Some people say the Chinese character for opportunity also means crisis. If so, that might reflect what’s happening where the Longfellow Bridge meets the curiosity called Charles Circle.
The opportunity is that we could calm traffic and create a more rational traffic pattern at this location when we redo the Longfellow Bridge—a refurbishing that will soon begin.
The crisis is that we could be exacerbating Charles Circle’s problems.
Which will it be?
Transportation officials want to retain two lanes going over the bridge from Cambridge to Boston. They also want to retain the way the lanes expand to three when they meet Charles Circle.
There are several problems with this plan. It reduces the width pedestrians have for crossing the bridge, especially at the circle. It doesn’t reflect conditions on the bridge, which at most times has only three or four cars lined up at the circle, nothing approaching a back-up. Finally, and most important, it increases the flow of traffic into Charles Circle, where the real problems are.
No one has officially studied Charles Circle’s situation, although a team at the Central Transportation Planning Staff was supposed to do so. I don’t know where things stand, since no one at that agency returned my phone call.
But since I live one block away from the circle, I know it pretty well.
Most of the traffic going into Charles Circle comes from Storrow Drive—in both directions. Sometimes the circle works well since it is so confusing that everyone is on high alert. The crunch time is around 9-10 a.m., when traffic backs up into the circle because of cars headed to MGH.
So the traffic problems are not on the bridge. At most hours, traffic is light there. The big problem is in the circle itself—too many cars come into it, and there is too little space for them to go once they cross it.
Beacon Hill, West End and Back Bay residents should be concerned about this because when Cambridge Street is blocked, drivers take a right turn onto Charles and then onto Beacon and through the Back Bay to get to get to their destination by another way. The other scenario is that they chose the route to Leverett Circle, where there is a big mess already.
That’s a good aspect of Boston streets—we can get to our destinations in many different ways. But when the best route is blocked, it forces traffic through smaller streets and more residential parts of the city or to intersections that are overloaded already, a condition that is not ideal.
You might ask how I know all this. I could say it is because I’ve lived in this city so long that instead of memorizing lines from Shakespeare’s sonnets, I have been cluttering my brain with nerdy traffic patterns and pedestrian counts in the whole downtown. But it’s not just me. A number of people who served on the task force that grappled with the Longfellow’s redo are concerned about this matter.
So what if we had only two lanes on the Longfellow dumping into Charles Circle? There would be a small reduction in traffic in the circle. Since they haven’t done the traffic study, we don’t know how much, but it would be something. And it would create wider ways for pedestrians and bikes, two modes of transportation everyone says we should encourage.
Why not just leave the three lanes and make way for walkers and bikers by expanding the width of the bridge? The first answer is that the bridge is historic, governed by federal regulations for maintaining structures. But it is not just the regs that move us. Most of us think Boston is a better place where the automobile hasn’t destroyed history. In any case, it’s the three lanes of cars that increase the congestion in Charles Circle, not the bikes or the walkers.
There is something else interesting about the plans for the bridge. Construction will reduce the bridge to one lane from Cambridge to Boston for several years. In 2007 and part of 2008 the bridge also had only one lane in operation in that direction.
Where there unacceptable back-ups? None.
What will happen during construction when the bridge has only one lane? Nothing. Cars will find other ways to get to where they are going.
What will happen during construction to Charles Circle? It will see a reduction in traffic.
What will happen after construction is over and the bridge coming from Cambridge is back to two lanes with three lanes at the circle? An increase in traffic.
Do you think this is as crazy as I think it is?
What to do? If I were in charge, I would permanently reduce traffic on the Longfellow coming from Cambridge into Boston to one lane, with two lanes at the circle to help everyone feel better.
Since I’m not in charge, I’d suggest that before we bring traffic into Boston, we finish the study of Charles Circle to see exactly how much traffic we are dealing with in every scenario before we put the shovels in the ground.
You’ll have a chance to learn about the bridge and speak up on March 1 at 7 p.m. at the State Transportation Building, 10 Park Plaza, Conference Rooms 1, 2 and 3.