Old Harvard station

[3rdrail]

Of course the type 1 - type 4 cars (0600-0700's) never had any kind of destination sign anyway, just the metal plate by the door listing the stations, and that list didn't include stadium either. I guess you just had to know that if there was a Harvard game the trains would be running there.

It was customary also to run directly to Park first and then Washington on these trains with their crush load, by-passing the other regular stops. Here's a photo of a 1919 No. 3 Pressed Steel Co car by Eliot Shops outside Stadium Station, followed by a couple of interior OoS station signs from this series in my collection.

[Gerry6309]

The main difference between the capacity of the old Harvard and the New Harvard is that trains entered and departed the old Harvard at running speed, not through a protracted 10 mph curve. The new station should have been below the old one, with a long sweeping deep curve under the coop and Cambridge Common. We saved a few million on construction, and pay for it daily in delays!

A significant advantage of the existing Harvard Station layout is allowing a single shared entrance to serve all trains and all buses without too complicated ramp and/or elevator requirements. The two train tunnels and the two bus tunnels all face a common (two level) concourse. To have the Red Line cross under the bus tunnels and then go under the Coop and Cambridge Common would either require a third level down for the trains or a complete rebuild of the bus tunnels to be on one level. The latter would then require bus passengers on one side to go down (walk under the bus tunnerls) and then up again to get to the exit, or require a new street kiosk.

There is a price you pay for speedy operation. The plan I mentioned was the first one proposed. It would have followed Mount Auburn St. instead of Mass Av, descended to about 100 feet and deep tunneled to beyond the present S curve north of Harvard. Lots of elevators, the old station would have remained intact as a turnback for one line. Money caused the cheaper alternative to be built - with all the street and transit disruption. Harvard could have easily been lengthened for six car trains.

[3rdrail]

...to say nothing of having their ivy disturbed whilst (I would only use that word in a Harvard conversation) having the crimson ones greenery dug into for purposes of a wider underground radius, all the while being tax deferred.

[Gerry6309]

...to say nothing of having their ivy disturbed whilst (I would only use that word in a Harvard conversation) having the crimson ones greenery dug into for purposes of a wider underground radius, all the while being tax deferred.

The ivy covered walls took enough of a beating as it was, with the curve encroaching on Harvard Yard in places. A deep dig might have almost been unnoticed, perhaps for an access pit in cambridge common. The one near Porter Sq. remains to this day as a huge grate in Taggs' parking lot. I will also bet that that screeching gets into more than a few professors' heads! (Of course being from Harvard there is nothing up there anyway, so the echo must be deafening. )

[joshg1]

The 1945 plan for Boston area transit proposed extending the subway under Eliot Yard to a portal along the Charles into E. Watertown, where one would change Ashmont style on to PCC trains up the Watertown branch, across W. Cambridge (Alewife) on a viaduct, then along the Lexington (exact name?) branch to Arlington Heights, with a new yard there. At the time Memorial Drive ended at Hawthorne St, and Greenough Blvd, the Eliot Bridge, and associated junctions didn't exist. Not much tunnel, save $$.

When the follow up report came out in '47, that river side land was taken for roads and the subway was to turn north towards Porter. I never heard of a Mt Auburn St subway. My reading is that any extension beyond Harvard was going to be built as built, advantages and flaws as is.

For historical interest, in the '47 plan we could have changed at W. Cambridge for Lexington cars or a line that followed the Fitchburg to the Mass Central and peters out in Waltham just shy of future 128.

[3rdrail]

For historical interest, in the '47 plan we could have changed at W. Cambridge for Lexington cars or a line that followed the Fitchburg to the Mass Central and peters out in Waltham just shy of future 128.

Every tentacle into 128 is a win-win as it encourages mass transit as well as the installation of electronics development companies into that large region. This translates into a huge pay back of tax revenues which would be very beneficial now as well as a relief somewhat of 128 traffic at rush hour and convenience for passengers in a state where gas is approaching $5. Too bad.

[Charliemta]

I never heard of a Mt Auburn St subway. My reading is that any extension beyond Harvard was going to be built as built, advantages and flaws as is.

In the 1945 plan there would hve been a tunnel under Mt. Auburn Street from Brattle Square out to Mt. Auburn Hospital, where the line would have surfaced and run along the Charles River to Watertown where Greenough Blvd and the part of Memorial Drive next to the hospital are now. The trolley car line branch would have run fom east Watertown to Arlington Heights. I like the plan except I would have made the branch to Arlington a heavy rail branch of the Red Line instead of a trolley line. The other branch of the Red Line to Watertwon and Waltham would have been fantastic.

[3rdrail]

Are we thinking the same drawing ? The one that I'm thinking about is a spider map that was drawn up by a "being developed" MTA probably trying to set the tone and gain entrance into them taking over from BERy. It was very forward thinking, as I believe that most, if not all, extensions to date are on the map, along with some that re still being discussed two authorities and 63 years later !

[Charliemta]

Te 1945 MTA expansion map that I'm refering to is at this link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ottomatic77/3304445209/sizes/l/in/photostream/

[BostonUrbEx]

Te 1945 MTA expansion map that I'm refering to is at this link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ottomatic77/3304445209/sizes/l/in/photostream/

I never realized that was a "High Speed Line" to Arlington! I always overlooked the East Watertown part which clearly shows an Ashmont-esque loop. Very interesting. I'm not sure i get the point, though.

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

Te 1945 MTA expansion map that I'm refering to is at this link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ottomatic77/3304445209/sizes/l/in/photostream/

I never realized that was a "High Speed Line" to Arlington! I always overlooked the East Watertown part which clearly shows an Ashmont-esque loop. Very interesting. I'm not sure i get the point, though.

Yes. That would've retained freight service on the Watertown Branch from the Waltham end and on the Lexington Branch from the Billerica end while taking out the West Cambridge midsection on those two lines. At least in the case of Watertown there was a future possibility of this high-speed line hooking into Watertown carhouse and supplanting the 70 and 71 streetcars if the freight dried up, and provided a more substantial amount of system connectivity. Although obviously the Arsenal was still a very active military installation at the time they drew up that map.

[3rdrail]

That's the one and it's downright spooky how they got it right in 1945 ! Has anyone ever seen a write-up on the background for that map ? It truly is extraordinairy.

[The EGE]

That's the one and it's downright spooky how they got it right in 1945 ! Has anyone ever seen a write-up on the background for that map ? It truly is extraordinairy.

There is quite a bit of information about the history of Boston transit plans here, about halfway down.

[joshg1]

These are from the 1947 report- I can't really call it a plan:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/newmundane/7836160174
http://www.flickr.com/photos/newmundane/7836162742
and the southern part, even harder to see http://www.flickr.com/photos/newmundane/7836156448

I'm sorry for the lousy scan- a grad student was hogging the large copier and the lighting in the bowels of the Loeb library is awful. Harvard GSD- easier to get in than other HVD libraries- I went in August. It's a treasure trove of reports and plans, many of which fall into a never-gonna-happen category. Expressways within Portsmouth NH, anyone?

It's been almost a year since I read the two reports and I can't recall just where the portal beyond Harvard was to go. I'm *pretty sure* rebuilding Harvard Station isn't mentioned. Although expansion plans and cost/return projections make up the bulk of the reports and are more interesting reading, the emphasis was to rescue BERy transit by creating a MTA to buy it. I had no idea about post- postwar studies but they seem to cover the same ground. In the '40s it was assumed commuter trains would be dropped, but by the '60s the MTA/MBTA seem to have them dropped in their laps, as in "we can't expand RT b/c we're paying for CR."

[3rdrail]

These are from the 1947 report- I can't really call it a plan:

It's not, it's a conceptualized drawing...however, this one is better than most because for a committee that didn't exist as an authority yet, they foresaw many extensions that were going to happen for the next 69 plus years !
I call it bordering on precognition !