markhb wrote:Districts 4 and 7 look like a puppy kissing a seahorse. Does anyone see a salamander in there anywhere?
My concern about using the Grand Junction for revenue traffic is that the first time a drunk MIT student gets hit on the tracks, there will be huge amounts of grandstanding and "I told you so's" over it, and a political nightmare. Isn't the line basically an alley through their campus at this point?
Not really. By the
bridge needs fencing because there's a lot of homeless people who camp out under the Memorial Drive overpass. It's readily accessible from that dirty little park on the corner of Memorial Dr. and the BU Bridge. There was the body of a local student found there a few weeks ago, so it's in a general blindspot with inadequate safety. There are daredevils who walk the bridge, but it's harder than it was a few years ago because the grassy knoll sandwiched between the Pike and BU Bridge has recent-install fences. Renovated BU Bridge has MUCH better sidewalks than it used to, and a bike lane. So the motivation diminishes. What they may want to do if the bridge ever goes into revenue service is install a high chain link on top of the bridge walls so it's not such a temptation for the area univ. crew teams to climb up to graffiti the outside.
The bigger problem is simply that those Charles River white geese are sitting on the tracks at all hours of the day. It's an amusing sight to watch trains having to lean on the horn, inch across, and sometimes have to have a crew member get out and chase those things away shouting "OOOOOOGA! BOOOOGA!" and flapping their arms or something (I'd be scared to do that...those geese are mean mofos!). So it also needs fencing do not have to hose off blood and feathers from the loco's grill on every run. But that's a relatively easy problem to solve. As long as they can bat away the
Charles River White Geese advocacy group, who you can clearly see from the linked blog are
CRAZY people. There aren't many of them, though...the ringleader is this one obsessive guy. But from his rant about the bridge repairs it's not totally far fetched to see somebody chain themselves to the bridge with a fake bomb strapped to their chest for purposes of creating a scene. Crazy people.
There's a gated ped grade crossing at the
fort. Vassar and Waverley Streets have recently been upgraded with bike lanes and nicer sidewalks, so the tracks are hardly anyone's idea of a shortcut. But the sightlines on that Cambridgeport straightaway are excellent, so the engineer shouldn't have any problems seeing people on the tracks. There's a wide, wide
backlot behind all those ex-factories on Albany Street with an unfunded rail-with-trail proposal. Easy to do and still keep the line double-track on that stretch. Between Mass Ave. and Main St. there are fenced back access roads on either side of the ROW (on easements if they ever want the second track back), so that's not a concern. The air rights building has a driveway sitting on the ex-2nd track berth, likewise fenced off. And I'm pretty sure there are security cams in there. Galileo Galilei Way has bike lanes and sidewalks between Main, Broadway, and Binney. So the only place where shortcuts on the tracks are more convenient than the adjacent pavement or sidewalks are between Binney and Cambridge St. Cambridge St. and Medford St. have nearby side streets a little more convenient (although the easterly side of the ROW could probably use a fence like the westerly side). Sightlines are still very good on that straightaway.
Safety shouldn't be an issue except for that obvious spot under the Mem. Drive overpass. But, really, it's the favorite dumping spot in the city for dead bodies so if DCR hasn't put 2 and 2 together that the area kind of really needs fencing...I don't know what will.
