but we want to make sure that whatever expansion takes place, it doesn't impact negatively in any way on our community," Mayor Michael J. McGlynn of Medford said at the morning announcement in Union Square.

Besides the Green Line, the state plans to spend nearly $100 million to build four new stations along the long-neglected Fairmount Line.

For decades, commuter trains on the line have rumbled through the neighborhoods, but a limited number of station stops made it difficult for residents to ride them. T officials project that ridership on the line would jump from 2,800 per day now to about 7,300 daily once the four new stations are built.

''It's one of the better upgrades in transit we've made in a long time in the city," said Mayor Thomas M. Menino.

Warburg said that while he supports the Fairmount enhancements, pollution would be cut more by replacing the diesel trains with electric trolleys.

Some environmentalists also raised questions about the presence of the state's top environmental official at yesterday's ceremony at Union Square.

''I am concerned that it's a symbol that a rubber stamp is going to be put on this plan and that a really critical, incisive analysis is not going to be done on these projects," said Eloise P. Lawrence, staff lawyer with the Conservation Law Foundation.

But Robert Golledge, commissioner of the state Department of Environmental Protection, said he has been strictly objective in looking at the Big Dig transit commitments. He said he was invited to the ceremony by Foy and was there to accept a letter from state Transportation Secretary John Cogliano asking Golledge to begin the review process.

''I think my record to date on the issue is one which I take very seriously," Golledge said, citing his past letters to state officials urging them to improve air quality and to speed up decisions on the transit projects.

''I take my responsibility very seriously," he said, ''and my record shows that I'm anything but a rubber stamp."

Mac Daniel can be reached at [email protected].

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachus...lans_announced/

[pdxstreetcar]

There should be another branch running to Davis Square to allow a connection to the Red Line

[Benhamin]

There should be another branch running to Davis Square to allow a connection to the Red Line

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That would be kind of useless, seeing how they are so close together in the first place.

[Cotuit]

There should be another branch running to Davis Square to allow a connection to the Red Line

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

A branch to Davis might be a bit of overkill, it is actually quite a short walk from Davis to where the greenline would (will) be. A BRT-like bus service along Broadway from Sullivan Square Orange Line to the Green Line at Ball Square then down College Ave. to Davis Square could provide good cross-Somerville service.

[TheBostonian]

A branch to Davis might be a bit of overkill, it is actually quite a short walk from Davis to where the greenline would (will) be. A BRT-like bus service along Broadway from Sullivan Square Orange Line to the Green Line at Ball Square then down College Ave. to Davis Square could provide good cross-Somerville service.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

How about eventually extending the proposed Union Square branch to Porter? I wonder if it could be squeezed into the commuter rail right of way between Union and Porter. Or is that where the Minuteman Bikeway extension is proposed to be? I need to look at a map. But what would that help? I'd expect the area never to allow the development such transit improvements would foster.

Is anyone else concerned that the area served by the green line extension is going to become even more overwhelmingly expensive than it is now and that Somerville and Medford might allow some new development, but nothing near what is needed? I expect to see the immigrants of Somerville priced out.

[BostonFaker]

Prices everywhere are always determined by what people can afford i.e. willing to pay.

[Benhamin]

How about eventually extending the proposed Union Square branch to Porter?  I wonder if it could be squeezed into the commuter rail right of way between Union and Porter.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This is not economically feasible, why on Earth would you build a new rail line that only goes, what, a mile at most? On top of that, the state can't afford it, period. There are literally thousands of better ways to improve our transportation network, both mass transit and roads.