That's an industrial bong

The community crack pipe

I believe that to be a sewer vent. Puts the smell above the noses of pedestrians.

Is this the reason why the city smells better than when I was a kid? I distinctly remember downtown having such a strange shitty smell

That’s the vent for the new subway system 🙃

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It’s one of the global warmers.

Heaters for the homeless

It is a steam vent from city hall.

Below grade generator intake and exhaust.

I wish RI had a subway system going from Boston through Pawtucket to Providence to Cranston and Warwick

A subway between Boston and RI would suck cause it would stop every five seconds. You would never get where you’re going.

Have you ever taken the commuter rail? Doesn’t stop every 5 seconds

Eh stops more than it should! We should have express train options to BOS and back.

Right! Like building a subway with all the stops and then make the commuter rail an expressway. Or vise versa

It’s just ridiculous it takes as long as it does to get downtown to downtown. It’s what 40 miles? 45?

Yeah I agree. Opening a secondary track would allow you to alternate the stops.

Isn’t that Amtrak ?

subways stop more often than commuter rail, so that’s why you would not want a subway instead

Amtrak ticket do be costing though

It should be local transportation not relying on an underfunded national rail line that coincidentally kinda works our schedule wise sometimes.

Ah the old poop chutes

Nah RI doesn't want subways, with climate change & storms subway tunnels flood. Like NYC's do & Boston's is always at risk at the Aquarium stop. Are there people in RI who consider how RI should protect against climate change? I read the Army Corp of Engineers is studying if the hurricane barrier can withstand rising ocean.

and you know that the commuter rail and subway operate differently right?

https://cdn.mbta.com/sites/default/files/2022-12/2022-12-12-subway-map-v37f.pdf

between north station and Malden center there are two commuter rail stops, 6 orange line stops. between south station and brain tree there are 4 commuter rail stops, and 9 red line stops. subways are for shorter distances and have more stops. the commuter rail has 13 stops from providence to south station. a subway would at the minimum have 26 stops, but probably more. with just 26 stops and waiting for a quick 2 minutes per stop that's already almost and hour of waiting without travel time. a subway isn't a good form of transportation over that large a distance.

All wrong answers. This is a vent for the blower to an underground electrical vault.

I have built and installed these in Providence. The building it is next to has a gas fired boiler or other heating equipment in the sub basement. These boilers require both intake air for the gas combustion and an exhaust. The exhaust is hot and rises. It comes out the very top where the vent is narrower. The intake air goes in lower where the vent widens. It is essentially an exhaust pipe running in the middle of a larger intake pipe.

Morlock dinner bell?

Ah, I really love all the comedy but this makes sense. They aren't just at city hall they're all over. You can hear the equipment running and using as intake makes sense to what sound it's making.

I suppose it may be a place the joker and his henchmen could dump knockout gas to clear a building?

Unfortunately no, it's a sealed system. The combustion air does not mix with the heating/ cooling air. But I like the way you think.

1st: obligatory 'username checks out' 2nd, While likely not correct yours is the best answer.

A subway is just an underground railroad. there are no requirements on the technology to how many stops per mile you have. Subways can also go straighter then above ground routes.

You realize there are plenty of tunnels that go under the ocean/bay right?

OR ;

there's a secret underground missile silo

I assume they don't have entrances & grates to the streets that allow the flooding,

At least we’ve got a nice bottleneck right there to protect PVD from rising sea levels. Permanently closing the hurricane barrier and reinforcing it is relatively straightforward.

Boston on the other hand will have to build a seawall from either from Logan or across the islands further out. It’ll be a hell of a megaproject.

Isnt there a black and white photo of that intersection under water in the early part of last century?

this sounds hopeful.

https://stories.usatodaynetwork.com/risingthreat/wp-content/uploads/sites/153/2019/03/Carol-City-Hall.jpg

Thanks. An ancient and now deceased family member used to tell stories of down city in a row boat.

Sea wall locks? Storm gates? Flood gates? Rumored to be rusted at one time.

I’ve lived in Providence almost 25 years, downtown 10…always noticed these and randomly ask my friends “WTF are these?!l” and no one knew. So thank you! I can’t wait to make my friends feel dumb 😊

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