The “Thoughts from Everyone” series is a collection of discussions and analyses of the current system contributed by other transit fans that I personally find interesting. For a full index with ideas on all topics, see here.

This post includes discussions and analyses of transit in several cities further out to the west of Boston: Newton, Needham and nearby regions. Many such discussions involve the Green Line D branch, the Framingham/Worcester Line, and a possible branch of the Green Line to Needham.

Last updated: April 13, 2024 (created page)

Newton

Rebuild of Newtonville, West Newton and Auburndale Commuter Rail Stations (Framingham/Worcester Line)

Since 2019, MBTA has been designing a rebuild of the three commuter rail stations on the Framingham/Worcester Line in Newton with bidirectional high platforms, for accessibility and to improve service. I have documented the progress here. This section describes other people’s opinions on this real-world proposal.

Discussion of Newtonville’s station concept in April 2024 (F-Line to Dudley, the EGE and others, Apr 2024), and later comments

• This is with respect to a concept design in April 2024, which narrowed the immediate scope to Newtonville station alone, and proposed shortening the platforms from 800 ft to 400 ft.
• Many users expressed discontent with the shorter platforms. A few comments have justified their thoughts with insights on commuter rail operations, such as this, this, this and this by F-Line and this by The EGE. Their common themes are:
  • Platform length does not significantly affect cost;
  • Shorter platforms will result in increased dwell times.
• Themissinglink quoted a response from MBTA planners which used regional rail and electrification as justification. However, such arguments were later opposed by users due to both implementation timeline and the length of EMU trains.