Adams Square

If anyone is still interested, I had time to dig through the archives. The March/April, 1980, issue of the BSRA's Rollsign has a nice two-page spread (pages 16 and 17) of six photos similar to those linked in the first posting in this thread. The caption of one of the pictures indicates the area was visited on March 19, 1980.

According to one of the captions,

The end of the tunnel is about 600 feet from Scollay, just before the loop at the old Adams station.

For those who may be interested, the BSRA lists this back issue as available. I'd love to scan and upload the pages for you all, but that would violate the BSRA's copyright, and I'd rather not tick them off.

If I remember correctly, the original Scollay northbound through platform was curved not too gently to the right and shorter than the platform today.

Then the track curved to the left, again not too gently, to enter Adams station.

The Adams Square Loop was made for Lynn and Boston Street Railway cars to loop for their return trip. In fact, it's correct name was the "Lynn and Boston Loop".

So I don't check my Flickr account for a few days, and some pictures I took over a year ago end up causing a rather large debate. It seems like some of you figured it out pretty early. This section of subway track runs below City Hall Plaza. Both ends have been walled off as you can see in some of the pics. These are all original pics taken with a Nikon D40x last year. I did remove the color using photoshop, as I thought it gave a more interesting look. I've been told one can access the Old Scollay Sq. platform from one of the stations nearby (Bowdoin?) but unfortunately I wasn't able to check it out during my visit that day.
On a side note, the crackers are not stored in the subway tunnel. They reside in the bowels of City Hall and there are more of them than I cared to count. So how do crackers from 1963 taste? VERY DRY!

Well it wouldn't be Bowdoin that you could access the old platform. BUT when I was exploring the stairway at the west end of Blue Line platform there was a door that I assumed led into the Green Line tunnel. Could this be the door? I do not have a picture of the door I am talking about, but it is the other room in this picture: http://sery2831.smugmug.com/Trains/Blue ... T5Qfv-L-LB

Here is a link to some pictures that I took back in July 1966 in the Milk-State-Devonshire / Cornhill / Adams Square area.

http://www.villagephotos.com/pubbrowse. ... id=2118099

The picture entitled "Adams Square Diagram" is copied from the Twenty-first Annual Report of the Boston City Transit Commission (June 1915) and shows the Scollay Square to Adams tunnel under Cornhill. Also of note is an exit from the Milk/State/Devonshire station that runs under Washington Street to a point very close to Adams. An arrow had been added to the diagram to show the camera angle of the other pictures.

The picture entitled "pano2" is a panorama view that extends from a sealed exit of the Milk/State/Devonshire station on the left, includes the aforementioned exit passage at the left and center of the picture, and show the Scollay-to-Adams tunnel under Cornhill at the right.

The final picture, entitled "Adams" is unfortunately much obscured by construction fencing, but the opening for the Scollay-to-Adams tunnel under Cornhill is shown at the far left, and the inside wall of the Adams Loop is on the right.

These photos are somewhat related to this topic, as hogie247's pictures were evidently taken in the section of the tunnel to the right of me, i.e. between Adams and Haymarket.

-John

(My Anti-Virus is showing that "Villiage Photos" to be an Unsafe Site.)

3rdrail wrote:(My Anti-Virus is showing that "Villiage Photos" to be an Unsafe Site.)

I've been using it for several years without incident. I wonder what's going on. Has anyone else received that message? Has anyone else managed to see the pictures without such a message?

I went to the site and I had no warnings or anything, however, I just realized I'm on my desktop which doesn't have much in terms of anti-virus. I visited the site on Google Chrome though which usually blocks suspicious sites and Chrome did nothing to block it. I've been running a scan since 3rdrail's post and nothing yet.

Anyways, that photo shows them obviously cutting through the tunnel, but did they split the tunnel in half or did they reconstruct the cut out section? What I mean is, are there two segments of abandoned tunnel then? Because if it runs under Cornhill AND connects to city hall it must be one or the other?

AVG anti-virus didn't raise any alarm about the site, but Norton says it's unsafe. Something about drive-by downloads.

sery2831 wrote:Well it wouldn't be Bowdoin that you could access the old platform. BUT when I was exploring the stairway at the west end of Blue Line platform there was a door that I assumed led into the Green Line tunnel. Could this be the door? I do not have a picture of the door I am talking about, but it is the other room in this picture: http://sery2831.smugmug.com/Trains/Blue ... T5Qfv-L-LB

You are correct. The door is located inside a niche which leads to the WB Green Line rail a few feet before the platform. If you had
opened that door the rail would have been a few feet away.

Looking at the map my original thought was correct, it is in the opposite direction of Adams Square. Thanks for the confirmation wellsme.

hello all, i am very excited to have seen these photos of tunnel. i may have anwsers to some ?s . first, i beleive that this portion of the tunnel still excists and very good chance i know where the entrance is but will have to do some digging first but i will post my findings. second,i believe that none of the original adams sq station excists today having reviewing the photos. third,after reviewing the photo with the beams. i believe that this section was part of scollay sq station,notice the tiled wall on the left side it appears to be the same type of wall that you can still see on platform heading to park st station. i believe when they rebuilt the station they put up the cinder block wall but also because of the realeinment the new tunnel,the old platform was cut off cause of the new wall of the tunnel. thanks to all who posted i found this subject to quite exciting. will post if/when i find entrance.

The latest Rollsign Magazine from BSRA has great, in-depth coverage of the subway in and around Adams Square- original and as re-configured. It's got diagrams and photos that I've never seen before ! July-August 2010 issue (out November 2010).

I've been following the thread on Adams Square and have a few questions that Boston rail enthusiasts/historians hopefully can answer.

1. The written descriptions and old maps have been very helpful in identifying the old alignment. Using the current Government Center station as a reference point (including stairways, businesses etc.), was the original Scollay Square station located within the existing Government Center station? If not, where did northbound cars from Park Street turn onto the old alignment? Was the Scollay Square station designed as two parallel tracks with side/island platforms or similar to the "triangular" design of the current station. Was the southbound track realigned?

2. Leaving Haymarket going south, are there any distinguishing features identifying where the old and new alignments met?

3. What was the time frame for the subway realignment project?

4. Was service operated during this period?

Any responses to my questions is appreciated.