Watertown MBTA
Peter Laws
Peter Laws|GEnie:P.LAWS1| "Finally: one of our guys is |pl...@uafhp.uark.edu
n5...@ka5bml.ar.usa.noam| driving the car"--Dennis Miller|pl...@uafsysb.bitnet
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, 7 Feb 1993 16:02:51 +0600 (CST)
From: Peter Laws <pl...@uafhp.uark.edu>
To: "mail --> news" <rec-ra...@cs.utexas.edu>
Subject: Re: Watertown MBTA
>
> GALEN STREET TRACKS TERMED A HAZARD
<ranting of NIMFYs deleted>
<my smart remark about the number of accidents also deleted>
>
> "The street was not designed to handle this much traffic, and we need
> two lanes into and out of Galen Street," McMahon said.
>
Now I may be way off base here, but wouldn't restoration of the A line
*reduce* the amount of traffic on Galen St. et al???
Peter Laws|GEnie:P.LAWS1| "Finally: one of our guys is |pl...@uafhp.uark.edu
n5...@ka5bml.ar.usa.noam| driving the car"--Dennis Miller|pl...@uafsysb.bitnet
Paul Anderson
>> "The street was not designed to handle this much traffic, and we need
>> two lanes into and out of Galen Street," McMahon said.
> Now I may be way off base here, but wouldn't restoration of the A line
> *reduce* the amount of traffic on Galen St. et al???
Most of the traffic on Galen Street is not headed for Boston, but rather for
I-90 (Massachusetts Turnpike). Much of the rest is headed to Newton via
Washington Street and Centre Street, with some headed to Brighton.
Of course, those who believe internal combustion machines are the only way to
get around think those who favor resumption of trolleys are simply nostalgic.
Your argument is valid but people along the route are now so dependant on cars
and the occasional diesel bus that they view trolleys as a nuisance rather
than a solution. Too bad.
My uncle, who is an avid trolley fan from New Jersey, told me that he was first
turned on to trolleys by riding the Watertown trolley on a visit to Boston many
years ago.
Paul
Paul Anderson, OpenVMS Specialist ande...@funyet.enet.dec.com
Digital Equipment Corporation (508) 496-9140
40 Old Bolton Road, Stow MA 01775-1215
Robert Coe
> My uncle, who is an avid trolley fan from New Jersey, told me that he was
> first turned on to trolleys by riding the Watertown trolley on a visit to
> Boston many years ago.
How many years ago was that? You know, there used to be TWO Watertown
trolleys: the one we've been discussing from the subway via Brighton Ave and
Newton Corner to Watertown Station and another one from Harvard Square to
Watertown Square via Mt Auburn St. That other one is now a trolleybus.
___ _ - Bob
/__) _ / / ) _ _
(_/__) (_)_(_) (___(_)_(/_______________________________________ b...@1776.COM
Robert K. Coe ** 14 Churchill St, Sudbury, Massachusetts 01776 ** 508-443-3265
Jon Bell
>
> [...] You know, there used to be TWO Watertown
>trolleys: the one we've been discussing from the subway via Brighton Ave and
>Newton Corner to Watertown Station and another one from Harvard Square to
>Watertown Square via Mt Auburn St. That other one is now a trolleybus.
Are those trolleybuses really still running? It's been so long since I've
heard anything about them that I thought they were dead. I thought it was
strange that the MBTA would keep such a tiny fragment of a system in
operation (three or four lines).
Jon Bell / Dept. of Physics & C.S. / Presbyterian College / Clinton SC
Robert Coe
> Are those [Cambridge] trolleybuses really still running?
Yes. The lines from Harvard Square to North Cambridge, Waverly, Watertown,
and I believe also Huron Avenue, still run.
> It's been so long since I've heard anything about them that I thought they
> were dead. I thought it was strange that the MBTA would keep such a tiny
> fragment of a system in operation (three or four lines).
Believe it or not, the current talk is of MORE lines. When they tore down
the Orange Line el in Roxbury and moved the trains to a parallel surface line
some distance away, they promised substitute service to the people who lived
near the el. They've been using busses, but the people have been demanding
light rail (as an extension of the Green line via the unused portion of the
Tremont Street tunnel). Partly because the Tremont St tunnel is already
overcrowded, but mostly because of construction costs and NIMBY complaints
by a parochial school near the mouth of the tunnel, they've about decided to
compromise on trolleybusses. This has spurred some talk of converting the
very heavily used Harvard-Dudley bus line BACK to trolleybusses. That would
make a lot of sense, since otherwise the line in Roxbury would have no con-
nection to the lines in Cambridge.
Phil Gustafson
>In article <3sXaZB...@1776.COM> b...@1776.COM (Robert Coe) writes:
>>
>> [...] You know, there used to be TWO Watertown
>>trolleys: the one we've been discussing from the subway via Brighton Ave and
>>Newton Corner to Watertown Station and another one from Harvard Square to
>>Watertown Square via Mt Auburn St. That other one is now a trolleybus.
>
>Are those trolleybuses really still running? It's been so long since I've
>heard anything about them that I thought they were dead. I thought it was
>strange that the MBTA would keep such a tiny fragment of a system in
>operation (three or four lines).
The Watertown, Waverley, and North Cambridge lines to Harvard were the last
MTA streetcar lines that didn't use the central subway. They were converted
to trackless trolley service in October, 1958 (1957?) and were the last new
TT lines in the system.
Within five years or so they were the only remaining TT lines. (Ooops.
the much older Huron Ave. line stayed, too.) They were kept at least
partly to avoid exhaust and unloading problems in the Harvard tunnel.
Those four lines are still running, although plenty of diesel busses
use the tunnel, too.
I'm old enough to remember when all service to Waverley was handled by
Type 5's, and always considered PCC's a little too buslike. Never thought
I'd think of TT's with affection.
Phil
--
|play: ph...@rahul.net
|work: (Under Construction) | Phil Gustafson 408-286-1749 |
| "Lips that yodel shall never kiss mine, and hands that bowl or play the |
| accordion shall not caress my broad, tanned shoulders." (J. C. Duffy) |
Paul Anderson
b...@1776.COM (Robert Coe) writes:
> ande...@funyet.enet.dec.com (Paul Anderson) writes:
>> My uncle, who is an avid trolley fan from New Jersey, told me that he was
>> first turned on to trolleys by riding the Watertown trolley on a visit to
>> Boston many years ago.
> How many years ago was that? You know, there used to be TWO Watertown
> trolleys: the one we've been discussing from the subway via Brighton Ave and
> Newton Corner to Watertown Station and another one from Harvard Square to
> Watertown Square via Mt Auburn St. That other one is now a trolleybus.
Robert,
I'll have to ask my uncle again, but as I remember it, it was a very snowy
night, and he was impressed by the fact that the trolleys were running fine
through the snow. I believe he rode both the lines you mention that night.
jtb...@hubcap.clemson.edu (Jon Bell) writes:
> Are those trolleybuses really still running? It's been so long since I've
> heard anything about them that I thought they were dead. I thought it was
> strange that the MBTA would keep such a tiny fragment of a system in
> operation (three or four lines).
I live a half block from Belmont Street, where Route 73 trackless trolleys
travel between Harvard Square in Cambridge and Waverly Square in Belmont. One
and a half blocks the other way is Mount Auburn Street, where Route 71
trackless trolleys travel between Harvard Square and Watertown Square. I hope
they never get rid of the trackless trolleys! They are quieter and cleaner
than the diesel busses they run on Sundays.
There are also trackless trolleys on Route 72 (Huron) and 77 (North Cambridge),
both out of Harvard Square. The trackless trolleys also make the underground
tunnel at Harvard Square much more breathable!
Paul
Paul Anderson, OpenVMS Specialist ande...@funyet.ogo.dec.com
Digital Equipment Corporation ande...@funyet.enet.dec.com
40 Old Bolton Road, Stow MA 01775-1215 (508) 496-9140
Nick Nussbaum
Robert K. Coe writes:
Believe it or not, the current talk is of MORE lines. When they tore down
the Orange Line el in Roxbury and moved the trains to a parallel surface line
some distance away, they promised substitute service to the people who lived
near the el. They've been using busses, but the people have been demanding
light rail (as an extension of the Green line via the unused portion of the
Tremont Street tunnel). Partly because the Tremont St tunnel is already
overcrowded, but mostly because of construction costs and NIMBY complaints
by a parochial school near the mouth of the tunnel, they've about decided to
compromise on trolleybusses. This has spurred some talk of converting the
very heavily used Harvard-Dudley bus line BACK to trolleybusses. That would
make a lot of sense, since otherwise the line in Roxbury would have no con-
nection to the lines in Cambridge.
When the promised replacements were originally discussed, the reason
the locals wanted light rail was its incompatibility with the rest
of the system. The area is poor and underserved by municipal services.
The locals were afraid that a fleet of buses would gradually wander
off to other parts of the city as they needed replacements buses and
they would be stuck without transportation, or with all the clunkers
of the system.
The Harvard Dudley line is already loaded as heavily as it can with
regular buses and still fight the street traffic.
My ( only slightly jesting ) plan was to build a monorail down
Mass Ave with as unobtrusive an elevated structure as possible.
--
Nick Nussbaum ni...@eskimo.com PO 4738 Seattle,WA 98104
Paul Anderson
This talk of trolleybusses has me confused. Is a trolleybus the same as a
trackless trolley?
One of the proposals for Washington Street after the el was taken down was for
busses that would use the street when above ground but then enter the subway
and use the tracks. What, then, is this called?
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
>> My uncle, who is an avid trolley fan from New Jersey, told me that he was
>> first turned on to trolleys by riding the Watertown trolley on a visit to
>> Boston many years ago.
>
>How many years ago was that? You know, there used to be TWO Watertown
>trolleys: the one we've been discussing from the subway via Brighton Ave and
>Newton Corner to Watertown Station and another one from Harvard Square to
>Watertown Square via Mt Auburn St. That other one is now a trolleybus.
combined with the former Middlesex and Boston Street Railway bus line between
Watertown and Waltham. The latter, of course, many years earlier was also a
street car line, but to the best of my knowledge, M&B and the 'El' never had
any through service. Possibly there wasn't even a track connection in
Watertown Square (I don't know this, just guessing), since the Boston and
Maine had a branch line that made a grade crossing right in the Square.
Len Bachelder Archives Committee, Boston and Maine RR Historical Society
MITRE Corp. Secretary, Massachusetts Bay Railroad Enthusiasts
Bedford MA 01730 Member, 470 Railroad Club
<M00...@mbvm.mitre.org>
"Amazing love, how can it be that Thou, my God, should'st die for me!"
- Charles Wesley
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
Harvard Square station of the Red Line. They are "71 WATERTOWN", "72 HURON",
"73 WAVERLEY" and "77 NORTH CAMBRIDGE". I think (not certain) that the
trolleybusses do not run on Sundays. At least I AM certain that 77 does not
run on Sundays or late evenings. During those times, the other 77,
"77 ARLINGTON HEIGHTS" takes local passengers; when the trolleys are running
it does not.
The original reason for keeping these routes was that they pass through a
tunnel in the Harvard Station, and it was not practical to run diesel busses
there. (Actually to be correct, the 72 never did go through the tunnel, but
it was already trolley when the others were converted, they decided to keep
it such and re-route it through the tunnel.) The 72 was the second line
converted to trolley bus (from streetcars) by the Boston Elevated, in 1936,
just a few months after the HARVARD-LECHMERE. As such, it is the longest
operating trolley bus line in the Boston area and possibly in the country -
the only competition in that regard would be Philadelphia.
There are plans afoot to build a tunnel under Chinatown and institute
trolley bus service through it from the Boylston Street Green Line Station to
the World Trade Center / Fan Piers area. Don't hold your breath, but my bet is
that it will happen eventually. Likely that trolley busses will also be used
eventually along Washington STreet as far as Dudley Square as Orange Line
replacement, though some area residents would prefer light rail.
Phil Gustafson
>This talk of trolleybusses has me confused. Is a trolleybus the same as a
>trackless trolley?
Yes. "Trolley Bus" is actually the more common name. "Trackless Trolley"
seems to be the same sort of Bostonism as "frappe" or "tonic" in their
New England senses.
>One of the proposals for Washington Street after the el was taken down was for
>busses that would use the street when above ground but then enter the subway
>and use the tracks. What, then, is this called?
My understanding from other postings in this group is that the tunnel segment
used by the TT's would be paved. Work vehicles with both rubber and flanged
wheels are common, but for transit I think they'd be sort of like the
Amphicar: a 1960's British vehicle that could be used as a pretty bad
automobile or a very bad boat.
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
>trackless trolley?
>
>One of the proposals for Washington Street after the el was taken down was for
>busses that would use the street when above ground but then enter the subway
>and use the tracks. What, then, is this called?
>
PA...@maine.maine.edu
As for the Washington St. Idea, The MBTA was thinking of opening up the old
incline that street cars used to go into the Tremont St. Subway to Park St.
What the (T) thought of doing was to pave a road for them to drive right down
into the subway satation at Bolyston St. and some how/some where turn them to
go back out of the subway. I guess you can call it just like the one at
Havard Sq. Station in Cambridge on the Red line.
Peter J. (for junk) Paras
Assistant Yardmaster - Seashore Electric Railway
PA...@UMAINECS.UMCS.MAINE.EDU
Robert Coe
> Yes. A trolley bus and trackless trolley are the same.
> As for the Washington St. Idea, The MBTA was thinking of opening up the old
> incline that street cars used to go into the Tremont St. Subway to Park St.
> What the (T) thought of doing was to pave a road for them to drive right
> down into the subway satation at Bolyston St. and some how/some where turn
> them to go back out of the subway. I guess you can call it just like the
> one at Havard Sq. Station in Cambridge on the Red line.
It isn't quite that simple. The two tubes of the incline enter Boylston St
station on separate levels, and there's no way to cross between them until
you get north (towards Park St) of the station proper. At that point you'd
have to turn across the active tracks of the Green line cars bound to and
from the Boylston St tunnel. (I posted a diagram a few months ago and won't
waste bandwidth doing it again.) That would be operationally messy and would
require some potentially tricky isolation of the trolleybusses' ground wire
from the screetcars' hot wire. (I suppose there must be places (SF? LA?)
where that's been done, at least.) I think if I had to make it work, I'd
pave the tunnel all the way to Government Center and have the busses use the
same turning loop there that the streetcars use.
The two tubes of the bus tunnel at Harvard Square are also on two levels, but
the trolleybusses either keep going after passing through the tunnel (through
running) or turn in a loop outside the far end of the tunnel. And they don't
have to turn across a streetcar wire, since there are no longer any street-
cars at Harvard Square.
Phil Gustafson
>
[re: trolley buses in Tremont St. tube]
>It isn't quite that simple. The two tubes of the incline enter Boylston St
>station on separate levels, and there's no way to cross between them until
>you get north (towards Park St) of the station proper. At that point you'd
>have to turn across the active tracks of the Green line cars bound to and
>from the Boylston St tunnel. (I posted a diagram a few months ago and won't
>waste bandwidth doing it again.) That would be operationally messy and would
>require some potentially tricky isolation of the trolleybusses' ground wire
>from the screetcars' hot wire.
Crossing trolley bus wires and streetcar wires is almost exactly half as
difficult as crossing two sets of trolley bus wires. There's simply no
problem with hanging insulated frogs. It's also easy, and was formerly
common, to have TT's and streetcars share a hot wire on narrow routes.
The idea of paving the tunnel sounds a bit silly to me, but I'm biased
in favor of light rail and live 3000 miles away, so it doesn't matter. The
argument that light rail on the route would exacerbate the tunnel crowding
seems a bit disingenuous, though: most of the track in question is
now totally unused, and turning the new route at Park would restrict the
extra traffic to the four-track part of the tunnel. Perhaps Len could
tell us how many routes used the Tremont Streeet tube in 1920 or so:
I'm sure there were a lot.
Dan Rabin
(John Scott McCauley Jr.) writes:
Getting back to the MBTA Green line. Between Arlington and Bolyston stations
there seems to be another abandoned route. Does this lead to the original
portal in the Public Garden?
Yes.
Is there anything still above-ground?
Not that I've ever noticed, and I've looked a little bit.
Is the MBTA still using the other portal near Haymarket Square?
As of my most recent acquaintance with the area in the early 80's,
there were four tracks up the incline north of Haymarket on the Green
Line. Two went to the elevated structure to North Station and
Lechmere, and two to a ground-level loop that was used to turn back
Riverside trains at North Station (The loop may have been stub tracks
by the time the Orange Line was put underground at North Station).
One more question. North of Park Street there seemed to be a tight region
in which only one way could go at a time, sort of like a gauntlet track.
An outbound trolley would stop, turn off its light, and wait for an inbound
trolley to pass. Was this a gauntlet? Or was the outbound trolley just
waiting for the switches to line up right?
Is `inbound' toward Park Street or away? I can't recall the situation
you describe, unless it's the approach to Park from Government Center,
where the approaching train can be switched onto either the inner or
outer station track, but the tight reversing loop also merges with the
inner track, so that an approaching train sometimes has to wait for a
train to go around the loop.
-- Dan Rabin
CZ94
>>... That would be operationally messy and would
>>require some potentially tricky isolation of the trolleybusses' ground wire
>>from the screetcars' hot wire. (I suppose there must be places (SF? LA?)
>>where that's been done, at least.)
>
In Toronto the Bay St. trolleybus line crosses streetcar lines at
King, Queen, Dundas, and College Sts. I never noticed just how
they did this.
There was talk of the TTC scrapping its trolleybuses and replacing them
with diesels :-(. Whatever happened with this issue?
(It's been 7 years since I lived in Toronto, so please excuse any
errors in this posting.)
Tom Box
CZ...@MUSICA.MCGILL.CA
David Anthony Wyatt
>In article <1993Mar2.1...@Princeton.EDU> j...@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (John Scott McCauley Jr.) writes:
>>In article <oTwqZB...@1776.COM> b...@1776.COM (Robert Coe) writes:
>>[on trolleybusess crossing trolleys]
>>>... That would be operationally messy and would
>>>require some potentially tricky isolation of the trolleybusses' ground wire
>>>from the screetcars' hot wire. (I suppose there must be places (SF? LA?)
>>>where that's been done, at least.)
>>
>>I've never seen a trolleybus route cross a trolley route... it
>In Toronto the Bay St. trolleybus line crosses streetcar lines at
>King, Queen, Dundas, and College Sts. I never noticed just how
>they did this.
There is a real difference between a trolley bus / trolley-shoe overhead
intersection and a trolley bus / pantograph overhead intersection. In Edmonton
there is one pan/TB intersection. The pan running wire hangs lower than the TB
overhead, and the contact surfaces are arranged to carry the pan without any
contact with the TB setup at all. It looks something like this:
TB overhead Pantograph overhead
: : /
: : /
: : /
: : /
: : /
: : /
: : /
: |: /
: |: /
: |: /
: |:/
|: |:|
|: /:|
|: / :|
|: / :|
|: / :|
|:| :|
/:| :
/ :| :
/ :| :
/ :| :
/ : :
/ : :
/ : :
/ : :
/ : :
/ : :
In a TB / Trolley-shoe intersection, the same techniques and similar hardware
can be used as in a crossing of TB/TB lines, or streetcar (shoe) lines.
--
---David Wyatt
UNIX Workstation Administrator Computer Services
Internet: David...@UManitoba.CA The University of Manitoba
Bitnet: WYATT@UOFMCC Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada R3T 2N2
Robert Coe
> tions there seems to be another abandoned route. Does this lead to the
> original portal in the Public Garden?
The wide space between the inbound and outbound tracks led to a portal,
though I don't think it was the original one. The original portal preceded
the construction of the Boylston St tunnel and exited at the northern edge of
Boylston St. I believe the later one emerged in the middle of the street.
That space contains a stub-end track that's sometimes used for storage. I've
seen the BSRA's "Type 5" car there; yesterday the "wire car" that's usually
stored at North Station was there.
But as you travel inbound from Arlington St, look to the right just before
the left turn into Boylston St station. The tunnel widens and the wide area
ends at a blank wall. What was that? A shortcut to the outbound Tremont St
tunnel? I've read a lot of history of the Boston system but have never seen
it mentioned.
> Is there anything still above-ground?
No. But if you want to see the vestige of an old portal, look on Common-
wealth Avenue just east of Kenmore Square station. Instead of tearing the
portal out, they apparently just filled it in, leaving the top of a decorated
stone arch projecting above the lawn in the median strip.
> Is the MBTA still using the other portal near Haymarket Square?
If you mean the one between Haymarket and North Station, yes - although it's
now used only by Green Line cars. Orange Line trains, which used to exit
there, now continue under the Charles River and emerge just before Community
College station. If you mean the portal that allowed Blue Line trains to
connect (via street running) to the Red Line tracks on the Longfellow Bridge,
no. That portal has been gone for probably 60 years. (Amazingly, though,
if you look carefully when walking across the east side of the Longfellow
Bridge, you can still see where they cut the access hole in the fence between
the roadway and the tracks.)
> One more question. North of Park Street there seemed to be a tight region
> in which only one way could go at a time, sort of like a gauntlet track.
> An outbound trolley would stop, turn off its light, and wait for an inbound
> trolley to pass. Was this a gauntlet? Or was the outbound trolley just
> waiting for the switches to line up right?
Probably the latter. The track geometry in that area was changed a lot in
the mid-1960s, but neither before nor after those changes was there any gant-
let track.
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
ph...@rahul.net (Phil Gustafson) writes:
>
>Crossing trolley bus wires and streetcar wires is almost exactly half as
>difficult as crossing two sets of trolley bus wires. There's simply no
>problem with hanging insulated frogs. It's also easy, and was formerly
>common, to have TT's and streetcars share a hot wire on narrow routes.
>
>The idea of paving the tunnel sounds a bit silly to me, but I'm biased
>in favor of light rail and live 3000 miles away, so it doesn't matter. The
>argument that light rail on the route would exacerbate the tunnel crowding
>seems a bit disingenuous, though: most of the track in question is
>now totally unused, and turning the new route at Park would restrict the
>extra traffic to the four-track part of the tunnel. Perhaps Len could
>tell us how many routes used the Tremont Streeet tube in 1920 or so:
>I'm sure there were a lot.
>
the section between Park Street and Government Center. At the present time,
no regular service turns on the loop at Park Street, though it is often used
for emergency turn-backs, etc. As for history, without doing some research, I
couldn't tell what was using the tunnel in the 20s, but I DO remember the 1940s
when, although of course there was no Riverside line, there were trolleys
running on the Beacon Street (now "C"), Boston College (then called "Lake
Street", now "B"), Arborway (now "E" and running to Heath Street only), and
Watertown (the ephemeral "A" branch). As I recall, the Beacon and Lake Street
lines ran then from Lechmere, the Arborway and Watertown from Park Street.
There was no loop at Scollay Square (now "Government Center") for turning cars
from the south, though the Brattle Street loop was in service for turning cars
there from the north (Sullivan Square via Main Street and via Bunker Hill
Street - they entered the subway from the street at the Canal Street Loop,
which was then a loop, not a stub end terminal as it is today). There was
considerably more service, as I recall, on the Huntington Avenue line ("E"),
what with cars going to Arborway and regularly used turnbacks at Heath Street
(loop), Brigham Circle (then called "Francis Street" - just a crossover), and
Northeastern (then called "Opera Place" - a third layup track as it is today).
The tunnel portals at Broadway and Tremont Street were used by lines running
between North Station (Canal Street Loop) and Egleston via Tremont Street and
between North Station and City Point (South Boston). So instead of the present
four routes in the subway, all running north of Park Street, you then had a
grand total of eight routes, but only four on the "bottleneck" portion between
Park Street and Scollay Sqaure.
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
>in favor of light rail and live 3000 miles away, so it doesn't matter. The
>argument that light rail on the route would exacerbate the tunnel crowding
>seems a bit disingenuous, though: most of the track in question is
>now totally unused, and turning the new route at Park would restrict the
>extra traffic to the four-track part of the tunnel. Perhaps Len could
>tell us how many routes used the Tremont Streeet tube in 1920 or so:
>I'm sure there were a lot.
>
included digging a tunnel for their use from approximately South Station
under Chinatown (perhaps under Essex Street) to Boylston Street station
on the Green Line. The trolleybus route would continue from the South
Station area on streets to the Fan Piers and World Trade Center. This would
Len Bachelder Archives Committee, Boston and Maine RR Historical Society
MITRE Corp. Secretary, Massachusetts Bay Railroad Enthusiasts
Bedford MA 01730 Member, 470 Railroad Club
<M00...@mbvm.mitre.org>
"Amazing love, how can it be that Thou, my God, should'st die for me!"
- Charles Wesley
still on the official agenda, I do not know, but I still hear talk about
trolleybusses to the Fan Piers. Digging that tunnel would be a BIG job,
though of course not as BBBBIIIIIGGGGG as the other "Big Dig"!!
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
In article <1993Mar2.1...@Princeton.EDU> j...@phoenix.Princeton.EDU asks: Scott McCauley Jr.) writes:
>There was talk of the TTC scrapping its trolleybuses and replacing them
>with diesels :-(. Whatever happened with this issue?
I don't know which ones. The story I heard was that Edmonton would not
let them out of the terms of their lease of the vehicles, so they figured
that if they had to pay for them anyway they might as well use them. I
strongly suspect the issue is as much a political one as a technical or
operational one.
Andy Nourse
> common, to have TT's and streetcars share a hot wire on narrow routes.
> Phil
It still happens on holidays, etc. on Market Street in San Francisco
when they're running the antique trolleys. It will be happening on
a more regular basis when they get the trolleys going here full
time in a couple of years.
James B. VanBokkelen
In article <1993Mar2.1...@Princeton.EDU> j...@phoenix.Princeton.EDU
(John Scott McCauley Jr.) writes:
.... Between Arlington and Bolyston stations there seems to be another
abandoned route. Does this lead to the original portal in the Public
Garden?
Yes.
Actually, it is more complicated than that. The two active tracks split,
and there is a sealed-off ramp up to street level between them. This was
used by the Huntington Ave. line before the tunnel from Copley Sq. to
Northeastern U was finished at the beginning of WWII. If you look carefully
out the right side of an outbound car, you can also see a stubbed-off tunnel
that used to lead to the original Public Garden ramp, before the Boylston
St. tunnel was built.
Is the MBTA still using the other portal near Haymarket Square?
As of my most recent acquaintance with the area in the early 80's,
there were four tracks up the incline north of Haymarket on the Green
Line. Two went to the elevated structure to North Station and
Lechmere, and two to a ground-level loop that was used to turn back
Riverside trains at North Station (The loop may have been stub tracks
by the time the Orange Line was put underground at North Station).
At least one line normally turns back at North Station (Canal St.). The
terminal was converted from a loop to a stub when the LRVs were first
put into service (1976 or so?), because of a major engineering gaffe by
Boeing-Vertol. An LRV is pretty flexible vertically and horizontally,
but there is very little travel available if you twist one end relative
to the other. This was discovered when an after-hours LRV test trip
fully-loaded with Boston Street Railway Association members tried to go
around the loop and the combination of the tight turn and a short
upgrade almost broke 3402 (I believe) in half. The car never ran in
regular service...
I expect that the Canal St. terminal will vanish when the new route/station
under the new Boston Garden & commuter rail North Station goes into service;
The new station seems to include turn-back tracks and a little storage space.
Is `inbound' toward Park Street or away? I can't recall the situation
you describe, unless it's the approach to Park from Government Center,
where the approaching train can be switched onto either the inner or
outer station track, but the tight reversing loop also merges with the
inner track, so that an approaching train sometimes has to wait for a
train to go around the loop.
Cars coming from Gov't Center can get to either platform track at Park
St. The switch is rigged with a timer, so all cars have to stop. If
the car is trying to get to the inner platform, it may have to wait
for a car turning on the loop.
James B. VanBokkelen 2 High St., North Andover, MA 01845
FTP Software Inc. voice: (508) 685-4000 fax: (508) 794-4488
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
>(John Scott McCauley Jr.) writes:
>
> Getting back to the MBTA Green line. Between Arlington and Bolyston stations
> there seems to be another abandoned route. Does this lead to the original
> portal in the Public Garden?
>
>Yes.
>
> Is there anything still above-ground?
>
>Not that I've ever noticed, and I've looked a little bit.
>
to the Boylston Street station. When the line was extended to just short of
Kenmore (before 1920 I think - I was going to look all this up last night but
forgot - Kenmore Square was then called Governors' Square), a new "Public
Garden Entrance" was constructed a bit west of the original one. The tracks
came to ground level alongside Boylston Street at the edge of the Public Garden
between Charles and Arlington Streets. I remember this faintly from when I was
just a youngster. This portal was used by the cars that ran out Huntington
Avenue, and was closed when the Huntington Avenue Subway opened in, I believe,
1941. I have not prowled around in the tunnels, but I suspect that most if not
all of what you can now see down there is from the later Public Garden Entrance
not the original one. There was until fairly recently (I don't think it's
still there but I could be wrong) a crossover at the place where the bottom of
the ramp used to be. I don't think there's anything left at ground level. A
second roadway was built in that block of Boylston Street when the subway
portal was closed, and whatever there is left would be underneath that road.
> Is the MBTA still using the other portal near Haymarket Square?
>
>As of my most recent acquaintance with the area in the early 80's,
>there were four tracks up the incline north of Haymarket on the Green
>Line. Two went to the elevated structure to North Station and
>Lechmere, and two to a ground-level loop that was used to turn back
>Riverside trains at North Station (The loop may have been stub tracks
>by the time the Orange Line was put underground at North Station).
>
loop, but was made into a pair of stub-end tracks quite a few years ago,
when the LRVs replaced PCCs in the subway. The tracks to Charlestown used
to branch off from this loop and entered Causeway Street. If you go back
before 1936, those tracks were also used by Eastern Mass. Street Railway
cars to Lynn, Salem, etc. The Eastern Mass. had its own subterranean loop
between Haymarket and Adams Square stations, while the El's Charlestown
cars used the Brattle Loop.
> One more question. North of Park Street there seemed to be a tight region
> in which only one way could go at a time, sort of like a gauntlet track.
> An outbound trolley would stop, turn off its light, and wait for an inbound
> trolley to pass. Was this a gauntlet? Or was the outbound trolley just
> waiting for the switches to line up right?
>
>Is `inbound' toward Park Street or away? I can't recall the situation
>you describe, unless it's the approach to Park from Government Center,
>where the approaching train can be switched onto either the inner or
>outer station track, but the tight reversing loop also merges with the
>inner track, so that an approaching train sometimes has to wait for a
>train to go around the loop.
>
lack of clearance would require that a car stop. I too have frequently
been on trains that stopped momentarily as they were about to enter Park
Street Station from the north. It may be that they are supposed to stop
(but don't always do it) at the facing point switch, or more likely that
a car is waiting for the one ahead to clear the block. The spacing of
trains is controlled by the signals, as visibility is extremely limited
by the sharp curves and numerous obstructions.
James B. VanBokkelen
In article <1993Mar2.1...@Princeton.EDU> j...@phoenix.Princeton.EDU asks: Scott McCauley Jr.) writes:
>There was talk of the TTC scrapping its trolleybuses and replacing them
>with diesels :-(. Whatever happened with this issue?
They did, but have since restored at least some of the trolleybus routes.
I don't know which ones.
In September 1992, I saw GM "fishbowl" trolleycoaches in service on a line
that passed under the east end of Toronto Union Station, and went down to
the harbor area. Don't recall the line number, though.
James B. VanBokkelen
... If you mean the portal that allowed Blue Line trains to connect
(via street running) to the Red Line tracks on the Longfellow Bridge,
no. That portal has been gone for probably 60 years. (Amazingly, though,
if you look carefully when walking across the east side of the Longfellow
Bridge, you can still see where they cut the access hole in the fence
between the roadway and the tracks.)
The Cambridge St. portal was capped sometime after 1959 - I remember
seeing it when I was a kid. It (and the street running) survived until
the Blue line extension beyond Maverick was opened (1954?) - before
that the E. Boston tunnel cars used it to get to the Harvard Sq. shop
for maintenance.
Ron Newman
|> As for history, without doing some research, I
|> couldn't tell what was using the tunnel in the 20s, but I DO remember the 1940s
|> when, although of course there was no Riverside line, there were trolleys
|> running on the Beacon Street (now "C"), Boston College (then called "Lake
|> Street", now "B"),
Did the "Lake Street" line terminate in a different place than the
current "B" line? Commonwealth Avenue has a median strip all the
way through Newton; did the trolley tracks use to continue past
the Brighton-Newton town line?
Also, did any trolleys continue beyond Lechmere into Cambridge
and Somerville? I assume the current bus routes 69, 80, 87, and 88
were once trolley routes. Did the passengers always have to
change at Lechmere, or was there through service?
Finally, I've seen old pictures of cars in Park Street Station
labelled with West Roxbury destinations, so I'm wondering
if there used to be a LOT more routes into that station.
--
Ron Newman rne...@bbn.com
Robert Coe
> Finally, I've seen old pictures of cars in Park Street Station
> labelled with West Roxbury destinations, so I'm wondering
> if there used to be a LOT more routes into that station.
Well, at the risk of opening up a whole new thread (on a subject of which my
knowledge isn't very great :^), there was a period of a few years in which
heavy-rail subway trains of what is now the Orange Line used the Tremont St
tunnel and hence passed through (the upper level of) Park St. These trains
were moved out, and the tunnel returned to streetcar use, when the Washington
St tunnel was completed. I don't remember the dates (and I hate to guess
after being off by about 30 years on the closing of the Cambridge St portal),
but it was certainly before 1920.
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
jb...@vax.ftp.com (James B. VanBokkelen) writes:
>
>In September 1992, I saw GM "fishbowl" trolleycoaches in service on a line
>that passed under the east end of Toronto Union Station, and went down to
>the harbor area. Don't recall the line number, though.
>
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
>that passed under the east end of Toronto Union Station, and went down to
>the harbor area. Don't recall the line number, though.
>
Toronto assigned route numbers to its bus (including trolleybus) lines
in alphabetical sequence by the route name. In this sequence, BAY
became, I think, route 9. It is (or at least was), the heaviest non-rail
line in the system, and at one point the TTC Board publicly stated that
converting it to bus (which is was for a while before they strung the
trolleybus wire) was a mistake. BAY as such did not exist as a streetcar
line in modern times. It was the in-town end of the DUPONT car line until
the UNIVERSITY Subway opened. At that time, DUPONT was abandoned and the inner
end became the BAY bus while the outer end became an extension of the ANNETTE
trolley bus. Also, at the same time, about half of the DUNDAS streetcar
service was rerouted to the Ferry Docks along the innermost end of Bay Street
retaining rail service there. This operation was abandoned along with the
City Hall Loop when the BLOOR-DANFORTH subway opened about 1970. This was
also about the time that BAY was converted from Diesel bus to trolleybus.
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
rne...@bbn.com (Ron Newman) writes:
>
>Did the "Lake Street" line terminate in a different place than the
>current "B" line? Commonwealth Avenue has a median strip all the
>way through Newton; did the trolley tracks use to continue past
>the Brighton-Newton town line?
>
Beyond that point, yes, trolleys of the Middlesex and Boston Street Railway
ran in the median of Commonwealth Avenue to Norumbega Park until the mid-30s
or thereabouts. I don't think any rail line ever extended beyond Norumbega
but am not certain of that. Also, I don't know if there was a track connection
between the M&B and the Boston Elevated at Lake Street, but I strongly suspect
that there was.
>Also, did any trolleys continue beyond Lechmere into Cambridge
>and Somerville? I assume the current bus routes 69, 80, 87, and 88
>were once trolley routes. Did the passengers always have to
>change at Lechmere, or was there through service?
>
have been the official name for it) that operated out of a carbarn on Broadway
in Somerville just a few yards east of the Alewife Brook Parkway. A high-rise
apartment house now occupies the location, though I believe there is still a
small bus loop in the front of the property. This Division, at the time of
its closing which I think was in 1941 or 1942, supplied cars for routes from
Lechmere to Clarendon Hill via both Highland Avenue and Somerville Avenue -
the present bus routes 87 and 88, and for a route between Clarendon Hill and
Sullivan via Broadway - this is bus route 89(?) now. Route 80 (Lechmere to
Arlington Center via Medford Hillside) was a bus route then though I am sure
that at one time it had been a streetcar route. Lechmere <> Harvard (69) was
the first trackless trolley route, converted in 1936. It had a different
number in the "old" days - I think it was 77, and the present 77 was something
else - I know 69 used to be the number for the Park Street <> Arborway via
Huntington Avenue line. Those three (87, 88 and 89) are the only rail lines I
remember in that Division, although Sullivan also was reached by lines running
out of the Salem Street barn in Medford. The Clarendon Hill routes went to
trolley bus in 1942(?), and route 80 and the extension from Clarendon Hill to
Arlington Center via Broadway, both of which has been served by gas busses,
were soon afterward converted to trolley bus. In "modern" times, there was
no through rail service at Lechmere.
>Finally, I've seen old pictures of cars in Park Street Station
>labelled with West Roxbury destinations, so I'm wondering
>if there used to be a LOT more routes into that station.
>
question about through service from Somerville to downtown, would require
the "research" that I spoke of earlier. I do have (and the Boston Street
Railway Association has available for sale) copies of maps of the Boston
Elevated system at several eras, and there have been summary histories
printed, but no really detailed one that I know of. In general, yes, when
the Subway first opened, cars from all sorts of places - West Roxbury,
Somerville, Dorchester, Brookline, etc., all ran into the subway. As the
subway got extended from its initial length (from between Haymarket Square
and North Station to "twin" portals at Boylston Street near Charles and at
Tremont Street and Pleasant Street (Broadway)) and after the "Main Line"
Elevated (now the Orange Line) was built and then extended to Forest Hills,
most streetcar lines in the outer areas were changed to feed the Subway or
Elevated rather than to run through. As you probably know, the East Boston
Tunnel was originally a streetcar tunnel, terminating at "Court Street Station"
bits of which can still be seen between State and Government Center stations.
Originally cars from various East Boston destinations (Chelsea and Revere then
were served by the Eastern Mass. Street Railway) operated through the tunnel
to Court Street. The Maverick loop, with streetcars coming down the ramp and
terminating in a loop there was built when the tunnel was changed to third
rail "heavy rapid transit" operation in the late 20s. (Dates I don't recall
with any exactness without looking up.)
The routes using the "Tremont Street Subway" (the present Green Line) were as
I described them in my previous posting by at least the late 30s, but I can't
say without doing considerable digging into old records just when the other
routes quit running into the Subway. I'll make what you might call an educated
guess and say that the discontinuance of through routings of streetcar lines
corresponded to the opening of 1.) the "El" to Dudley (which became a mammoth
transit terminal including serving through cars from companies like the Bay
State and Blue Hill Street Railways from the outer suburbs), 2.) the Cambridge
Subway to Harvard, 3.) the Lechmere Viaduct, 4.) the Boylston Street Subway
extension under Kenmore Square (which resulted in the establishment of Kenmore
Station as a transfer point). Since all the transit in Boston was controlled
by the West End Street Railway, which dissolved itself into the Boston Elevated
Railway, (unlike cities like New York and Chicago where the "rapid transit" and
streetcar lines were operated by several competing companies), it evolved more
Len Bachelder Archives Committee, Boston and Maine RR Historical Society
MITRE Corp. Secretary, Massachusetts Bay Railroad Enthusiasts
Bedford MA 01730 Member, 470 Railroad Club
<M00...@mbvm.mitre.org>
"Amazing love, how can it be that Thou, my God, should'st die for me!"
- Charles Wesley
trunk lines into which the local streetcar routes would feed. IMHO, this has
resulted in a much more rational approach to transit service, with far fewer
local busses running downtown (more lines do now than did 30 or 40 years ago).
The only flaw is that there isn't free transfer between bus and rapid transit.
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
b...@1776.COM (Robert Coe) writes:
>
>rne...@bbn.com (Ron Newman) writes:
>> Finally, I've seen old pictures of cars in Park Street Station
>> labelled with West Roxbury destinations, so I'm wondering
>> if there used to be a LOT more routes into that station.
>
>Well, at the risk of opening up a whole new thread (on a subject of which my
>knowledge isn't very great :^), there was a period of a few years in which
>heavy-rail subway trains of what is now the Orange Line used the Tremont St
>tunnel and hence passed through (the upper level of) Park St. These trains
>were moved out, and the tunnel returned to streetcar use, when the Washington
>St tunnel was completed. I don't remember the dates (and I hate to guess
>after being off by about 30 years on the closing of the Cambridge St portal),
>but it was certainly before 1920.
>
"Main Line" Elevated opened in 1901 along with the Atlantic Avenue El, so that
from that date, trains were running between Sullivan and Dudley both via the
Atlantic Avenue line and via the Tremont Street tunnel. I believe the date of
the opening of the Washington Street tunnel, and therefore of the re-conversion
of the Tremont Street tunnel to streetcar only use, occured in 1907, but I
could easily be a year or two off on that one. During the time that the El
trains ran through the Tremont Street tunnel, the section between Park Street
and Scollay Square stations was used only by them, with streetcars from the
south looping on the inner loop at Park Street and those from the north looping
at Brattle Street.
CZ94
>... This operation was abandoned along with the
>City Hall Loop when the BLOOR-DANFORTH subway opened about 1970. was
This is based on fuzzy childhood memories of visits to The Big City,
so I'm open to correction, but I'm pretty sure that the Bloor-Danforth
subway dates back to before 1970. Mid-1960's would be my guess.
I think it's at least as old as the Montreal Metro, the first portion
of which opened in 1966. The central portion of the Bloor-Danforth
subway was built first, then the line gradually extended at both the
east and west ends.
Tom Box
CZ...@MUSICA.MCGILL.CA
Alan Williams
First, the Bay street trolley bus is route #6. It normally has the Flyer
"electric bus" vehicles running on it. It was switched from diesel buses
in the early 1970's because of the the build up of exhaust fumes in the
area south of Queen St. This is the heart of Toronto's financial district,
and Bay St. resembles a canyon in this area.
More recently, the Harbourfront LRT has started running under Bay St. south
of Union Station. It runs underground until Queen's Quay, turns west, and
surfaces. It then runs on a slightly raised right of way along the middle
of Queen's Quay to Spadina, where it turns north. There is an underground
station at Bay/Queen's Quay, one at Union Station, and surface street car
stops for the rest of the route. The TTC has been running the old 1950's
vintage (PVC?) street cars on this route. I don't believe the LRT route
is numbered. This line has been running for 2-3 years now.
Alan Williams | Bell-Northern Research Ltd.
al...@bnr.ca | Ottawa, Ont. CANADA K1Y 4H7
Sandy F. Smith, Jr.
>
> In article <16B878B5...@MBVM.Mitre.Org>, M00...@MBVM.Mitre.Org writes:
>
> Did the "Lake Street" line terminate in a different place than the
> current "B" line? Commonwealth Avenue has a median strip all the
> way through Newton; did the trolley tracks use to continue past
> the Brighton-Newton town line?
The terminal now called "Boston College" is just a few hundred feet past
the intersection of Lake Street and Commonwealth Avenue in Brighton. There
once was an interchange at this terminal for cars of the Eastern Mass. (I
believe), which continued out Commonwealth Avenue into Newton. I don't
know exactly when the Eastern Mass. abandoned this service.
>
> Also, did any trolleys continue beyond Lechmere into Cambridge
> and Somerville? I assume the current bus routes 69, 80, 87, and 88
> were once trolley routes. Did the passengers always have to
> change at Lechmere, or was there through service?
>
I believe there were several Cambridge-Somerville-(Medford?) routes that
operated through beyond Lechmere. Somehow, I also recall that originally,
the trolley viaduct at the Charles River Dam (1913) simply ended in
switches at its east end, connecting to the tracks in Cambridge Street and
whatever preceded McGrath Highway. The loop and station at Lechmere were
built sometime around 1930.
> Finally, I've seen old pictures of cars in Park Street Station
> labelled with West Roxbury destinations, so I'm wondering
> if there used to be a LOT more routes into that station.
You betcha! The original purpose of the 1895-97 Tremont Street subway was
to take *all* the surface routes serving Downtown Boston off the streets,
and there were scores of those in the 1890's. If Park Street seems busy
now with only four routes using it, imagine what it looked like with six,
eight, or ten times that number.
Now I have a question: Len Batchelder, in another post on a related
thread, said that none of the current Green Line branches terminates at
Park Street. When last I lived in Boston (1984), the Arborway branch used
the loop at Park Street as its regular terminal; I somehow recall that this
was still the case in 1988. When did the T change the northern terminal
for the E branch, and where does it end now?
_________________________________________________________________________
Sandy F. Smith Jr._____...@mail.sas.upenn.edu________(215) 898-4940
Administrative Assistant, Graduate Division, School of Arts and Sciences,
University of Pennsylvania, 16 College Hall, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6378
(Opinions mine, not Penn's. If they want 'em, they gotta pay for 'em.)
Sandy F. Smith, Jr.
>
> Well, at the risk of opening up a whole new thread (on a subject of which my
> knowledge isn't very great :^), there was a period of a few years in which
> heavy-rail subway trains of what is now the Orange Line used the Tremont St
> tunnel and hence passed through (the upper level of) Park St. These trains
> were moved out, and the tunnel returned to streetcar use, when the Washington
> St tunnel was completed. I don't remember the dates (and I hate to guess
> after being off by about 30 years on the closing of the Cambridge St portal),
> but it was certainly before 1920.
Trains of the Main Line Elevated used the Tremont Street Subway from 1901
until 1909, when the Washington Street tunnel was completed. During that
time, there was also no through streetcar service between the Public Garden
and North Station, as the two-track tunnel Park St<->Scollay Square was
used exclusively by the El trains. Btw, this gives Boston the distinction
of having the first *rapid-transit* subway in America as well, coming as it
did three years before the opening of the IRT.
Thomas A. Goldthorpe
>|> City Hall Loop when the BLOOR-DANFORTH subway opened about 1970. This was
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
{much more deleted}
Lets try 1965. Thats the year we got the H-1 subway cars (can do
fantastic speeds, if the TTC ever uses them like that again, they
stopped doing so around 1977-78, just after the H-5's started burning
out :-) ). If I remember correctly, around 1970 the extensions to the
line were opened.
Then again, I could be completely mistaken....
tom
David Anthony Wyatt
jb...@vax.ftp.com (James B. VanBokkelen) writes:
>In September 1992, I saw GM "fishbowl" trolleycoaches in service on a line
>that passed under the east end of Toronto Union Station, and went down to
In article <16B8BB0C...@MBVM.Mitre.Org>, M00...@MBVM.Mitre.Org writes:
>Are you sure they were GM and not Western Flyer?
In <1993Mar8.2...@bnr.ca> al...@bnr.ca (Alan Williams) writes:
>First, the Bay street trolley bus is route #6. It normally has the Flyer
>"electric bus" vehicles running on it. ...
The Western Flyer trolley buses (model E700A's) operated by the TTC are now all
out of service. At least they were a year ago. They were built in the early
1970's using new bodies and motive equipment (motors, controllers, trolley
poles, etc...) salvaged from CCF/Brill trolleys built in the 1940's and 1950's.
The GM "fishbowl" trolleybuses were delivered to Edmonton Alberta in 1982. GM
Canada supplied the bodies. Brown Bovari Company supplied the motors,
controllers and other electrical components. The coaches were "bashed" by a
local Edmonton contractor. The order consisted of 100 vehicles of which 60 are
in service in Edmonton and the remaining 40 are on lease to the TTC. The three
year lease was to end late this spring (May?) but I suspect it will be extended.
Edmonton is seriously dithering on what to do with its TB network and won't
likely need them back anytime soon (if ever).
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
sfs...@mail.sas.upenn.edu (Sandy F. Smith, Jr.) writes, in part:
>
>The terminal now called "Boston College" is just a few hundred feet past
>the intersection of Lake Street and Commonwealth Avenue in Brighton. There
>once was an interchange at this terminal for cars of the Eastern Mass. (I
>believe), which continued out Commonwealth Avenue into Newton. I don't
>know exactly when the Eastern Mass. abandoned this service.
>
same terminal. Only the name was changed to protect the innocent. (Is my
age showing?) The company that went out Comm Av into Newton was the
Middlesex and Boston Street Railway. I think 1931 was the date of their
conversion from rail to bus but I am not certain. The company continued
in existence under the same name long enough to be operating under heavy
subsidy by the MBTA until the 1970s, but now what's left of its routes are
just another part of the MBTA bus system. Several of the M&B's former car
barns survive, however, converted to other uses. Many of their bus routes
became redundant and were abandoned when the Highland Branch trolley line
opened in 1959. The Comm Av line, I think, lasted a little longer than that
but not much.
>
>
>
>Now I have a question: Len Batchelder, in another post on a related
>thread, said that none of the current Green Line branches terminates at
>Park Street. When last I lived in Boston (1984), the Arborway branch used
>the loop at Park Street as its regular terminal; I somehow recall that this
>was still the case in 1988. When did the T change the northern terminal
>for the E branch, and where does it end now?
>
which now only runs to Heath Street although restoration of service to the
Arborway is still officially in the plans, has been running through to Lechmere
for a while now.
Nick Nussbaum
>> Finally, I've seen old pictures of cars in Park Street Station
>> labelled with West Roxbury destinations, so I'm wondering
>> if there used to be a LOT more routes into that station.
>
>Well, at the risk of opening up a whole new thread (on a subject of which my
>knowledge isn't very great :^), there was a period of a few years in which
>heavy-rail subway trains of what is now the Orange Line used the Tremont St
>tunnel and hence passed through (the upper level of) Park St. These trains
>were moved out, and the tunnel returned to streetcar use, when the Washington
>St tunnel was completed. I don't remember the dates (and I hate to guess
>after being off by about 30 years on the closing of the Cambridge St portal),
>but it was certainly before 1920.
From "Change at Park Street Under" by Brian J Cudahy
When the Tremont St Subway opened, it promptly hit 280 cars an hour.
In the period mentioned above (1901 ) when the Main Line El ( Orange Line)
took over the subway it displaced 1500 street car trips a day including
trolley lines to Allston and Brookline.
The Main Line El ran from Sullivan Square ( Charlestown ) to Dudley (Roxbury)
and later Forest Hills. From Sullivan Square 10 stub terminals linked
the third rail, m.u. cars to street cars to such places as Medford
And Everett. A later El extension ran to Everett.
At Dudley, there were transfer loops for streetcars to
Forest hills, Jamaica Plains, Roxbury Crossing, Dorchster and Roxbury.
The Main Line soon had a branch, the Atlantic Ave El which ran along the
waterfront steamships. It was temporarily closed by the great Molasses Flood
of 1919.
The Main Line moved into its own tunnel on Washington Street in 1908 and
the Tremont line reverted to low platform trolley status.
--
Nick Nussbaum ni...@eskimo.com PO 4738 Seattle,WA 98104
Robert Coe
> Now I have a question: Len Batchelder, in another post on a related
> thread, said that none of the current Green Line branches terminates at
> Park Street. When last I lived in Boston (1984), the Arborway branch used
> the loop at Park Street as its regular terminal; I somehow recall that this
> was still the case in 1988. When did the T change the northern terminal
> for the E branch, and where does it end now?
It goes through to Lechmere and has for a few years. Before that there was
a short-lived experiment in which Lechmere service was provided by a shuttle
that turned at the old Brattle Street loop in Government Center station.
For a long time before that, the Riverside cars went through to Lechmere.
Before that my memory is hazy, but I think maybe the Beacon Street cars
went to Lechmere. I thought the shuttle to Government Center made a lot of
sense, since it insulated the Lechmere service (which runs on fairly long
headways at best) from delays due to traffic in the Tremont St and Boylston
St tunnels. But I guess the MBTA didn't think so, since it didn't last very
long.
___ _ - Bob
/__) _ / / ) _ _
(_/__) (_)_(_) (___(_)_(/_______________________________________ b...@1776.COM
Nicholas Russon
>M00...@MBVM.Mitre.Org writes:
>j...@phoenix.Princeton.EDU asks: Scott McCauley Jr.) writes:
>
>>There was talk of the TTC scrapping its trolleybuses and replacing them
>>with diesels :-(. Whatever happened with this issue?
>
> They did, but have since restored at least some of the trolleybus routes.
> I don't know which ones.
>
>In September 1992, I saw GM "fishbowl" trolleycoaches in service on a line
>that passed under the east end of Toronto Union Station, and went down to
>the harbor area. Don't recall the line number, though.
A friend of mine is a TTC supervisor...I'll try to remember to ask him about
the resumption of service. For the record, though, many of the trolley
buses are currently stored at a TTC facility at the east end of the
Gardiner Expressway, just a few hundred metres west of Leslie Street on
Lakeshore Boulevard.
They've been there since the last "farewell" run.
I'll be honest though: I didn't pay a lot of attention to them...they
don't run on rails! ;-)
Regards,
Nicholas
--
Nicholas Russon nz...@meadow.uucp | Giving money and power to
Amdahl Canada nz...@amail.amdahl.com | government is like giving
416-542-6530 nichola...@canrem.uucp | whiskey and car keys to
416-750-0979 | teenage boys. (P.J. O'Rourke)
James B. VanBokkelen
.... I thought the shuttle to Government Center made a lot of
sense, since it insulated the Lechmere service (which runs on fairly long
headways at best) from delays due to traffic in the Tremont St and
Boylston St tunnels.
It significantly increased travel time from Park St. and west to Lechmere
since it added an extra wait for the shuttle.
After the LRVs arrived in the 70s & through the early 80s, Arborway
turned at Park, Beacon turned at Gov't Center, Riverside at No. Sta.,
and Boston College at Lechmere. The MBTA usually has had a Starter
(car movement supervisor) at Boylston St. during rush hour.
Regardless of normal turnback points, he breaks up clumps of cars and
tries to maintain outbound service frequency by ordering them to
short-turn at either Park or Gov't Center. At times, there has been
a corresponding Starter at Park St. westbound who directs specific
cars to run express, sometimes as far as Kenmore. I don't recall
seeing this before the Boylston St. tunnel was re-signalled with
longer blocks (1980?), which greatly reduced its capacity.
Nick Nussbaum
>thread, said that none of the current Green Line branches terminates at
>Park Street. When last I lived in Boston (1984), the Arborway branch used
>the loop at Park Street as its regular terminal; I somehow recall that this
>was still the case in 1988. When did the T change the northern terminal
>for the E branch, and where does it end now?
I'm wondering if it happened about the time they started using
the "new" articulated cars on the Arborway branch, it being the
last branch to use the older cars...
Mark Brader
Here's a sketch of the Toronto subway system, plus the Scarborough RT.
The numbers indicate the sequence of opening of the different parts.
This is approximately to scale; the + signs show a square of side
5 miles (8 km), and have no other significance.
+ + 6
6
0 5
0 5
7 5 9999999
7 5 9
7 5 9
7 5 9
+ + 7 1 8
7 1 8
7 1 4
44444 7 1 4
8 4444443333333333332331333333333333333333444
2 1
2 1
1
1. 1954. - Eglinton to Union
2. 1963. - Union to St. George
3. 1966. - Keele to Woodbine
4. 1968. - Keele to Islington and Woodbine to Warden
5. 1974? - Eglinton to Sheppard
6. 1975? - Sheppard to Finch
(1987? - North York Centre station added intermediately)
7. 1979? - St. George to Wilson
8. 1981? - Islington to Kipling and Warden to Kennedy
9. 1984? - Scarborough RT: Kennedy to McCowan
0. Under construction - Wilson to Sheppard West
All these dates are from memory, but I'm positive they're within a
year or so for the later ones, and exact for the earlier ones.
--
Mark Brader "A healthy nation is as unconscious of its
SoftQuad Inc., Toronto nationality as a healthy man of his bones."
utzoo!sq!msb, m...@sq.com -- Shaw
This article is in the public domain.
Mark Brader
> in alphabetical sequence by the route name. In this sequence, BAY
> became, I think, route 9.
The alphabetical system only applies to the original assignment of
route numbers. A curiosity of this numbering was that the numbers
were scattered throughout the range 1 to 99, presumably in the hope
that later routes could take their proper alphabetical place. However,
there've been anomalies for a long time -- routes 32 and 34 have been
Eglinton West and Eglinton East respectively for at least 25 years.
Maybe they were Eglinton and Eglinton East even earlier.
I remember when the number of routes started getting close to 100 --
any time a route disappeared, e.g. through being merged into another
one, we would see its number reappear shortly afterwards for some new
route. Then it got to where there were more than 100 routes, and
since then, new ones have generally had new numbers above 100.
(They go up to the 140s now. Streetcars have separate numbers in
the 500s, and overnight buses, in the 300s.)
Bay is route 6, as someone said, and the other trolleybus line that
was still in use the last I heard was Annette, route 4. That one
runs from St. George station via Bedford, Davenport, Dupont, Annette,
and Jane Streets to Jane station.
> BAY as such did not exist as a streetcar
> line in modern times. It was the in-town end of the DUPONT car line until
> the UNIVERSITY Subway opened. At that time, DUPONT was abandoned and the
> inner end became the BAY bus while the outer end became an extension of
> the ANNETTE trolley bus. Also, at the same time, about half of the
> DUNDAS streetcar service was rerouted to the Ferry Docks along the
> innermost end of Bay Street retaining rail service there. This operation
> was abandoned along with the City Hall Loop when the BLOOR-DANFORTH
> subway opened about 1970. This was also about the time that BAY was
> converted from Diesel bus to trolleybus.
This sort of rerouting was certainly common through the TTC's history
of streetcar operation. However, I'm certain that streetcar operation
on Bay to the Ferry Docks ended earlier than the City Hall Loop, for
the simple reason that I remember route maps with the latter and not
the former. I first visited Toronto in 1964, which is after the
University subway opened, but before the Bloor-Danforth; but I think
the first time I actually was aware that TTC system maps existed was
when the Bloor-Danforth subway opened in 1966.
The conversion of the Bay route from buses to trolleybuses dates from
about 1976, and the event that prompted it was the extension of the
Yonge subway to York Mills. See, when the original segment of the
Yonge subway opened in 1954, it was about 2 miles shorter than the
Yonge streetcar route had been; that had operated to the City Limit
loop at Yonge and Glen Echo. Rather than operate the 2 miles from
Eglinton to Glen Echo as a short streetcar line, it was trolleybusified
-- as route 99 Yonge, I believe. The present 97 Yonge was then the
59 North Yonge, and it operated express south of City Limit:
Union Eglinton City Limit
<------subway------------> <--- 99 --->
< express - - ----- 59 -------->
The city limit was also a fare zone boundary until about 1971, and
a lot of older routes terminated there -- many still do.
When the subway was extended north, the trolleybuses that had operated
the 99 Yonge became redundant, and the 6 Bay was chosen as a suitable
length and location of route to operate them on.
| More recently, the Harbourfront LRT has started running under Bay St.
| south of Union Station. ... I don't believe the LRT route is numbered.
| This line has been running for 2-3 years now.
It's route 604. Apparently the two subway lines and the Scarborough RT
are notionally routes 601, 602, and 603, though these designations are
not used in any public information, nor in any TTC radio communications
that I've overheard. The 604 designation is used on the streetcars,
though.
It is planned to extend this line up Spadina Ave. to Spadina station.
This was always intended, but was held up for years by objections from
people who didn't want the streetcar tracks to become a private right-
of-way. Most of Spadina Ave. is now 6 lanes of cars wide.
} The Western Flyer trolley buses (model E700A's) operated by the TTC are
} now all out of service. At least they were a year ago.
} The GM "fishbowl" trolleybuses were delivered to Edmonton Alberta in 1982.
} ... 40 are on lease to the TTC. The three > year lease was to end
} late this spring (May?) but I suspect it will be extended.
} Edmonton is seriously dithering on what to do with its TB network
} and won't likely need them back anytime soon (if ever).
The anti-trolleybus faction here succeeded in getting all the trolleybus
routes converted to buses for a while, and tried to return the leased
vehicles to Edmonton. Edmonton said no way was Toronto getting out
of the lease, they needed the money. The pro-trolleybus faction used
this as a bargaining point to reactivate the Bay and Annette routes as
trolleybus routes. The anti-trolleybus faction insists that the
Western Flyer trolleybuses, having been stored outdoors since the
original shutdown, are no longer operable and should be disposed of.
(This as though they didn't already operate outdoors! But apparently
there has been vandalism.)
Meanwhile things remain unresolved -- the other trolleybus routes
(40 Junction, 47 Lansdowne, 61 Nortown West, 63 Ossington, 74 Mount
Pleasant, 89 Weston, 103 Nortown East) still have overhead over them,
but I have seen wire taken away (specifically, where the 103's line
crosses Yonge) to repair an operating route's wires, and not replaced.
The factions are still fighting a complicated political battle.
--
Mark Brader, Toronto "It's been proven. Places stay clean until somebody
utzoo!sq!msb, m...@sq.com drops the first piece of litter." -- TTC poster
Ron Newman
|> I don't recall
|> seeing this before the Boylston St. tunnel was re-signalled with
|> longer blocks (1980?), which greatly reduced its capacity.
Why did they re-signal the tunnel, if that reduced its capacity?
--
Ron Newman rne...@bbn.com
James B. VanBokkelen
Might have been tighter safety standards, but a cynic would say they
were trying to reduce the cost of the re-signalling (fewer blocks ==
fewer bucks). The old signal spacing was probably predicated on 30
MPH cars, and was at least somewhat obsolete after the 50 MPH PCCs
entered service (although I'm sure the speed limit in the tunnel was
lower). The MBTA has had quite a few rear-end collisions in the
various stations along Boylston St, since the tunnel is straight and
routine operational practice allows more than one car/train on the
platform at once, last I knew.
Robert Coe
> In article <iiP6ZB...@1776.COM> b...@1776.COM (Robert Coe) writes:
>
> .... I thought the shuttle to Government Center made a lot of
> sense, since it insulated the Lechmere service (which runs on fairly long
> headways at best) from delays due to traffic in the Tremont St and
> Boylston St tunnels.
>
> It significantly increased travel time from Park St. and west to Lechmere
> since it added an extra wait for the shuttle.
If the shuttle headways weren't too long, it should have *decreased* the
worst-case travel time. The way it is now, if the car going through to
Lechmere gets delayed, you're stuck with a long wait. (I speak from lots
of experience.) But when the shuttle was running, you could take almost
any car to Government Center and catch the shuttle there.
> After the LRVs arrived in the 70s & through the early 80s, Arborway
> turned at Park, Beacon turned at Gov't Center, Riverside at No. Sta.,
> and Boston College at Lechmere.
Are you sure it wasn't Boston College at Government Center and Beacon St
at Lechmere?
> The MBTA usually has had a Starter (car movement supervisor) at Boylston
> St. during rush hour. Regardless of normal turnback points, he breaks up
> clumps of cars and tries to maintain outbound service frequency by ordering
> them to short-turn at either Park or Gov't Center.
But not, in my experience, to go on to North Station or Lechmere if they
weren't headed there anyway.
> At times, there has been a corresponding Starter at Park St. westbound who
> directs specific cars to run express, sometimes as far as Kenmore.
In the PCC days they occasionally turned inbound cars from Riverside or
Beacon St at Kenmore in order to maintain headways on those lines. But I'm
not sure that the LRVs can negotiate the loop at Kenmore. Anybody know for
sure?
> I don't recall seeing this before the Boylston St. tunnel was re-signalled
> with longer blocks (1980?), which greatly reduced its capacity.
What was the point of the longer blocks? Were they trying to increase speed
at the expense of longer headways? They significantly improved the quality
of the track at around the same time, as I recall.
Sheldon Kovitz
Park Street. It is true for the actual six lines, but there are some
cars that are not assigned to the six lines. They are called run as
directed. Does anyone know if the run as directed cars run only as far
as Park Street.
An extremely annoying practice is for the northbound cars to be
assigned a new terminal point for that run as they pass a starter
in a shack at Boylston Street Station. To make up lost time for the
southbound run and to space the lines more evenly, cars are directed
to turn at Park Street, Canal Street loop (North Station), or
Government Center when the destination sign indicates a terminal
at a further point.
The idea of a shuttle from Government Center to Lechmere is not in
my opinion a good one as it forces riders from the northernmost
stations to change cars if they wish to proceed beyond Government
Center. A single car ride is always better.
I always thought that the Watertown line was a good idea because
of the principle of a single car ride to Boston, but apparently
the riders in that area are opposed to the restoration of service.
Does anyone have a list of the current routes in the US where
PCC cars are being used in revenue service. (One line is
the Boston high speed trolley line, part of the Red Line
from Ashmont to Mattapan.)
Dan Rabin
In the PCC days they occasionally turned inbound cars from Riverside or
Beacon St at Kenmore in order to maintain headways on those lines. But I'm
not sure that the LRVs can negotiate the loop at Kenmore. Anybody know for
sure?
I could be remembering wrong, but I seem to recall witnessing an LRV
looping at Kenmore sometime in 1980-82. Actually, I only saw an LRV
disappear onto the loop track, heard a LOT of screeching, and soon saw
an LRV emerge onto the outer westbound track--I wasn't aboard, just
waiting on the platform. At the time I didn't know where those extra
tracks led, and I recall being quite surprised at the re-emergence of
the train.
Kenmore station factoid:
Brian Cudahy's book claims that the inner tracks at Kenmore are built
on stilts to allow for easy conversion to high-platform operation.
The idea was to have accross-the-platform transfer between Beacon
Street cars and a main-line subway converted to heavy-rail operation.
Maybe the period of elevated-in-the-Tremont-subway operation gave them
the idea.
Another unbuilt Boston plan:
I once saw a planning document dating from ?the early 70's? concerning
a proposed extension to the Blue Line from the Bowdoin loop in a sharp
curve to a new Park Street platform (parallel to the Red Line on the
same level), then ?through Park Square to the Turnpike alignment? to a
Huntington Avenue subway crossing the Fens to Brookline Village and
using the Highland Branch thence to Riverside. The engineering had
been done as far as figuring out how deep to put the tunnel under the
Muddy River. The plan seemed to be intended to take some traffic off
the Bolyston Street subway.
-- Dan Rabin (rabi...@cs.yale.edu)
R. Todd Minsk
m...@sq.sq.com (Mark Brader) writes:
> 7. 1979? - St. George to Wilson
In service by April 1978, when I rode on it.
Todd Minsk, ferro-bibliographer
Larry Campbell
trains on the Riverside line at rush hour. This really seemed to
relieve crowding - at least, I always seemed to be able to get a seat
when a 3-car train came by. Shortly after they stopped running the
3-car trains, they replaced all of the overhead catenary with a
dual-cable system that looks more heavy duty. I either heard or
imagined that the improved catenary was put up because the 3-car
trains drew too much current for the old catenary. But the new
catenary has been up for, what, two years now, and I haven't seen any
3-car trains.
Does anyone know what happened to them?
--
Larry Campbell The Boston Software Works, Inc., 120 Fulton Street
camp...@redsox.bsw.com Boston, Massachusetts 02109 (USA)
--
Larry Campbell The Boston Software Works, Inc., 120 Fulton Street
camp...@redsox.bsw.com Boston, Massachusetts 02109 (USA)
Larry Campbell
-> The MBTA usually has had a Starter (car movement supervisor) at Boylston
-> St. during rush hour. Regardless of normal turnback points, he breaks up
-> clumps of cars and tries to maintain outbound service frequency by ordering
-> them to short-turn at either Park or Gov't Center.
-
-But not, in my experience, to go on to North Station or Lechmere if they
-weren't headed there anyway.
Actually I have seen that happen a few times recently (in the last two
years), but it is rare.
-In the PCC days they occasionally turned inbound cars from Riverside or
-Beacon St at Kenmore in order to maintain headways on those lines. But I'm
-not sure that the LRVs can negotiate the loop at Kenmore. Anybody know for
-sure?
Yes, I have seen both the Boeing and the Kinki cars turned at Kenmore.
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
sko...@ra.cs.umb.edu (Sheldon Kovitz) writes, in part:
>
>Does anyone have a list of the current routes in the US where
>PCC cars are being used in revenue service. (One line is
>the Boston high speed trolley line, part of the Red Line
>from Ashmont to Mattapan.)
of Route 23 on Germantown Avenue in Philadelphia. There's the Newark City
Subway, on which I'd place my bets for ending up as the LAST PCC operation
in regular service. And I believe that some still run in Pittsburgh.
I know it's not US, but don't forget Harbourfront in Toronto.
Len Bachelder Archives Committee, Boston and Maine RR Historical Society
MITRE Corp. Secretary, Massachusetts Bay Railroad Enthusiasts
Bedford MA 01730 Member, 470 Railroad Club
Garth G. Groff
I believe that San Francisco still runs some PCC cars
in regular service during their summer season. They
are mixed with other historic cars on the surface tracks
on Market Street (the LRVs run in the subway below).
I don't know if any of the PCCs are owned by the MUNI.
Last time I was there they were running at least one
former MUNI car on loan from the Bay Area Electric
Railway Association, but this was several years ago.
The BAERA has most of the surviving cast-off MUNI cars
in their collection at Rio Vista Junction near Fairfield.
They also have most of the surviving Key System cars and
the nearly all the remaining SN stuff, as well as lots of
other neat cars from other Northern California lines.
Well worth a visit.
~S
--
Garth (Haridas) Groff
"Not yet famous author"
gg...@poe.acc.virginia.EDU Chant "Govinda Bohlo Hare"
Sheldon Kovitz
Park Street. Since there may be no starter at Boylston Station at that
time, how do the cars know to turn?
Is the theory that certain run-as-directed cars are scheduled to turn
at Park Street valid?
Usually Boston College cars are directed outbound at Park Street at
those times.
Question: If the car is destined for Park Street, why not list
that destination when it leaves Boston College. Are all turnbacks
decided on the fly? This is major inconvenience for riders who
are destined for Govt. Center or beyond -- as I often am.
Robert Coe
> Brian Cudahy's book claims that the inner tracks at Kenmore are built on
> stilts to allow for easy conversion to high-platform operation. The idea
> was to have accross-the-platform transfer between Beacon Street cars and
> a main-line subway converted to heavy-rail operation. Maybe the period of
> elevated-in-the-Tremont-subway operation gave them the idea.
It used to be that if you looked closely at the inner tracks, you could see
that they ran on a sort of wooden trestle for the reason that you state.
That's probably also why the Kenmore loop was built, to allow Beacon St cars
to turn around there. (In those days there were, of course, no Riverside
cars.) It's not clear what they meant to do about the Boston College and
Watertown cars; possibly they planned to extend the subway farther down Com-
monwealth Avenue. It's also not clear what they planned to do about the
Tremont Street cars, which would have had to share tracks with the high-
platform trains. But what finally made the idea impractical was the opening
of the Huntington Avenue tunnel as a spur of the Boylston St tunnel in, I
believe, the late 30s or early 40s. In any case, when they rebuilt the
tracks a few years ago, they filled in the space between the platforms with
ballast gravel. They could still take it out, but I don't expect to live to
see high-platform operation on that line.
> I once saw a planning document dating from ?the early 70's? concerning a
> proposed extension to the Blue Line from the Bowdoin loop in a sharp curve
> to a new Park Street platform (parallel to the Red Line on the same level),
> then ?through Park Square to the Turnpike alignment? to a Huntington Avenue
> subway crossing the Fens to Brookline Village and using the Highland Branch
> thence to Riverside. The engineering had been done as far as figuring out
> how deep to put the tunnel under the Muddy River. The plan seemed to be
> intended to take some traffic off the Bolyston Street subway.
No kidding??! I once had an idea like that!! (I even sent it to the MBTA,
which didn't bother to reply.) For some time the MBTA has talked about ex-
tending the Blue Line to a connection with the Red Line at Charles Street.
My idea was to continue from there in a deep-bore tunnel to Kenmore Square,
with an intermediate station ("Beacon Street") in a densely populated but
underserved area of the Back Bay. Leaving Kenmore Square station, the route
would connect as you describe, making the Riverside Line an extension of the
Blue Line. There are two very attractive aspects of that plan (aside from
the obvious ones of relieving crowding in the Green Line tunnels and improv-
ing access to the airport from west of the city):
1) Since the Riverside line was originally a commuter railroad, there are
no loading gauge or bridge clearance problems to stand in the way. More-
over, the station spacing is already right for a heavy-rail subway.
2) It could be done in two stages: first to Reservoir, then later to River-
side as funds permit and traffic dictates. The section between Reservoir
and Riverside would not be isolated from the rest of the Green Line be-
cause of the connection to the Beacon Street branch of the Green Line at
Reservoir.
> -- Dan Rabin (rabi...@cs.yale.edu)
In fact, was it you with whom I discussed this one evening in Auditorium
Station after a Yale Club dinner a few years ago? :^)
James B. VanBokkelen
.... It's also not clear what they planned to do about the
Tremont Street cars, which would have had to share tracks with the high-
platform trains.
I expect the original plan was to run the Rapid Transit equipment
through the inner tracks at Park St. with the Tremont St. and South
Boston streetcars using the outer tracks. That way the only interaction
would be at the diamonds where the outer loop crossed the Rapid Transit
tracks. Likewise, using the outer platform at Haymarket would have avoided
interference with streetcars coming from Canal St. and turning at Scollay
on the inner loop.
Sheldon Kovitz
part of its Program for Mass Transportation. A decision as to whether
to include it in the final document (a menu of desirable projects) will
be made in June.
Stay tuned.
Robert Coe
> Even during off hours like after 9pm on weekday evenings, cars turn at
> Park Street. Since there may be no starter at Boylston Station at that
> time, how do the cars know to turn?
They have radios. Probably a remote dispatcher is keeping track of where
they are.
> Is the theory that certain run-as-directed cars are scheduled to turn
> at Park Street valid?
Probably not. If they expected to turn at Park St, they'd probably be signed
for Park St.
> Is the theory that certain run-as-directed cars are scheduled to turn
> at Park Street valid?
>
> Usually Boston College cars are directed outbound at Park Street at
> those times.
>
> Question: If the car is destined for Park Street, why not list that
> destination when it leaves Boston College. Are all turnbacks decided on
> the fly? This is major inconvenience for riders who are destined for Govt.
> Center or beyond -- as I often am.
I'd certainly call it a minor inconvenience. There are always lots of cars
going from Park St to Government Center. You'll probably spend less time
waiting at Park St than you'd have to wait for the next car at BC (if you
knew the first one was going to turn at Park St). And if you're going beyond
Government Center, you have to change anyway; BC cars don't go beyond Govern-
ment Center.
Robert Coe
> In article <2sm0ZB...@1776.COM> b...@1776.COM (Robert Coe) writes:
>
> .... It's also not clear what they planned to do about the Tremont
> Street cars, which would have had to share tracks with the high-
> platform trains.
>
> I expect the original plan was to run the Rapid Transit equipment
> through the inner tracks at Park St. with the Tremont St. and South
> Boston streetcars using the outer tracks. That way the only interaction
> would be at the diamonds where the outer loop crossed the Rapid Transit
> tracks. Likewise, using the outer platform at Haymarket would have avoided
> interference with streetcars coming from Canal St. and turning at Scollay
> on the inner loop.
They would have had some problems in Boylston St station, where there's not
much room to have both high and low platforms. Also, I doubt that even a
train of Blue Line cars could negotiate the loop on the inner tracks at Park
St. (But I suppose they could have operated it as a stub-end station.)
David Murphy
> How much of this plan is
>still on the official agenda, I do not know, but I still hear talk about
>trolleybusses to the Fan Piers. Digging that tunnel would be a BIG job,
>though of course not as BBBBIIIIIGGGGG as the other "Big Dig"!!
The South Boston Waterfront project will probably happen. The
approrpiations for the new federal courthouse included money for at
least the stretch from South Station to Southie (if my memory serves
me). The judges refused to move unless there was a transit link so the
money was found. But because of the BIG DIG work on this won't really
start until after the Artery is depressed.
I read the preliminary environmental impact statement and I think that
the project has great potential for increasing the T's connectivity.
While the transitway will initially end in a loop below South Station
the intent is to extend it along Essex Street to a station connected
to the Green line (Boylston) and the Orange line (Essex/Chinatown).
There the planners have two options (at least). They could connect to
the central subway between Boylston and Arlington (in the area where
the old ramp exited to the street) and divert C trains to the new
tunnel, or they could link up with the proposed Washington Street
service. There was some hint that they might do both if they could.
(It also seemed that they were enamored by Seattle's transitway.)
Personally I'd favor a connection to the Green line.
At the other end, once the service had emerged from the tunnel under
Fort Point Channel it could run in a reservation down the length of
the waterfront (but back a few blocks) with the option of extending it
down L Street to the bathhouse. Having driven L Street I doubt that
this would be light rail--the street is too narrow and often
double-parked.
One interesting option would be to extend the service to Logan Airport
using dual powered buses. This would connect with MassPort's new
hub-and-spoke people mover. (Not the best design for such a system,
IMHO, but that is another thread.) I'd rather they extend service with
LRVs and via a transit tunnel under the harbor but that is too costly
now--but could happen in later years.
Another option the PEIS mentions is leaving room for a portal to
connect to the transit service above the buried Central Artery. Thus
you could have trolleybuses or, better yet, LRVs running between South
and North Stations. Whether they would, if LRVs, rejoin the Green line
at North Station wasn't discussed.
My own idea for enhancing the route (in stages of course) would be to
extend it beyond a Boylston St.terminus. Instead I'd resurrect the
MBTA's wish for a Stuart Street subway and extend it to Lansdowne
Street and then swing north connecting with the Kenmore Loop. This
would allow LRV service (I betray my bias here :-) ) to run through to
Logan Airport from Riverside or Cleveland Circle. A direct link
between the airport, South Station, and a true convention center
station could be a boon. Not incidently, this would relieve pressure
on the central subway while providing service on a parallel route.
Stops could be at Park Sq. (just to confuse the tourists :-) ), Back
Bay/Copley Place (connecting with the major hotels and the Orange line
again), Convention Ctr (a bit tricky with the Pike and Conrail but
doable), and Lansdowne St, (serving the ballyard). It could be
extended to meet the Riverside line but connecting at Kenmore provides
connections with the B & C trainsa dn allows rerouting of the C trains
into the new tunnel. Of course, if Riverside went high platform a
direct connection would make sense. Imagine a high platform line from
Riverside directly to the airport!
Ah well, enough dreaming.
---dave
--
david murphy I'm a simple man, with complex tastes.
djmu...@wam.umd.edu uunet!haven!wam.umd.edu!djmurphy (NeXT)
James B. VanBokkelen
They would have had some problems in Boylston St station, where there's
not much room to have both high and low platforms. Also, I doubt that
even a train of Blue Line cars could negotiate the loop on the inner
tracks at Park St. (But I suppose they could have operated it as a
stub-end station.)
Boylston, particularly on the inbound side, has quite a bit of platform
length on the Boylston St. tunnel line beyond where the Tremont St.
tunnel line starts to descend, all of which would have been high. They
were probably also prepared to do some construction - routing the high
platform rapid transit through the inner tracks at Park St., crossing
the trolley loop and continuing on to Scollay would probably have involved
removing a little concrete and shifting a few pillars.
Bob Rogers
parked outside. These are all the usual dull black, but one car in the string
usually has a horizontal reddish band around it. What does this stripe
signify?
Thanks.
--
Bob Rogers Internet: rog...@instrumental.com
Instrumental, Inc. GEnie: R.C.ROGERS
Minneapolis, MN Phone: 612-920-6188
Robert Coe
> length on the Boylston St. tunnel line beyond where the Tremont St.
> tunnel line starts to descend, all of which would have been high. They
> were probably also prepared to do some construction - routing the high
> platform rapid transit through the inner tracks at Park St., crossing
> the trolley loop and continuing on to Scollay would probably have involved
> removing a little concrete and shifting a few pillars.
More than a little. Remember that in those days there was no loop to reverse
northbound cars at Scollay; the loop that is there now was built during the
extensive reconstruction of the 1960s when the Government Center was built.
Warren Brill
Mass, in the sixties, I used to ride Riverside->Fenway Park for Red Sox games,
also went over to Cambridge on a line we called "Harvard-Ashmont". What is
the REAL name of this line, and what COLOR is it. One of the things that
sticks out most in my mind was that it was FAST, underground for a long time,
then came out of the SECOND floor of a building suddenly into light for the
run across the Charles. The building looked really interesting, what with
two tunnels coming out of the second floor!
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
o *i---i-----v+++v--==-==-==x o
o Warren T. Brill, a.k.a. *----|[|]| _RIO GRANDE__ | o
o wbr...@hpfccq.fc.hp.com i_|___/|___|\____________#######|_i o
o wbr...@hpfcso.fc.hp.com =++=()^()^()= +=======+ =()^()^()=++= o
o ===================================== o
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
M00...@mbvm.mitre.org
wbr...@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM (Warren Brill) writes:
>
>Just a quick add-on to this thread: When I was a teenager, living in Wayland,
>Mass, in the sixties, I used to ride Riverside->Fenway Park for Red Sox games,
>also went over to Cambridge on a line we called "Harvard-Ashmont". What is
>the REAL name of this line, and what COLOR is it. One of the things that
>sticks out most in my mind was that it was FAST, underground for a long time,
>then came out of the SECOND floor of a building suddenly into light for the
>run across the Charles. The building looked really interesting, what with
>two tunnels coming out of the second floor!
>
portion Park Street <-> Harvard used to be called the Cambridge Subway, Park
Street <-> Andrew used to be the Dorchester Tunnel, and Andrew <-> Ashmont,
the Dorchester Tunnel Extension. Collectively they were called the Cambridge-
Dorchester Subway. I think Harvard <-> Alewife is called the Alewife Extension
but how "official" these names are is open to question. It is FAST, but just
how fast I can't say. Perhaps 45 mph or so. Since the sixties, it has been
extended on the Cambridge end, beyond Harvard, to Porter Square in North
Cambridge, Davis Square in West Somerville, and Alewife terminal at the Alewife
Brook Parkway, close to the junction of Routes 2 and 16 in West Cambridge. A
large parking garage is located at Alewife with convenient access to and from
Route 2 (although if fills up quite early most mornings), and bus routes
serving Arlington, Belmont, Burlington, Lexington, etc. have been redesigned
to feed into Alewife. As several people have already commented here, it is
not primarily a "walk-in" terminal, being located at some distance from any
residential areas, but was intended to attract automobile commuters and to be
a feed-in terminal for suburban busses. The T wanted to build the line into
Arlington, but the local NIMBYs shot that down.
At the opposite end of the line, a branch was opened (1970?) to Quincy and then
later extended to Braintree. It follows the former New Haven RR Old Colony
Division right of way, and has stations in somewhat similar, though fewer,
locations. It branches off from the Ashmont line at JFK/Columbia station,
parallels it through Savin Hill station without stopping, then crosses the
Neponset River into Quincy. If you want "FAST", ride this end of the line.
There is a station at North Quincy, roughly halfway between the former Old
Colony stations of Atlantic and Norfolk Downs, then stations approximately on
the former locations at Wollaston, Quincy Center and Quincy Adams, and finally
the Braintree terminal which is about a quarter-mile short of the former Old
Colony South Braintree station location. Immense parking garages were built
at Quincy Adams and Braintree - they also fill up early. The Quincy Adams
garage has direct access off the Southeast Expressway. Suburban busses feed
mainly to the Quincy Center station, though there is some bus service to
all the others as well (perhaps not Quincy Adams - I'm not certain of that).
Dennis H Lippert
>My office overlooks some tracks, and occasionally a string of LPG tankers is
>parked outside. These are all the usual dull black, but one car in the string
>usually has a horizontal reddish band around it. What does this stripe
>signify?
I don't think there *is* any, except to make them look pretty. The cars
with the band are owned by CNTX (used to know the actual *name*...)
and they also own identical cars w/o the band. The band is about a foot
wide, bright red, and runs long-wise around the tank... correct?
Den
--
==========================================================================
Dennis Lippert - mac...@pitt.edu or mac...@vm2.cis.pitt.edu
The "Mac Maniac" operator at the Sutherland Hall Lab - Univ. of Pittsburgh
"Just the Macs, Man"
James B. VanBokkelen
.... It is FAST, but just how fast I can't say. Perhaps 45 mph or so....
When automatic speed control was installed on the Cambridge end of the Red
line in the '80s, it came with a digital speedometer visible from the
passenger area, if the cab curtains weren't drawn. In the long straight
tunnel from Kendall to the curve from Main to Mass. Ave. entering Central
Sq. the speed limit was ~55 MPH.
jcj
>parked outside. These are all the usual dull black, but one car in the string
>usually has a horizontal reddish band around it. What does this stripe
>signify?
I'm leaping before I look here, but doesn't the red band signify an
toxic inhalant? (I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong 8-).
Robert Coe
> Of course Ted Williams made a bigger splash than Warren Spahn, and the
> Brave's hangout has been an apartment complex since many years ago.
I don't know how we got off onto this topic, but the "Braves' hangout"
(Braves' Field) is now Boston University's football stadium. The three
tall buildings that sit about where the old grandstand used to be are
BU dorms.
Incidentally, there was a streetcar turning loop at Braves' Field even af-
ter BU took it over. (Cars were occasionally signed for "Boston University
Field".) I don't remember when it was pulled up (or paved over), but it's
not still there.
Amateur Radio Club
The band is just so the owner can identify their cars easily,
just like some cars are blue or white or green (TXPX cars?).
The cars which you are probably referring to have a reddish-brown band and
either have (had) CITX or now have PROX (Procor) reporting marks.
Walthers offered an LPG car painted up with the band and CITX marks
not too long ago.
It is the same reason why one of the private grain companies painted their
cars a bright pink - they could be spotted easily from the air when doing
car checks.
Craig Thomasson
uum...@ccu.umanitoba.ca
Larry Campbell
-In article <1222...@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM>, wbr...@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM (Warren Brill) writes:
-|> One of the things that
-|> sticks out most in my mind was that it was FAST, underground for a long time,
-|> then came out of the SECOND floor of a building suddenly into light for the
-|> run across the Charles. The building looked really interesting, what with
-|> two tunnels coming out of the second floor!
-
-As Len said, this is the MBTA Red Line. But as far as I can tell, the
-Red Line does NOT come out a "building" at Charles Street, but simply
-out of the side of a hill. It then goes very close to the second or
-third stories of several Beacon Hill residential buildings. How anyone
-can sanely live in these houses is a mystery to me.
Actually it comes out of what I suspect used to be the ground floor.
I'm pretty sure the tracks are already higher than I could reach if I
were standing on the ground right next to where the tracks meet
daylight.
Many years ago a friend and I were looking for an apartment and saw an
ad for a remarkably inexpensive (!) apartment on Beacon Hill (one of
Boston's oldest and toniest neighborhoods, for the out-of-town
readers). We responded to the ad, and I was wondering why the rental
agent seemed to be whisking us through in such a hurry, when the
apartment began to shake and roar as if a train were running through
it. I looked out a bedroom window and, yes, there was a Red Line
train, eight feet below me.
We didn't take the apartment.
Sheldon Kovitz
mentionned that the T wanted to extend the line to Arlington. It was
Lexington, I think. A proposal is still on the table for an extension
to Lexington. Again I think local opposition is intense and I don't
expect it to happen in the forseeable future.
Glenn Christensen
In article <1222...@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM>, wbr...@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM (Warren Brill) writes...
>Just a quick add-on to this thread: When I was a teenager, living in Wayland,
>Mass, in the sixties, I used to ride Riverside->Fenway Park for Red Sox games,
>also went over to Cambridge on a line we called "Harvard-Ashmont". What is
>the REAL name of this line, and what COLOR is it. One of the things that
>sticks out most in my mind was that it was FAST, underground for a long time,
>then came out of the SECOND floor of a building suddenly into light for the
>run across the Charles. The building looked really interesting, what with
>two tunnels coming out of the second floor!
You are thing of the Red line. The station you are referring to is the Charles
Street station.
In the 60's, the Red line rapid transit line from Ashmont to Harvard Square.
It also connected at Ashmont with the trolley to Mattapan (this trolley line
was covered in a recent Railfan issue).
The Red line tunnel now continues north from Harvard Square - underground - to
Porter Square and eventually Alewife. A Red line branch has also been added
starting at the station nearest the Boston Globe building (can't remember the
name) down through Quincy to Braintree, providing easy access to commuters on
Rt. 3 South.
Regards,
Glenn
Ron Newman
|> The Red line tunnel now continues north from Harvard Square - underground - to
|> Porter Square and eventually Alewife. A Red line branch has also been added
|> starting at the station nearest the Boston Globe building (can't remember the
|> name) down through Quincy to Braintree, providing easy access to commuters on
|> Rt. 3 South.
The Ashmont and Quincy/Braintree branches split just north of JFK/UMass
station, which used to be called "Columbia" station. The old name is
arguably more appropriate, for the station is on Columbia Road, whereas
both the JFK Library and UMass are over a half mile away (about 15
minutes walk, or take a free shuttle bus).
Until about four years ago, the Quincy/Braintree trains passed
by this station without stopping. Now there are two
separate platforms for the two branches; if you're going
north, you need to look at a lit "Next Train" sign to tell
which platform you should wait on.
I don't know why they didn't just move the track split
south of this station instead.
--
Ron Newman rne...@bbn.com
Sandy F. Smith, Jr.
I'm vague on this, but somehow I recall that the final nail in the coffin
for the T's original proposal to build the Red Line extension to Arlington
Heights was the refusal of the Feds to provide funding for heavy rail
beyond Alewife. Somehow, I recall that the UMTA told the T at the time to
"consider light rail alternatives" instead for service Alewife<->Arlington
Heights. I suspect that had UMTA ruled otherwise, there'd be a trench (or
maybe even a tunnel) through Arlington by now, despite the opposition of a
number of Arlingtonians: the MBTA has had a generally good track record of
building the lines it wants to build.
_________________________________________________________________________
Sandy F. Smith Jr._____...@mail.sas.upenn.edu________(215) 898-4940
Administrative Assistant, Graduate Division, School of Arts and Sciences,
University of Pennsylvania, 16 College Hall, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6378
(Opinions mine, not Penn's. If they want 'em, they gotta pay for 'em.)
Henry Brugsch
"the Harvard Ashmont line" bring back a lot of warm
memories.
I discovered this amazing line in the late '50s when I got
my "freedom of the city."
Ok, a bit of perspective, I am blind, so my references are
all, tactile, audio, and olfactory.
The first time I rode the line was on a hot summer's day
with the temperature up around 90 degrees.
I vaguely knew where the line was, having traveled with my
parents on numerous occassions. We'd usually run from Park
to Washington st. to do Jordens in those days.
I could never get my mom to let me run on the rest of the
line. "just wasn't done."
So, I made up some excuse I wanted to attempt to run from my
home in Newton to Park St. on the street car. This for a
blind 13-year-old was a bit risky, but not really, so I got
the chance to "try it out."
But instead of just staying on the train and running round
the loop, I got off at Park, and found my way down onto the
island platform. A friendly starter took me in hand, and
started talking about the line.
He had decided to wait with me til the train came in.
He gathered I was interested in the system, so started
telling me about the construction of the pit. Apparently
there's a crawl-space under the platform to be used if you
fall in, and need to get away fromon-coming trains.
Luckily, I have never needed to use it.
The train eventually came in, shaking the platform with its
roar and growl. Upon entering the vehicle, you walked over to a long
bentch of wood. The place smelled of wire and ozone.
I had got one of the real old timers with inlayed pannels on
the doors. As the ubiquitous growling traction motors
started, and we rumbled towards washington, I felt a strong
breeze. But the run was suddenly aboarted by the proximity
of Wash.
As we left washington, the breeze became a gale. I found we
were on the first car, and some kids had opened up the door
in the front.
I found my way to the top of the car, and there was a
determined group pushed up against the wire grate that faced
out onto the tracks below.
Suddenly, one of them took my arm, and maneuvered me up to
the grate. "There, that's where it's at!" The gale became a
hammer of wind and noise.
The traction motors at my feet howled with demonic ferosity,
and the clank of the pick-up shoes sounded like a maniacal
dish washer gone berserk. It's a sound that has bonded
itself into my soul. The clank of the shoes, the growl of
the motors, and the rythmic thrump of the forward truck over
the parrallel joints. It is all gone, now, the old tunnel
cars as far as I know have been destroyed.
That ponderous rumble, and thrum will probably never be
heard again in the dark tunnels of Boston, now replaced by
the bing bong of the Hawker Sidley transit vehicles.
Hmmm, anyone out there got any tapes of those old cars? I
just missed a chance to get them. I got my first machine for
taping portible in '65, and they went in '61.
--
h...@infocom.co.uk -- at HOME with WAFFLE 1.65
"Badges, we need no stinking, Badges"
R. Todd Minsk
> My office overlooks some tracks, and occasionally a string of LPG tankers is
> parked outside. These are all the usual dull black, but one car in the string
> usually has a horizontal reddish band around it. What does this stripe
> signify?
>
> Thanks.
I seem to remember these as owned by PROCOR, a Canadian company similar
in function (at least with tank cars) to GATX, NAHX and other leasors.
Any significance of the stripe never occured to me; I always thought of
it as decoration that appealed to the car owner.
There IS significance as to why some tank cars are white and some
(probably most) black. It has to do with thermal expansion of a
commodity that a particular car is designed to carry. White tank car
results in less solar heat affecting the inside, so less insulation
needed.
Todd Minsk, ferro-bibliographer