Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Two Years? Really?

A few years ago, Massachusetts Rebuilt 14 Bridges in one Summer, on weekends only . Now the MBTA announced it's going to rebuild one subway station, an important one that connects two lines, and it's going to take, wait for it, two years. Coming March 22, 2014: Government Center Station Closure. I appreciate that they're still running trains through the station while work is going on (though they won't stop there) but it still seems like a long time. And their ‎pdf says that this plan provides accessibility 2 years earlier than alternatives! Glad I don't go to Government Center much.

2 comments:

Karl said...

You have to consider that this is working underground so it doesn't compare directly to bridges. If we look at other underground Boston project (say the big dig?) this is pretty quick.

Howard said...

I realize underground work has challenges, but the comparison to the big dig is kinda interesting. The BD was 15 years of construction, just 7.5 times longer and involved creating new tunnels instead of just renovating an existing space. The central artery alone is 3.5 miles, add the Ted Williams tunnel and Zakim bridge and Greenway and all the connections, seems like much more work than 7.5 times the size of a plaza. The don't even have anything above the station to work around.