North Washington St Bridge

[bigpicture7]

^ because building a new set of piers in the ocean for a very, very long span is extremely difficult and expensive. Plus, the LI closure was urgent/immediate.

Here: calmer, shallower waters...shorter span...more reasonable to erect temporary bridge.

Also, according to the Globe article, they're using a neat hybrid approach for North Washington:

Most likely, the temporary structure will merge into the existing bridge on the downtown side of the Charles, McInerney said. That will allow the contractor to accelerate work on the old bridge, cutting the overall construction time by six months. Crews have already begun working to remove and replace the utilities across the old bridge, and will dismantle and replace the bridge in stages, beginning next year.

[Equilibria]

MassDOT has produced a video rendering traffic flow during construction:



The absurd one is during Phase 2, where 1 bridge lane NB suddenly becomes 3 lanes for Rutherford Ave. I know it ultimately cuts it to two, but that seems like a missed opportunity for a road diet.

[jass]

Where is the train embankment

[Jahvon09]

When & how long will this all take place?

[vanshnookenraggen]

Originally Posted by jass

Where is the train embankment

What?

[statler]

Originally Posted by vanshnookenraggen

What?

Surely they are going to replicate this in the design, right?

[Charlie_mta]

Originally Posted by statler

Surely they are going to replicate this in the design, right?

I wish.

[mass88]

I don't get it, in the gondola thread people are trashing the idea because we don't need elevated systems in Boston and in this thread people are hoping for them.

[Proposition Joe]

People are trashing the gondola system because:

1.) It is a different mode of transport, with much less capacity than a train.
2.) It is a vaporware proposal being floated so that everyone can continue to ignore practical solutions that would actually require city and state money.
3.) The gondola is being proposed over a wide right of way, that's not only capable of handling transit improvements on the ground but needs to reduce its capacity for automobiles.

I don't think anyone is seriously proposing a train right of way as part of the project, people are just being nostalgic, but even so a train embankment over this bridge would still be more useful than the gondola.