Government Center Renovation

[kennedy]

From the MBTA website, I don't know if this is still happening or what, but I think it will, as most MBTA projects do. It'll just take forever.

Government Center Modernization
The entire existing Government Center station will be renovated and modernized. The station will be outfitted with new elevators, escalators, stairs, lights, and communication systems. The platforms on the Green Line level will be raised to be compatible with the new low-floor vehicles, and the platforms on the Blue Line level will be extended to accommodate six-car trains. These improvements will bring the station complex into ADA compliancy. Above ground, a new glass and steel headhouse will be constructed on City Hall Plaza, bringing natural light into the Green Line level. Additionally, a second headhouse with elevator and escalator will be constructed adjacent to the JFK building, leading directly to a new subsurface Blue Line mezzanine and fare-collection line. The design work was completed by CityBuilders: A joint venture of SYSTRA and Thomson Design Associates. The design work was brought to a 90% level by City Builders: A Joint Venture of Systra and Thomson Design Associates, and it is being further progressed to completion by Jacobs Engineering.


The design is okay, maybe a little too modern, or maybe to airport-y. Hopefully will work well with a nice new park and skyscarper on Scollay Square. Oh yeah, there are pics on the MBTA website. If anyone wants to let me know how I can put pics in the post, please do.[/quote]

[vanshnookenraggen]

This has been on the drawing boards for 6 or 7 years though. I remember going to a talk held by the architect who designed the new head house and he basically said he would never work for the T again.

[Beton Brut]

^^ I did some freelance work on TDA's media kit and wrote some content for their webpage a few years. Brian Thompson told me the same thing about working with the T. He's a bright guy -- studied with E. Fay Jones, one of the post-WWII Taliesin apprentices. TDA was also responsible for the silly PoMo masterplan for North Station.

[Ron Newman]

The design is okay, maybe a little too modern, or maybe to airport-y.

"airport-y" doesn't bother me at all in a context like this one. The South Station bus terminal, for instance, is sometimes compared to an airport waiting area; that's a great improvement over what an inter-city bus station usually looks like.

[jass]

Do they even have a timeline for this?

Or is it whenever Arlington gets done?

[AdamBC]

http://www.mbta.com/uploadedImages/About_the_T/T_Projects/government_center.jpg

Decent design, but still doesn't improve the fact that Government center is a foolish wasteland.

[Beton Brut]

Do they even have a timeline for this?

I ride through there every day, and I see no evidence of day-to-day maintenance, never mind construction prep. There's no information on the T's webpage - the project status is "Design," alluding to engineering work currently in progress. I'll wager that the T is holding its cards to see what happens with Hizzhonor's plans to move City Hall.

[Ron Newman]

Or maybe they want to wait until State is finished.

[Merper]

this is really no less uglier than what is there now.

a piece of 'sculpture' with no interest in its surroundings, at least from what I can tell. At least the current bunker 'fits' in.

May be more useful, definitely not prettier.

Can't we put an actual building here? One that follows the contours of the street pattern, ground floor retail, and T station? Would sure help enclose GC plaza. Can't construction of this type be financially lucrative for the T?

a non-architect's rough foot print:
http://www.merper.com/images/GC.jpg

why isn't something like this even discussed?

[chris]

But then where would they put the Big Apple Circus?

[Merper]

there's plenty of parking lots in the SBW....

[Ron Newman]

Big Apple Circus used to be on Fan Pier, then later behind Bayside Expo Center.

[Charlie_mta]

No matter what kind of subway entrance they build, the area will still be a vast empty wasteland. The only way to fix that is to infill City Hall Plaza with a mix of low-rise and high-rise buildings and a dense system of small streets, similar to the street pattern that pre-dated Government Center. A very small plaza could be retained on the south side of City Hall, but the area around the GC station kiosk and the rest of the plaza should be in-filled.

I'm sure the circus can find somewhere else to go. This is, after all, the center of a large city.

[Charlie_mta]

My concept for infilling Government Center with streets and buildings
(proposed streets are red, proposed building parcels are yellow):

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b66/karlgame/gc.jpg

Included is the removal of the GC garage.

[kz1000ps]

I look at that rendering of the new station, and all I can think is "overwrought." But it's definitely an improvement over the bunker.

@ Merper's site plan for a building over the station, call me crazy but I think that's one of the few areas where space should be left open, particularly for the tourists wandering over from the burial grounds, ect. Leave the sightlines of City Hall intact from the corner of Tremont/Cambridge and Court Streets.

EDIT: Yowza, great job Charlie! I like what I see, although my comments to Merper apply here also -- instead of having the new building follow the curve of the Sears Crescent, keep the sightlines open so you can see the main entrance from Tremont St.

[vanshnookenraggen]

Briv is proposing adding a new forum where we can redesign the city to our hearts delight. I was keeping it a secret but after seeing Charlie's proposal I think we should all bug him until he adds it.

[ablarc]

Nice job, Charlie.

[kennedy]

Like my dream project thread only visual...

Anyways, it seems a little overscaled. I like how big the bunker is, it just needs to be updated. And possibly cleaned.

[whighlander]

I think the City Hall Plaza could work if the edge along Cambridge Street was filled in with a long relatively low {5 or 6 floors} and relatively thin building -- similar to Centre Plaza on the other side of the street

The building would follow the Curve of Cambridge Street from the Bunker to the Pit with a relatively narrow sidewalk between the street and the building

T access to Green and Blue Lines would be provided to each end of the building at street level

The building would be penetrated at the ground levels by pedestrian passages {wide enough for emergency vehicle use} and 2 stories tall to permit adequate views from without

The ground floor facing the slightly reduced scale City Hall Plaza would be ideal for restaurants that in the summer / fall could spill out lots of plaza cafes / bars under the familiar umbrellas

With the new hotel on Court Street and the Sears Crescent bordering the adjacent corner ? this would start to function as an enclosed Plaza as in Europe

Then the City could sell the City Hall and Parking Garage to one /more developer -- who could do the rest that needs to be done to take full advantage of the location

Westy

[Mike]

Redesign fits Government Center to a T
By Richard Weir
Monday, October 4, 2010


The Government Center T station has the charm of a bomb shelter - and that?s its most winsome feature. Impressions only get worse up close.

?It feels like you are walking into a cave,? said Frank DePaola, the MBTA?s assistant general manager for design and construction.

DePaola is heading a project to give the dreary, circa 1964 station a $72 million, top-to-bottom facelift that will replace its bunker-style ?head house? with a glistening, three-story tall glass tower, add two new elevators and rebuild the platforms.

?This will feel like you are walking into the lobby of a hotel or the atrium of a shopping area,? DePaola said of the new structure - scheduled to be completed in late 2015 - that will serve as a giant skylight to filter daylight right down to the Green Line platform.

The transparency of the windowed cube is twofold: It increases security by allowing passengers and police to see in and out of the entranceway and it also blends in with the surrounding buildings.

?It?s more of a minimalist architecture, the exposed-steel framing with glass,? he said. ?By being transparent, it doesn?t really block or intrude on the architecture of the area or make a big statement.?

I?m not sure why anyone would be sensitive about overshadowing the nearest landmark, the much maligned, concrete brutalist behemoth that is City Hall, which incidentally leads Virtual Tourist?s list of the ?The World?s Top 10 Ugliest Buildings.?

That is exactly what a previous concept would have done had it not been scrapped several years ago after coming in $20 million over budget. That design envisioned the station headhouse looking like an enormous sail made of cables, columns and ?engineered fabric? extending from Tremont Street to City Hall.

But DePaola said MassDOT?s new leadership resulted in the hiring of a new architectural-engineering firm, HDR, and the creating of a new, more Spartan-like desisn that focuses resources more on improving the transit experience than on flair. The new concept calls for an 8,000-square-foot headhouse - 3,000 feet larger than the existing one - with 10 fare gates, double the amount now that tend to bottleneck at rush hour.

The platform improvements will include brighter lighting, new tiles and raised Green Line platforms to allow people in wheelchairs or with canes and strollers easier access to trolleys. It will also include totally rebuilt connections to the Blue Line and a new evacuation stairwell for that line.

But the biggest addition will be two new elevators, which will make the station ADA compliant. Adding to the project?s huge price tag will be the building of a temporary, nearby head house so that the station can remain open during construction.

Riders I showed the new designs to last week had mixed opinions, from calling the new station ?gorgeous? to an unnecessary burden to taxpayers.

?It?s time for a change,? said Robert Brown, 60, a physician from Brookline. ?It?s pretty drab. Since this is sort of like the hub, it should look a lot nicer than the average station.?


Link (http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1286315)


http://multimedia.heraldinteractive.com/images/20101003/e94cbf_govcenter_10042010.jpg

[Jackson]

I'm not so sure a piece of modernistic glass really fixes anything. Granted yes, the station will be nice and obviously much cleaner of course, which is the T's job, just being concerned with the state of their property.

However, this new station doesn't change the fact that Government Center is a wasteland of nearly useless space in a downtown city core with a concrete behemoth acting as the centerpiece.

Now if this was part of a massive Government Center facelift that would be something different entirely. But this is Boston...that kind of talk is blasphemy.

[czsz]

Modernist and brutalist complexes nationwide are being "improved" or "renovation" in piecemeal fashion with the addition of gimmicks like the useless awning in Government Center, or the new little slopey lawn at Lincoln Center. Any successful reform is going to have to be on the same scale as the projects themselves, but, ironically, planners steeped in a "smaller is better" mentality can no longer think so grandiosely about anything.

[vanshnookenraggen]

That looks like a pretty weak ass design which look look worn out in 25 years.

?This will feel like you are walking into the lobby of a hotel or the atrium of a shopping area,? DePaola said of the new structure

Um, why not design it to feel like you are walking into a train station since THAT'S WHAT IT IS. Who is this clown? A glass box is cheap, just admit that's the aim.

[KentXie]

A burden on taxpayer? Who ever said there should just leave the city if they don't want their taxpayer's money used on improvement. Seriously, the "I Got Mines" mentality is nothing less then selfish and uncaring.

[KentXie]

That looks like a pretty weak ass design which look look worn out in 25 years.



Um, why not design it to feel like you are walking into a train station since THAT'S WHAT IT IS. Who is this clown? A glass box is cheap, just admit that's the aim.

I believe designing a regular train station headhouse is probably a lot more cheaper than what is proposed. For example, those NYC subway headhouse probably cost a quarter of this proposal's total going to be, so I doubt being cheap is the aim here.

[armpitsOFmight]

If you want to improve GC, bring back the original Scollay Square!!!

[Jackson]

The MBTA, with all its budget problems, is getting swept up in the whole "let's make a dramatic statement with the architecture of our new stations" mentality. I doubt that I'm in the minority when I say I would prefer to have an MBTA that is clean, efficient, and has updated trains with very modest stations rather than an MBTA that's dirty, inefficient, and has dilapidated trains with spectacular stations.

This design isn't even that impressive. Granted, many stations need to be renovated, but I would bet they could save a lot of money on these projects if they cut all the frills out.

[BostonUrbEx]

Why not keep the headhouse? I thought the plan was to make a second one on the west end of the Blue Line platform? There's no need for this cheap glass box.

Also, I like the way the brick headhouse just rises out of the brick plaza, even if I do hate how large and barren the plaza is...

[palindrome]

The MBTA, with all its budget problems, is getting swept up in the whole "let's make a dramatic statement with the architecture of our new stations" mentality. I doubt that I'm in the minority when I say I would prefer to have an MBTA that is clean, efficient, and has updated trains with very modest stations rather than an MBTA that's dirty, inefficient, and has dilapidated trains with spectacular stations.

This design isn't even that impressive. Granted, many stations need to be renovated, but I would bet they could save a lot of money on these projects if they cut all the frills out.

Agreed, and i think Arlington best reflects this. I believe it was under $25m, and it is a clean, functional and modest station.

[Jackson]

It sounds like the Herald editorial staff agrees with us...

Rail reality bites . . .

By Boston Herald Editorial Staff
Monday, October 4, 2010 - Added 15 hours ago

?It makes little sense to continue expanding the system when the MBTA cannot maintain the existing one. Slow expansion until the safety and maintenance priorities can be addressed.?

- MBTA Review recommendation, November 2009

One year ago former John Hancock CEO David D?Alessandro conducted a top-to-bottom review of the struggling MBTA, then stood beside Gov. Deval Patrick to deliver the bad news: If the T were a private company, it would have already folded or declared bankruptcy.

D?Alessandro?s review, which Patrick commissioned, also cautioned against any further expansion projects until the agency has a better handle on its existing maintenance and repair needs.

Ah, but the courting of South Coast voters must go on, and so Patrick and Lt. Gov. Tim Murray were back at it last week - talking up their plans to build a new commuter rail line to New Bedford/Fall River, announcing $320,000 in technical assistance grants to local communities for vague planning purposes.

This is the project that is projected to cost up to $2 billion - with no identifiable funding source - and that is supposed to magically pay for itself with all of the new economic activity it will generate.

During a debate Thursday at UMass-Dartmouth Patrick again cited the need to fulfill an ?unkept promise? to residents of the South Coast, who were passed by when the T expanded commuter rail service to Boston over the past few decades. The region does have higher-than-average unemployment and could use a helping hand.

But if you?re facing down foreclosure on your house - and your roof is caving in - do you keep the ?promise? to put in a new master suite?

In addition to $8 billion in current debt obligations, D?Alessandro?s report predicted the T will have a cumulative operating deficit of at least $550 million by fiscal 2014.

Meaning that even if the revenue fairies come up with magic financing dust for construction of the South Coast line, no one has an earthly clue how the T would pay for future operations.

The state?s chief executive is ignoring financial realities, and that is a dangerous thing indeed.

LINK (http://bostonherald.com/news/opinion/editorials/view.bg?articleid=1286272&srvc=news&position=4)

The MBTA needs to sit down, stop building fancy new stations, stop trying to undertake mega expansion projects, and focus on what they already have. That means purchasing newer, cleaner trains; renovating and cleaning (note: this DOES NOT mean sink millions to build a state of the art modernized station with tons of architectural frills) existing stations; improving its own infrastructure to at least respectable reliability; and then working to maintain all that. When the MBTA isn't $8 billion in debt, then I can get behind extravagant expansions and stations like the one mentioned above (except in needs a different design).

If the MBTA doesn't have a solid base to work from, how can they survive if they routinely keep expanding on borrowed money?

[Shepard]

The MBTA needs to sit down, stop building fancy new stations, stop trying to undertake mega expansion projects, and focus on what they already have. That means purchasing newer, cleaner trains; renovating and cleaning (note: this DOES NOT mean sink millions to build a state of the art modernized station with tons of architectural frills) existing stations; improving its own infrastructure to at least respectable reliability; and then working to maintain all that. When the MBTA isn't $8 billion in debt, then I can get behind extravagant expansions and stations like the one mentioned above (except in needs a different design).

If the MBTA doesn't have a solid base to work from, how can they survive if they routinely keep expanding on borrowed money?

I really disagree with this sentiment for a number of reasons:

1) Aside from arguments around fiscal mismanagement, the issue around funding doesn't need to be placed solely on the T's shoulders. It's an issue of policy. Should there be tolls on I-93? Almost certainly, considering how much the Big Dig cost. Should there be congestion pricing? Sounds like a good idea. Should street parking be charged at variably-priced market rate? Certainly worth studying, now that we have multi-space electronic meters. And should all of those funds go to help pay for our public transit? Most definitely.

2) Despite everything, the T has actually done a *relatively* fantastic job of maintaining - and actually planning for the exapansion of - servivce, with almost no talk of fare increases. Compare that to the grim news coming out of NYC's MTA. The T deserves credit for this.

3) These large projects are not at the exclusion of other projects. The T's introduction of real time data to software/app developers is a case in point. I have some confidence that somewhere in the T's management are people who are actually thinking about how to solve service deficiencies in creative and inexpensive ways.

4) Architecture is marketing, and ultimately it does make a difference that residents and even tourists consider Boston to have a "nice" transit system. Much of that impression is made in the stations. To a large extent it's what separates DC's Metro - which has less coverage, longer headways, and no greater reliability (talking from personal experience) than the T - from Boston.

[Ron Newman]

Government Center needs the ADA improvements, even if nothing else is done to it. Anyone who has tried to drag luggage down to the Blue Line level in order to get to Logan will agree.

[Tombstoner]

4) Architecture is marketing, and ultimately it does make a difference that residents and even tourists consider Boston to have a "nice" transit system. Much of that impression is made in the stations. To a large extent it's what separates DC's Metro - which has less coverage, longer headways, and no greater reliability (talking from personal experience) than the T - from Boston.

I doubt I disagree with you on many things, but I think DC's system is incomparably better than MBTA. Mainline coverage is much more extensive and connections to commuter rail are better (not to mention the quality of the rolling stock). Yeah, the stations are very classy and that separates them from Boston, but that's not all.

As a newcomer who is completely ignorant of the history of the system, the source of the deficit, financing debacles, etc., I have to say that I'm surprised that the system (pretty modest coverage, stations that are a very mixed bag--to be polite--and frequency that is like NYC on a bad day) is as sub-par as it is. It seems heavily used and not inexpensive (not expensive, but passes are not cheap). I don't see why it can't afford to offer a better transit experience: cleaner stations with a modicum of flair (some of them are very nice, but others feel downright dystopian [cue the subterranian cannibals and mutants]) a modicum of punctuality, and a Green Line that looks like it wasn't built as an historical replica to commemorate V-J day. One of the things that attracted me to Boston was the promise or real, honest-to-god mass transit. It certainly beats Atlanta (where I moved from) but maybe we could set the bar higher?

[belmont square]

I think DC's system is incomparably better than MBTA. Mainline coverage is much more extensive and connections to commuter rail are better

I don't think these two points can be supported. Using a standard of a 1/2 mile walk, Metro misses Georgetown, Adams-Morgan, and downtown Alexandria (three of its most active urban neighborhoods), as well as some key national-level tourist attractions (Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials). You could say the T misses Inman and Union Square, Somerville, but its hard to argue that those destinations are as prominent, for either the visitor or the local, as the areas Metro misses.

As for commuter rail, better connections is faint praise--the VRE lines (which connect in with all METRO subway lines nicely), is a peak direction only service with no midday, evening or weekend service. And the three MARC lines (which with the exception of the Penn Line share the same low level of service with VRE) only serve Union Station in central DC, which means that, like the T's South Station lines, a transfer is required for anyone not on the Red Line.

[Dan]

I doubt I disagree with you on many things, but I think DC's system is incomparably better than MBTA. Mainline coverage is much more extensive and connections to commuter rail are better (not to mention the quality of the rolling stock). Yeah, the stations are very classy and that separates them from Boston, but that's not all.

As a newcomer who is completely ignorant of the history of the system, the source of the deficit, financing debacles, etc., I have to say that I'm surprised that the system (pretty modest coverage, stations that are a very mixed bag--to be polite--and frequency that is like NYC on a bad day) is as sub-par as it is. It seems heavily used and not inexpensive (not expensive, but passes are not cheap). I don't see why it can't afford to offer a better transit experience: cleaner stations with a modicum of flair (some of them are very nice, but others feel downright dystopian [cue the subterranian cannibals and mutants]) a modicum of punctuality, and a Green Line that looks like it wasn't built as an historical replica to commemorate V-J day. One of the things that attracted me to Boston was the promise or real, honest-to-god mass transit. It certainly beats Atlanta (where I moved from) but maybe we could set the bar higher?
The fundamental problem with the Boston subway is that it is not just old, but old in concept. And by that, I mean:

1) In Boston, subway covers less and commuter rail covers relatively more than in DC. Examples in Boston that receive commuter rail coverage (but would be subway in DC) are Winchester, Melrose, Hyde Park, Roslindale, Needham. And neither Arlington nor Watertown have rail in any form.

2) Regarding the Green Line, you don't mean VJ Day, but rather the Spanish-American War of 1898, because that is how old the original Green Line tunnel is. This is the first subway in America, and was designed to separate slow moving streetcar traffic from even slower moving horses and pedestrians. It is not "rapid transit" as we know it.

3) Two of the four Boston subway lines (Green and Blue) terminate downtown (or immediately adjacent to it). Clearly, this is not optimal for providing a minimal transfer service. In any modern system, both lines would continue to the other side of the urban area. (Note that the Sommerville extension of the Green Line will somewhat rectify this in part).

Remodeling stations is rather easy to do. But that is not the fundamental problem. Rather, it is the overall layout of the system.

[palindrome]

Two part post here:

1. I hope they move the escalator/staircase bank right now, or extend the inbound platform, because it is a clusterfuck trying to get around those when exiting inbound trains.

2. Not to bring this conversation any further off topic, but was any discussion ever given to the idea of ever tri/quad-tracking the central subway portions of the green line? Similar to how Kenmore/Park stations are set up, but instead of merging back to 1 line keeping it straight all the way. Some obvious technical problems would be the e line split and Boylston station in general, but was it ever even considered at any point in time (perhaps before Arlighton/Copley renos?)


:confused:

[KentXie]

Looks like Government Center might be closed down for 3 years.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42469163# (Government Center 'T' stop could close for 3 years)

[BostonUrbEx]

What is this a joke? 3 years if its closed, 4 if it isn't? Should be 1 year if its closed. This is going to be another State St fiasco but worse.

The Orange Line north of Sullivan is supposedly going to be shuttled for 3 years too (but it may just be nights and weekends, it isnt clear yet). Is 3 the magic minimum for any T project?

And that brings me to another point: 3 years to build a station from scratch where tracks have to be realigned, possibly while working only nights and weekends. But it will take 3 years to renovate a stop that's already there.

[F-Line to Dudley]

Is this 3 Earth years or 3 Mars years like State St.


They BETTER do the Blue Line level and the new entrance first if the Green Line is going to be closed. I can see why ripping the roof off is going to cause more than the usual disruptions, but they can't shut that station down altogether and there is no plausible reason why the BL level has to shut too with it being structurally separate.


If that's what it takes then postpone the @#$% thing, accelerate the Red-Blue connector to an actual build schedule, get the Lechmere relocation and at least the Union Square branch of the extension open so the west end can operate without shuttles, and do the ADA renovations on Hynes, Symphony, Science Park and the afforementioned Blue Line level + new entrance to buy some forward progress. Can you imagine how asphyxiated downtown is going to be with ALL double-transfers from Red to Blue having to cram through DTX and ALL airport passengers going east on the Green Line having to transfer at Park to South Station for the Silver Line? It's going to render the Red Line totally and utterly nonfunctional.

[Shepard]

Three years is about 30 months too long for this. Three years without an easy Green-Blue connection will be madness.

I'm not sure I recall what track re-alignment needs to be done... is this truly necessary? For heaven's sake, just build an elevator. Plaster up some of those nifty green tiles like they have at Kenmore. And if the glass cube must be had (personally I do like it) then open a temporary entrance elsewhere so the station can stay open.

F-Line - to your point - was Charles MGH station constructed with the BLX in mind - i.e. room for escalators and elevators down to a below-grade platform?

[BostonUrbEx]

F-Line - to your point - was Charles MGH station constructed with the BLX in mind - i.e. room for escalators and elevators down to a below-grade platform?

It certainly was.

Red-Blue needs to happen if they're going to shut down for 3 years.

But they shouldn't need 3 years to begin with..... ._.

[HenryAlan]

This is ridiculous! So the choice is between closing for three years, or spending more money to do it in four? This should be a no brainer. The 'T is the life blood of this city, and that is a pivotal transfer point. There shouldn't even be lip service to the idea of shutting it down, no matter how much is saved. Losing government center for three years will cost a lot more than the "keep it open" option. Myopic idiots!

[mass88]

Well if Copley and Arlington are any indication, Government Center should be done in about 8 years.

[mass88]

This is ridiculous! So the choice is between closing for three years, or spending more money to do it in four? This should be a no brainer. The 'T is the life blood of this city, and that is a pivotal transfer point. There shouldn't even be lip service to the idea of shutting it down, no matter how much is saved. Losing government center for three years will cost a lot more than the "keep it open" option. Myopic idiots!

We all know how this is going to go. They could close it for 3 years and get the job faster and cheaper, but will opt to keep it running where it will take longer and cost more. They will do this under the guise that they don't want to affect people's commutes too much and they are doing it for us. Which is real terms means they are going out of their way to help out some construction companies that use only union labor and make large political donations to Democrats on Beacon Hill.

[datadyne007]

I just commented about this on UHub.

Is it possible for them to maybe reopen/sloppily refurbish the abandoned Hanover St. entrance concourse on the other end of the BL platform to still allow access?

[ant8904]

I really need to know, what engineering difficulties that it would take 3 years to of total closure to renovate a station? If I was the governor, I would have to say, "I'm not an engineer, but I have some serious doubts of that the challenges really requires 3 years to overcome it."

I'm pretty sure that if they kept it open, it will take more than 4 years, but closing the station the the gain of a year, but a loss of 3 years is unacceptable. I seriously doubt that it really takes 3 years (unless they only work on nights and weekends or in week long spurts with months of nothing).

[Lurker]

If this is union meddling, someone needs to call them out on it BIG TIME. In this economy there are plenty skilled construction workers to do the project in a timely fashion and the public shouldn't tolerate blatant extortion. Especially given the critical nature of Government Center as a central transfer station.

[porter]

If this were a private company the job could be done in 3 months, probably less. This is completely ridiculous. Every time I think the people running this city have reached a new summit to their stupidity, they keep climbing.

As for the union workers that will be doing this, if you have no fear of being fired for slacking off, you can get a lot of slacking off done.

[PaulC]

They have no intention of closeing the station for 3 years. Look at the outrage on this forum in just a few hours. They will keep the station open, take a ridiculous length of time at a ridiculous price and say see this is what you asked for it's not our fault.

[InTheHood]

Honestly, I had to read that article twice to make sure that it wasn't dated April 1. But it's not April Fool's, it's just the usual T fools.

Every T project drags on forever and runs way over budget. Presumably this keeps the unions happy? But what's interesting is that the actual work occurs in brief bursts over the course of the 3-5 years of the typical unambitious T renovation. If you spent any time near Copley, Arlington, Shawmut, Ashmont, State, or the Lechmere viaduct projects that ooozed their way to completion at some point over the past decade, you know what I mean. Middle of the day, middle of the week on the blocked-off platforms and mostly .... crickets. You'd need time-lapse photography to determine that any actual work was being done, or to watch the parked vehicle of the detail cop slowly rust. And then you walk down the street and you see non-public sector project - let's take MassArt as a current example - and the contrast couldn't be more stark. Actual workers! Working! On some private sector projects, you even sometimes see work being performed after 3 PM! And even - good gracious - on Saturday! With visible progress week-to-week!

Someone has got to wake up and realize that the world has changed and these games just won't cut it anymore. If the same "don't kill the job" spirit had ruled when the original central subway was being planned, it would have taken approximately 230 years to complete, and twenty generations of "bus substitutions." I don't want to derail this thread onto another unproductive political rant, and I'm far from a right-winger, but honestly, when crap like this is presented to the public with a straight face you can understand the wellspring of rage and contempt that got those guys in Wisconsin elected. The point of public works has to be to work for the damned public, not to provide a decade worth of paychecks to a handful of connected people.

[bbfen]

Which is real terms means they are going out of their way to help out some construction companies that use only union labor and make large political donations to Democrats on Beacon Hill.

Really? Just, really?

I'm somewhere to the far left of liberal on 90% of the issues and here's what I want: the T to fucking set a construction schedule and stick to it. Why doesn't it happen? Because of deferred maintenance. And why do they defer basic repair? Because Rethuglicans scream and holler about the damn Socialist, Nazi, Commie, Fascist burdens imposed by the "Welfare State" that operating budgets are reduced to somewhere around 90% below what's actually needed to keep the system operational.

::generalizations work both ways::

[datadyne007]

Really? Just, really?

I'm somewhere to the far left of liberal on 90% of the issues and here's what I want: the T to fucking set a construction schedule and stick to it. Why doesn't it happen? Because of deferred maintenance. And why do they defer basic repair? Because Rethuglicans scream and holler about the damn Socialist, Nazi, Commie, Fascist burdens imposed by the "Welfare State" that operating budgets are reduced to somewhere around 90% below what's actually needed to keep the system operational.

::generalizations work both ways::

Precisely. No one is willing to support the upkeep of the rapidly aging system BECAUSE of the inconveniences they experience. They're holding grudges against the T for issues caused by a lack of proper funding. For some reason they don't understand that increased funding would mean LESS inconveniences. All anyone cares about in this day and age is saving the pennies in their pocket right now and has absolutely no care or outlook towards the long-term. The GOP is rapidly tainting the entire country with this mindset and infrastructure will continue to fail until they're properly funded.

[InTheHood]

I'm afraid I don't follow the above comments.

I agree that the T funding is a shambles and I'd support moves by the legislature to shore that up, even if that meant some painful "revenue increase" measures that hit me and others in the wallet.

But let's be clear about two things:

1) In Massachusetts, at least, you can't blame ANY of this on the Republicans

2) With respect to SPECIFIC T improvement projects, the delays and the failure to execute aren't due to underfunding. Underfunding has led to bloat in the T's debt structure and postponement of some projects, but the projects that have moved forward have been funded hansomely. No matter how you measure it, by mile, by man hour, per elevator, etc., the cost to lift a shovel in Boston dwarfs that just about anywhere in the world. Dragging out projects doesn't reduce their cost ... on the contrary, any competent project manager will tell you that it makes costs increase. Competently managed, the funds allocated to the Arlington rebuild (to take just one example) ought to have covered two stations in half the time. And no, the age of the system here doesn't create such a "special case" that makes things impossible to execute. Even in the most expensive cities in Europe, where some infrastructure is ancient and labor costs are sky-high, projects are routinely completed faster and cheaper.

Even if you have no background as a PM or in construction, if you spend a few days, weeks, or months at a T construction site, you can figure this out. Everything is in super slow-motion. Workers drift in late, leave early, and don't work with any urgency. Some materials show up way early and sit in crates for ages, risking damage. Other materials must be late - if that's the explanation for the frequency with which people stand around doing nothing. A commercial building site looks nothing like this.

Whether it's the unions or the politicians or sheer management incompetence, I don't really care, but it has got to change.

[Lurker]

The issue isn't funding. Look at the Big Dig, a near limitless stream of money was thrown into that project and we all know how long it took to build and how well it is holding up.

The issue is a union monopoly on projects, prevailing wage bullshit, ridiculous work rules, horrible construction scheduling, and a criminal lack of oversight or basic competence in matters of construction administration. The public rightfully doesn't want to part with any more money from their pockets, when it is obvious any additional funding is going to into someone else's pockets rather than increased productivity.

[mass88]

Really? Just, really?

I'm somewhere to the far left of liberal on 90% of the issues and here's what I want: the T to fucking set a construction schedule and stick to it. Why doesn't it happen? Because of deferred maintenance. And why do they defer basic repair? Because Rethuglicans scream and holler about the damn Socialist, Nazi, Commie, Fascist burdens imposed by the "Welfare State" that operating budgets are reduced to somewhere around 90% below what's actually needed to keep the system operational.

::generalizations work both ways::

What you responded with has nothing to do with what I said. I am guessing you don't agree with my assessment of the situation.

[stellarfun]

A different take, and probably more accurate.

http://www.bostonherald.com/blogs/news/on_the_t/?p=144&srvc=home&position=recent

http://boston.cbslocal.com/2011/04/07/mbta-looking-to-renovate-government-center/

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?articleid=1328981&srvc=home&position=rated

[jass]

1) In Massachusetts, at least, you can't blame ANY of this on the Republicans
.

Sure you can. Fed republicans anyway.

[metasyntactic]

Another article on this issue from the Boston Globe. Looks like they are really aiming for a two-year closure.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2011/04/10/on_government_center_project_t_leaning_toward_2_ye ar_closure/


In construction, time is money. Transportation officials in the Big Dig state say they are committed to doing highway and MBTA projects faster and more efficiently than the public has become resigned to expect.

Take the Interstate 93 bridge replacement project that the state is calling ?Fast 14.??

That plan calls for the replacement of 14 deteriorated I-93 bridges in Medford ? seven in each direction ? this summer. Using prefabricated sections, the state will swap out old for new and replace each bridge in a single weekend, with financial penalties for the contractor if the highway is not open again by Monday morning.

Under traditional methods, the work would have required three years of partial closures, doing a lane at a time. Hailing the innovation, the US Department of Transportation just awarded it $1 million through a grant program to promote innovative techniques.

When it comes to subway stations, of course, old and new can?t be swapped in a single weekend.

So the choice is between keeping a station open during construction, to minimize the inconvenience to the public, or closing it to speed the work and save money ? kind of like ripping off a Band-Aid quickly, with a shorter but more intense sting.

The T has tended to err on the side of the former. That made projects such as the Ashmont and State Street transit stations and the Kenmore Square bus facility seem to take epochs, with the additional time and work costing T riders and taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.

Until now, with the reconstruction of Government Center approaching.

?There is a policy shift,?? Secretary of Transportation Jeffrey B. Mullan said last week, aimed at curbing ?the seemingly endless construction cycle.??

With Government Center, the T is leaning toward closing the station for two years. That could save $16 million and shave 15 months or more off a project that might take four or more years and approach $71 million the old way.

It?s not a decision made lightly, Mullan said, nor is it yet written in stone. The work is not expected to begin until November 2012.

?Certainly we are not going to be advocating a major issue of closing such an important station without a lot of discussion with the city and with the customers,?? he told the board that oversees the DOT and MBTA last week, in a briefing that signaled the beginning of that public process.

State officials have worked closely with city officials on the design. Now they are talking about the construction, and they will gather plenty of public input, MBTA General Manager Richard A. Davey said.

Board member Elizabeth Levin, a Boston resident, said she wants to make sure the city is comfortable with the choice. ?They haven?t definitively told us that, but they clearly were happy that we were trying to be creative in finding ways to reduce that schedule,?? Davey said. ?While we presented it such that the closure seems to be the alternative that makes a little more sense . . . we still want to make sure we have a comfort level with the city.??

The proposal bundles better access for people with disabilities with a thorough modernization of a station that, according to the T, was built in 1897 as Scollay Square Station and was last significantly freshened in 1962, when it was renamed Government Center, to reflect the razing of Scollay Square for Boston?s new City Hall.

It calls for a soaring new glass headhouse ? an entrance, in subway parlance ? in place of today?s brick bunker, as well as new escalators, elevators, stairs, lighting, and communication systems. The Green Line platforms will be raised so passengers can access vehicles more easily. And the Blue Line platforms will be lengthened to accommodate six-car trains.

Ed Hunter, the T?s director of construction, presented both potential timelines to the board.

Under the longer one, the project would consume more space on the plaza and include construction of a temporary headhouse, which increases the likelihood of running into unexpected utility lines, always a risk when digging in Boston.

?Utilities have not really treated us very kindly in any endeavor that we?ve had,?? Hunter said.

Most of the work would be done at night, reducing passenger risk but increasing noise to neighbors in the slightly residential area. The station would remain open, but boarding and walking areas would be frequently changed and rerouted. And the T would divert service to buses on 32 weekends.

The alternative would close Government Center to Blue and Green Line passengers seeking to enter and exit, but would limit the busing weekends to six, with the trains otherwise rolling through without stopping. It would allow for two shifts of construction workers at the station. And most importantly, Hunter said, ?it?s safer . . . It separates the work from the passengers, and reduces the risk of accident and potential litigation from somebody that wanders into a work area that might not be secure, [and] customer exposure to noise and dust.??

The T?s last statistical bible, the 2009 Blue Book, found 11,127 passengers a day entering the station or transferring between lines at Government Center; it did not tally exits.

As an alternative, Green Line customers will be able to walk about one-fifth of a mile to Haymarket ? cutting across the Government Center plaza ? or one-quarter of a mile to Park Street.

For the Blue Line, Bowdoin is about one-fifth mile, and State Street is just one-10th mile. Bowdoin, now open only for weekday commuters, would be open later and on weekends during construction.

Meanwhile, the revamped State Street ? which has been under construction for more than six years ? is supposed to be finished by the end of this month.

[InTheHood]

Good grief, people, if you are accepting the T's "we need at least three years because we don't know what's up with the utilities" line of argument, I've got a viaduct or two that I'd like to sell you. Just because Davey says so to the Herald and Globe doesn't mean that the T is working on a schedule that any other transit agency in the world would accept.

Exhibit A: London. Yep, they've got old and unknown utilities there, too. And yep, they've closed a bunch of tube stations as they've worked on renovations to improve access for disabled persons. And while they aren't at all snappy by continental European standards, their work is absolutely warp speed compared to the T. They work at night, they work on weekends, and you can watch the forward progress week-to-week. Months went by without bupkus happening at Copley or State.

Exhibit B: Zurich. The gold standard for light rail. A "typical" project last year was the replacement of all the track and all the catenary between Bellevue and Tiefenbrunnen, a busy stretch over a mile long, with many stops ... the equivalent of taking out every existing bit of infrastructure between Brigham Circle and Heath and putting in all-new steel and wires in conjunction with repaving all of the streets and improving the sewers (the Swiss coordinate such things). Time from start-to-finish: 3 months, and service stopped on exactly the day thay said it would and it came back up exactly on the day they said it would. Seriously, if the Swiss were running things, something like the Arborway restoration could be a done deal in 8 months, and if they said in October it would be running on June 23rd, you could bet your life's savings then and there that the first Arborway tram would be moving at 5AM on June 23.

We settle for much, much less. And the T's response to criticism for the huge over-runs in both time and money is simply to move the goalposts ... make the task even easier, make the timeline longer, customer service be damned. Hey, at least there will be lots of jobs.

[mass88]

Good grief, people, if you are accepting the T's "we need at least three years because we don't know what's up with the utilities" line of argument, I've got a viaduct or two that I'd like to sell you. Just because Davey says so to the Herald and Globe doesn't mean that the T is working on a schedule that any other transit agency in the world would accept.

Exhibit A: London. Yep, they've got old and unknown utilities there, too. And yep, they've closed a bunch of tube stations as they've worked on renovations to improve access for disabled persons. And while they aren't at all snappy by continental European standards, their work is absolutely warp speed compared to the T. They work at night, they work on weekends, and you can watch the forward progress week-to-week. Months went by without bupkus happening at Copley or State.

Exhibit B: Zurich. The gold standard for light rail. A "typical" project last year was the replacement of all the track and all the catenary between Bellevue and Tiefenbrunnen, a busy stretch over a mile long, with many stops ... the equivalent of taking out every existing bit of infrastructure between Brigham Circle and Heath and putting in all-new steel and wires in conjunction with repaving all of the streets and improving the sewers (the Swiss coordinate such things). Time from start-to-finish: 3 months, and service stopped on exactly the day thay said it would and it came back up exactly on the day they said it would. Seriously, if the Swiss were running things, something like the Arborway restoration could be a done deal in 8 months, and if they said in October it would be running on June 23rd, you could bet your life's savings then and there that the first Arborway tram would be moving at 5AM on June 23.

We settle for much, much less. And the T's response to criticism for the huge over-runs in both time and money is simply to move the goalposts ... make the task even easier, make the timeline longer, customer service be damned. Hey, at least there will be lots of jobs.

Well said.

[Shepard]

Sell that corner of GCP for a pre-approved high-rise private development incorporating the station entrance into the structure and charging the developer with its construction and ADA compliance. All the T would need to pay for is the track realignment and platform changes.

[stellarfun]

Well, there is Amsterdam's new North South Line -- 10 kilometers -- which is now taking 15 years to build at nearly twice the original cost.

[InTheHood]

You are correct, Stellar, the Amsterdam North-South Metro is a fiasco. It's five years behind schedule and currently slotted at 3x the original budget (although the original budget, at under E1 Bn for a ten mile heavy rail line bored through multiple tunnels in the middle of that city was always unrealistic). Another stupendously expensive, delay-prone project you could have tossed out there was the Second Avenue Subway in Manhattan.

But the amazing thing about the MBTA: measured on a cost per mile, cost per station, cost per rider, or on a simple degree-of-difficulty basis, the T can belly up with the most ridiculous urban transit boondoggles of all time on a cost basis before they even turn a shovel. And after they actually start and blowing their generous budgets and unambitious timelines, they are in a league of their own.

Exhibit A: The proposed Silver Line Phase 3 bus tunnel. That was supposed to be about 2 km long, featured only two (2) "new" platform sets to connect to stations at Chinatown and Boylston (really, more like 1 1/2 given proximity of these stations and some shared egress), and was to be built entirely under roadways. The last estimate, circa 2006, before this was mercifully euthanized? $1.2 Bn over 6 years.

So let's compare: the Amsterdam project is 5x longer, will handle well over 10x the projected traffic, and is infinitely more complex than SL3 would have been, with multiple all-new stations and interconnections, and is being built in a city where (standard) labor is more expensive than Boston, tunnelling under all sorts of sensitive foundations. It's widely viewed to be an utter failure in terms of engineering, project planning, and any other metric you could care to toss out there - many have called it one of the biggest planning failures in Europe.

But if I inflate the now four-year-old T estimates for Silver Line 3 to current commodity pricing and compare the scope and cost to Amsterdam's North-South, the Amsterdam fiasco looks like a pretty good deal, no? Even if they over-run their estimates yet further it's way more cost effective than SL3 would have been.

In the present case, we are talking about a modest relocation and realignment of a rather shallow cut-and-cover underground light rail line. And true to T form, they are treating it as if they were building the freaking pyramids.