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MassDOT has scheduled a Public Hearing on the Longfellow Bridge Rehabilitation Project as follows:
Thursday, March 1, 2012, 7:00 pm- 9:00 pm, State Transportation Building, 10 Park Plaza, Conference Rooms 1, 2 and 3, Boston
The public hearing will provide opportunity for public comments on the Environmental Assessment for the proposed Longfellow Bridge Rehabilitation Project.
The Longfellow Bridge is a signature project of the Patrick-Murray Administration's historic Accelerated Bridge Program to replace or rehabilitate structurally-deficient bridges across the Commonwealth.
The Longfellow is one of the most architecturally significant bridges in Massachusetts, completed in 1908 and renamed to honor Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in 1927. The bridge joins Cambridge Street in Boston with Main Street in Cambridge and carries the MBTA Red Line and other modes of transportation across the Charles River. The bridge presently carries 28,000 motor vehicles, 90,000 transit users, and significant numbers of pedestrians and bicyclists each day.
The MassDOT Highway Division's Accelerated Bridge Program project will repair structural deficiencies and accommodate public transit, motor vehicle, bicycle and pedestrian transportation options, while restoring the historic elements of the bridge. The Environmental Assessment document includes the preferred cross section of the bridge that will carry one lane of traffic outbound and two lanes inbound, with sidewalks and bike lanes on both sides and the MBTA Red Line in the center.
Written views received by MassDOT up to five days prior to the public hearing will be displayed for public inspection. Plans will be on display one-half hour before the meeting begins, with an engineer in attendance to answer questions. A project handout will be made available on the MassDOT project website.
Comments on the Environmental Assessment must be submitted by March 21, 2012. Written statements and other exhibits in place of, or in addition to, oral statements made at the Public Hearing regarding the proposed undertaking are to be submitted to Pamela S. Stephenson, Division Administrator, Federal Highway Administration, 55 Broadway, 10th Floor, Cambridge, MA 02142, Attention: Damaris Santiago with a copy to Thomas F. Broderick, P.E., Acting Chief Engineer, MassDOT Highway Division, 10 Park Plaza, Boston, MA 02116, Attention: Kevin Walsh, Project File No. 604361. Such submissions will also be accepted at the meeting. Project inquiries may be emailed to dot.feedback.highway@state.ma.us.
While I’m tempted to point out that cpiatal accumulation has had myriad positive externalities that raise the quality of living & thus accomplish more humane ends than any philanthrophy or do-gooderism I’ll agree with you that one way to encourage people not to drive is to invest less in roads. The main reason I bike to work or take the train is because it’s a complete nightmare to drive from the southern suburbs into downtown. Off-peak I can get to drive to work in 25 minutes, and that’s what I would do if I didn’t have to go in rush hour (when it’s more like 75 minutes). I’ll add that I never, ever would have considered biking 13 miles each way if it were not for cycling infrastructure: wide streets in Dedham, bike lanes in Roslindale, and the separated paths along the Jamaicaway as well as the Southwest Corridor. Downtown is still a semi-nightmare along Mass Ave, but I’m optimistic that we’ll see progress there thanks to the good work of folks like yourself. Increasing the appeal of biking to work is an interesting one. In my mind there are two steps:1) convincing people it can be done at all2) convincing people that it is safeunder #1, friends and colleagues are routinely stunned to learn that I bike to work. I’m not particularly fit or outdoorsy or green’ or anything like that. and they are shocked to see me on the bike in the rain and cold. but (#2) they still think I am nuts, that it is way too dangerous especially in the city. one of my colleagues bikes from Lexington to Alewife on the separated path and then takes the T to work because he refuses to ride in Cambridge. There is not much I can do to convince them otherwise, and honestly it doesn’t seem very safe to me sometimes.