Boston's MBTA rules that black people are still illegal downtown
First, they picked up the elevated orange line and moved it--the whole train line--out of the ghetto and to the west a little bit. They promised the citizens of Dorchester and Roxbury a "bus rapid transit" system called the Silver Line, which would run in its own lanes to downtown, then take a tunnel under city traffic.
They just never built the tunnel. They built the other tunnel, which takes Silver Line patrons from transportation hub South Station to the airport. But the tunnel that would allow residents from the southern neighborhoods to get efficiently into the city (even to service jobs at the airport)? They just never built it.
The MBTA's proposed solution, reported in today's Globe, is to continue not buliding said tunnel. The buses will continue to run their congested route to the Downtown Crossing shopping district (where all the property is owned by NY interests). There will be one change to the buses' routes, however, which will look good on the T's silly non-map route diagrams. The Silver Line buses' routes will be extended from Downtown Crossing over the streets of downtown Boston to meet up with the rest of the Silver Line at South Station.
If you have ever even attempted to walk from one address to another in Downtown Boston, you know what an impossibility this bus routing must be.
A few conclusions can be drawn. First, "bus rapid transit," at least in Boston, has proved itself nothing more buses with expensive paint, a website that is sometimes updated, and a few extravagant underground stations blocks from the landmarks they're named after. Second, the MBTA is actually stupid enough to increase traffic in the downtown area by adding 60-foot articulated buses to the traffic mix.
Third, if you're poor and/or dark-skinned and live south of downtown, just stay home. Those South Shore commuter trains that rumble past your homes without stopping will be coming for you soon. As soon as the stations are built. In the next 10....15....50 years.
They just never built the tunnel. They built the other tunnel, which takes Silver Line patrons from transportation hub South Station to the airport. But the tunnel that would allow residents from the southern neighborhoods to get efficiently into the city (even to service jobs at the airport)? They just never built it.
The MBTA's proposed solution, reported in today's Globe, is to continue not buliding said tunnel. The buses will continue to run their congested route to the Downtown Crossing shopping district (where all the property is owned by NY interests). There will be one change to the buses' routes, however, which will look good on the T's silly non-map route diagrams. The Silver Line buses' routes will be extended from Downtown Crossing over the streets of downtown Boston to meet up with the rest of the Silver Line at South Station.
If you have ever even attempted to walk from one address to another in Downtown Boston, you know what an impossibility this bus routing must be.
A few conclusions can be drawn. First, "bus rapid transit," at least in Boston, has proved itself nothing more buses with expensive paint, a website that is sometimes updated, and a few extravagant underground stations blocks from the landmarks they're named after. Second, the MBTA is actually stupid enough to increase traffic in the downtown area by adding 60-foot articulated buses to the traffic mix.
Third, if you're poor and/or dark-skinned and live south of downtown, just stay home. Those South Shore commuter trains that rumble past your homes without stopping will be coming for you soon. As soon as the stations are built. In the next 10....15....50 years.
posted by Rob at 7:30 AM
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