Transportation

Survey Finds Bus Priority Lanes Improve Speed, Reliability During Commute

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Buses like this one on the 71 bus will get priority heading toward Harvard Square on Mt. Auburn Street in the new Cambridge-Watertown Bus Priority Pilot program. The following information was provided by the Town of Watertown:

Evaluation of the Cambridge-Watertown Mt. Auburn Street Bus Priority Pilot shows improved travel time and service reliability for 12,000+ daily MBTA bus and shuttle riders along Mt. Auburn Street, west of Fresh Pond Parkway.

Transportation

Shuttle May Be Coming to Watertown; Initially it Would Not Serve Residents

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There is good news, and some not so good news for people waiting for a public shuttle bus in Watertown, the Town Council’s Economic Development and Planning subcommittee learned Tuesday night. The Watertown Transportation Management Association (TMA) is close to creating what will be known as the Watertown Connector, which will serve Arsenal Street and other parts of the Eastside of town. However, at first, the shuttles will only be available for people who work for businesses or live in apartment complexes that are part of the TMA. The TMA is made up mostly of companies and projects required by their building permits to contribute to the TMA (and in most cases the shuttle), some who have joined voluntarily, plus the Town of Watertown. The shuttles would be an expansion of the current Athenahealth shuttle system, said Bridger McGaw of Athenahealth who also serves as president of the Watertown TMA.

Around Town

OP-ED: State Senator on the Bad Week for the MBTA

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The following piece was written by State Sen. Will Brownsberger, who represents Watertown, Belmont and parts of Boston:

It has been a very bad week for the MBTA. Two train derailments injured dozens and massively inconvenienced hundreds of thousands of people. 

As I write, no one seems to know yet how long it will take to repair critical signal systems that the derailed train destroyed. Red line riders may have to endure diminished service and extraordinary rush hour crowding for days or weeks. While expediting repairs, the MBTA has rightly brought in an outside consulting team to review the events. The legislature will take great interest in the results of that review. 

For me, here is the big question: What will that review reveal about the work force and operational management of the MBTA? We knew that from time to time scheduled bus trips simply don’t happen because an employee doesn’t show up. We know that the MBTA’s derailment rate is high. We knew that a terrifying runaway train incident was triggered by an operator disabling a safety device. Investigators have already concluded that the recent green line derailment was operator error. 

While safety is always nominally the number one mission of any transit agency, how strong is the safety culture really? Are line managers overextended and under too much pressure to deliver timely service with inadequate staffing? What do these incidents say about employee morale and discipline? As legislators, we tend to focus less on operational conditions, which are hard to evaluate from outside, and more on the issues of system repair and service expansion. My impression has been and remains that the MBTA’s board and leadership team have been doing a very good job in turning around a state of physical system decay that was produced by decades of inadequate investment.

Around Town

Repaving Project Continuing This Week on N. Beacon St., Charles River Road

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Roads inside and outside of the Arsenal on the Charles will be repaved in early June. Roadwork will soon resume at the intersection of North Beacon Street and Charles River Road near the driveway to the Arsenal on the Charles. Athenahealth and its contractor, Charles Contracting, announced that road paving will take place in the area on Monday, March 17 and Tuesday, March 18 beginning at 9 a.m. (weather permitting). Athena owns the Arsenal on the Charles complex. Residents on that stretch of road are being asked to remove cars from driveways prior to this time “as you will not have access to driveways during this process,” the announcement said.

Arsenal on the Charles

Repaving Could Cause Delays on North Beacon, Charles River Road

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Roads inside and outside of the Arsenal on the Charles will be repaved in early June. Some of the roads inside and outside Arsenal on the Charles will be repaved beginning June 10, 2019. Beginning at 7 a.m. on Monday, June 10, the area where North Beacon Street meets Charles River Road (near the Arsenal on the Charles driveway). Also starting that day is work on roadways inside the complex, including the area off the east entrance to the complex from Arsenal Street (Talcott Avenue). The top layer of the roadway will be ground, or milled, down 1.5 to 1.75 inches, and the manhole and other castings will be adjusted.

Transportation

Find Out About the Bus Priority Lanes on Mt. Auburn St. at Meeting

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Buses like this one on the 71 bus have been given priority heading toward Harvard Square on Mt. Auburn Street in the new Cambridge-Watertown Bus Priority Pilot program. The following information was provided by the Town of Watertown:

Did you know that more than half of all commuters using Mt. Auburn Street during rush hour are riding the bus? 

Watertown and Cambridge, working with the MBTA and DCR, created a bus priority lane on Mt. Auburn Street for the 71 and 73 buses, between Cottage Street in Watertown and Fresh Pond Parkway in Cambridge, to help move buses faster. Extensive data collection of the before and after conditions will be presented at a meeting on:

Wednesday, June 12, 2019, 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.46 Belmont St.

Transportation

Ted Williams Tunnel to be Closed at Night This Week

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The following announcement came from MassDOT:

The Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) has announced that the Ted Williams Tunnel in Boston, which carries vehicles traveling on I-90, will be closed to all vehicular traffic during overnight hours on most nights next week. These closures will be implemented on evenings between approximately 11:30 p.m., and 5 a.m., and are necessary to allow crews to safely and effectively conduct milling, paving and concrete repair operations. During these overnight closures, vehicles will be detoured to the Sumner Tunnel and trucks will be directed north on Route 1A to the Tobin Bridge. The full dates of these overnights closures are as follows:

•  Evening of Monday, June 3

• Evening of Tuesday, June 4

• Evening of Wednesday June 5

• Evening of Friday, June 7

• Evening of Saturday, June 8

Signage and messaging will be in place to notify drivers of these operations. MassDOT encourages the public to be mindful of potential traffic impacts.

Transportation

MassDOT Releases Advice for Memorial Day Travelers

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The Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) advises Memorial Day holiday travelers to plan ahead, utilize MassDOT’s “real time” travel tools to plan trips, and use public transportation if possible to reach destinations. On Memorial Day, Monday, May 27, Registry of Motor Vehicle customer service locations and all other Commonwealth of Massachusetts offices are closed. In addition, on Monday, the I-93 HOV lane will not be deployed, all MBTA subway, trolleys, commuter rail and buses will operate on Sunday schedules, and the MassDOT Highway Assistance Program will have extra patrols on state roads. “We traditionally see more vehicles on the roadways throughout Memorial Day weekend, so members of the public should plan their trips in advance and make smart decisions before setting out for their destinations,” said MassDOT Highway Administrator Jonathan Gulliver.  “Anyone who will be driving should consider traveling during off-peak hours, build extra time into their trips, and check MassDOT’s Go Time app or other wayfinding navigational tools to help with decisions on which roads to take and when to travel.”

Per long-standing policy, MassDOT will be shutting down scheduled roadway construction activities on Friday, May 24, at 5 a.m. Scheduled road work will then resume at the start of business on Tuesday, May 28. 

The High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lane on I-93 between Boston and Quincy will have normal morning hours this week and will extend its afternoon hours on Thursday, May 23, to be open on Thursday from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m., and on Friday, May 24, between the hours of 1 p.m. and 8 p.m. The HOV lane will not be deployed on Monday, May 27. Normal HOV lane operations will resume on Tuesday, May 28. The Sumner Tunnel Swing Lane will be open on Thursday, May 23, at 1 p.m. The Swing Lane will also be open throughout the holiday period beginning at 12 p.m., Friday, May 24, until 5 a.m., Tuesday, May 28.