If you ever leave Allston (I know, ridiculous!) you’ve no doubt noticed that nearly every bridge that connects our fair Hamlet to the rest of the world is under construction.
The inspiration for this post comes from an announcement by the city that the Cambridge Street bridge will be repaired soon.
We are all now used to the Jersey barrier sidewalk taking up an entire lane of traffic, but it wasn’t always this way.
As many frustrated pedestrians have proven by tearing down the diamond link blockade, it is “safe” to walk on the fenced off portion of the sidewalk, it just won’t stay that way unless repairs are made. Many eons ago concerned citizens made complaints that you can see the Mass Pike through the holes in the sidewalk, and instead of fixing the issue we got our fancy new walkway and gorgeous new graffiti wall.
Dear City of Boston, If you want us to stop writing stuff here, why don’t you give us back the sidewalk? With Love, your Mom.
They’re going to fix the bridge now, in a proposed two year plan by the city. This should present no problems, given that the Western Ave. Bridge and The Anderson Memorial Bride have construction scheduled for the better part of the next two years.
Before any of this was scheduled, it was already a hellish nightmare-scape to ride any of the forms of public transit available to us in Allston. The 66 Bus is so notoriously unreliable that it has spawned not one but two satirical twitter accounts, though whether the people who made these accounts see it as satire or note is not clear.
Pretty sick they want me to pick people up today, meanwhile the bus stops all still look like small ski resorts. Solid planning.
— 66 Bus (@The66bus) February 11, 2013
Bus Etiquette #1: Pay with Cash, Get on Last. Holdin up the line on the bus makes me cold. #allston u wonder y I dont wanna show up #MBTA
— MBTA 66 Bus(@Da66Bus) January 26, 2013
To schedule all of this construction obstructing a large portion of the commuting community has created a veritable cluster fuck during rush hour for as long as recent memory can account for.
Perhaps the city is trying to keep us all stranded on our island like something out of The Truman Show or LOST. Take away our entertainment and our means of escape. The BU Bridge was fixed quickly, and with relatively low impact on commuting, why can’t it be that way for all the others?
It begs the question: what is so special about BU that their bridges are fixed before it even had time to register that construction was happening, while Lower Allston whiles away in a public transportation black hole?
Photo via walkingonscorpions.blogspot.com
Thankfully it’s summer and we can just walk the mile and a half to get to Cambridge from L.A., but I am not looking forward to a sweaty winter on the 66, 64, 86, and 70 stuck in construction traffic.
I leave you with this monument to bad bridge times:
