Submitted by throwawaysscc t3_z7iyij in boston
Comments
SkiingAway t1_iy7jzlk wrote
Eh, it's not exactly a very fairly written piece.
For example:
Describing the area of Lincoln St/Brighton that was affected as some kind of thriving neighborhood is.....roughly equivalent to describing Mass & Cass as home to lots of independent entrepreneurs. It was primarily slaughterhouses, stockyards, and industry. There were a handful of non-industrial properties at each end of Lincoln St that got taken out.
There's probably few places less pleasant in the country to be than Lincoln St in the early 1950s unless you had no sense of smell or sight.
The claim that the Pike somehow divided North Allston from South Allston also seems....questionable at best, as it was just as divided pre-Pike. Exact same crossings, exact same placement. Actually, the ped bridge from Franklin, shitty as it is, I think amounts to a net increase of connectivity vs the pre-Pike condition. The "steep Cambridge St bridge" is one short flight of stairs/ramp at Mansfield/Lincoln as the only added obstacle from the pre-Pike condition.
I could go on.
There's certainly valid points in the article, but there's also a whole bunch of not very objective writing that I'd argue doesn't inform very well.
kabloom195 t1_iy856l0 wrote
The stock yards were on the south side of the tracks, where Boston Landing and Stop and Shop are today. The north side of the tracks was about a dozen residential properties (Market St to Portsmouth St) and railyard infrastructure.
West of Market St, the creation of Leo M Birmingham Parkway was probably more damaging than the Pike in terms of the number of properties that were ripped up to create roadway.
kabloom195 t1_iy86ubb wrote
Looking through historical aerial photos at mapjunction.com, it doesn't look like the throat on the Charles River was more park-like before the pike was built.
DooDooBrownz t1_iy8mg5f wrote
this all happened when groupthink was: city=bad, suburb=good, car is king. when you approach the traffic congestion problem from that perspective those solutions were pretty standard at the time in the US. central artery and a beltway or a series of beltways is a well used template. of course in hindsight it's easy to criticize things when granularity of specific issues and circumstances surrounding all those projects has been lost to time.
im sure in 20 years when the seaport district has water lapping at the second floors of those new buildings someone is gonna be facepalming and calling us stupid and bad decision makers
Prestigious_Bobcat29 t1_iy997c3 wrote
Idk I think you’re being far too kind. I work in urban planning and the thing about the mid century groupthink is that is was so obviously doomed to fail. In fact, it’s gone far better than any planner then could have hoped! Population projections from the time expected modern populations to be far higher than they ended, and as plenty of people pointed out at the time the geometry just made no sense. Highways are too low capacity to work in urban environments. It’s absolutely fair to slam what was an obvious mistake at the time it was made.
Similarly, the seaport does not reflect modern planning best practices at all. It’s held up as a model by planners of what not to do, no hindsight needed!
throwawaysscc OP t1_iy8gbh6 wrote
Perhaps the thrust of this series is emphasizing the importance of process in public works projects. The turnpike extension wasn’t vetted as it should have been. When I see the political infighting described in the article, it’s makes me wonder why the turnpike skipped passing nearer Worcester.
Alternative_Nail1632 t1_iy8az5y wrote
And it even had a cover photo of a building that was not demolished.
dontbeapile t1_iy8z7kn wrote
But the increased speed from electronic tolls has rendered the pike even more dangerous. oh god cry me a river.
throwawaysscc OP t1_iyd998u wrote
Car crashes killed 42,000+ humans last year. Trains, planes and buses, were they as destructive, would have been brought in line quickly by the weight of public opinion. Cars are special somehow, and remain a danger to everyone.
Alternative_Nail1632 t1_iy8asy0 wrote
This article is misleading at best. Interesting that it starts by addressing the loss of railroad stations but fails to mention that the pike extension was built where those railyards and railroad tracks previously existed. Almost nothing was torn down and the neighborhoods were not cut in half, as they were already split by the railroads. The turnpike extension was a natural progression from rail to automobile transportation.
Prestigious_Bobcat29 t1_iy99iu4 wrote
Shifting from high capacity to low capacity modes of transportation when population projections anticipated higher populations than actually came to pass (which the highways can’t even handle) is malpractice of the planning profession, not a natural progression
Alternative_Nail1632 t1_iy9qc94 wrote
I tend to agree, but at the time it was part of a progression towards car ownership and a move toward transportation by truck rather than rail, thus the closing of certain lines and the bankruptcy of virtually every railway.
Doza13 t1_iy8pxas wrote
Huge eye roll here. I bet the author would enjoy the quick 10 minutes from 128 to the airport down the pike...
The highway was desperately needed at the time (and still needed). There were no viable alternatives at the time and this route was the least destructive too.
Master_Dogs t1_iybpjgb wrote
> Huge eye roll here. I bet the author would enjoy the quick 10 minutes from 128 to the airport down the pike...
Maybe if you're going 128 mph, but if you follow Google maps it's 17 minutes from 128 to the airport. Likely much, much longer when it isn't midnight. I get a max of 55 minutes during rush hour traffic if I play around with start times.
> The highway was desperately needed at the time (and still needed). There were no viable alternatives at the time and this route was the least destructive too.
Uh, no. Did you miss the part where Alston had 3 fucking train stations at the time? Trains are absolutely a viable option if we dump $20B+ into them like we did with the Big Dig and other urban highway projects. Sprinkle in some pedestrian, bike and bus infrastructure for the last mile and suddenly you have a really nice transportation system that doesn't involve razing people's houses and leaving everyone else with a nasty loud eyesore.
abhikavi t1_iy73xox wrote
Wow. Having a whole article of bad planning decisions just listed like that was.... I couldn't make it through. Too depressing.
We really can't blame this one on cow paths, either.