BRA updates Mt. Vernon Street redesign plan

A reconfigured Mt. Vernon Street is one step closer to reality a Boston Redevelopment Authority official noted last night as it laid out its plans to update the street that serves as Columbia Point’s backbone at a meeting at the McCormack Middle School.

“This is the continuation of a process that’s been underway for a year,” said Tad Read, a senior planner and project manager with the BRA who has been involved with the project since it began. “We’re primarily focusing on answering questions raised at the last meeting.”

Those questions involved talk of creating a left-turn lane into Harbor Point Apartments while traveling up Mount Vernon Street to prevent backups as cars seek to turn into the complex.

“We’ve revised the design to include a left-turn lane. That was a big issue for residents of Harbor Point,” Read said.

Another problem area noted, for which there is not yet a design fix, is the traffic congestion along Mount Vernon Street due in the main to UMass Boston students and faculty parking at the Bayside Expo lot, which accommodates 1,300 cars. “There has been an increase in traffic,” Read said. “Not enough to change the design, but there has been an increase.” He said that was due to construction on other parts of the campus closing off other parking lots and concentrating more cars into the Expo lot.

Read said the design will address the outdated traffic signal operation at Mount Vernon Street and Morrissey Boulevard, which filters cars moving on and off the peninsula. The final tweak, he said, is meant to ensure that the southeast portion of the street, where it now narrows to two lanes, will be able to handle future traffic volumes so that new development at the UMass campus can be accommodated.

Columbia Point is one of the key locations in Boston’s bid to host the 2024 Summer Olympic Games and backers have said the games can kick-start infrastructure projects backed up in the city’s pipeline. Read said plans to update Mount Vernon Street have been underway since the 2011 Columbia Point Master Plan. “If the Olympics did take place nearby,” he said, “the Olympics are an event that involve a lot of walking and public transportation as well as alternative transportation, so the fact that this new design is intended for all users, it will be very well suited.”

With this first step of the design phase completed, the BRA will now undertake a second study to flesh out further details for which the BRA must secure funding in the city’s capital budget. Construction would followed in the next two to three years. Read estimated the cost of the redesign at “several millions of dollars,” adding, “we know the community would like to see the new street designed and constructed as soon as possible.”


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