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Home My Public Portal About2018-06-12 MBTA bus comment ltr 6-1-18 Watertown Town Council Administration Building 149 Main Street Watertown, MA 02472 Phone: 617-972-6470 June 13, 2018 Ms. Jessica Casey, Chief Officer Service Planning and Strategy Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Better Bus Project 45 High Street, 10th Floor Boston, MA 02110 Dear Ms. Casey, Thank you for initiating the “Better Bus Project”. Watertown is a very bus dependent community, with roughly 3300 residents commuting to work by bus. Roughly 20,000 employees enter Watertown daily, 75% of whom travel in single occupancy vehicles. We support the MBTA taking a fresh look at improving bus service. Watertown has had, and continues to have, substantial development in its formerly industrial corridors, primarily along Arsenal Street and Pleasant Street. Numerous underutilized industrial parcels have converted to residential and new commercial uses, yet no new bus service has been added to serve the new residents and employees. More than 1300 new units have been built in multi-family structures since 2005, and another 900 are permitted or under construction but not yet occupied. A number of business campuses have been built or substantially renovated, such as Arsenal on the Charles, housing athenahealth with over 2500 employees, Riverworks, the former Aetna Mills with 200,000 square feet of office and an estimated 1000 employees, and the redevelopment of the Arsenal Mall into Arsenal Yards, with 374,000 square feet of office and retail space, 424 residential units, and a hotel, all under construction. Watertown has incorporated smart growth transportation policies into its permitting process, requiring transportation demand management and Single Occupancy Vehicle (SOV) reduction goals, but it is hampered by the limits of its public transit. Service has not caught up with increased demand, resulting in overcrowded buses, no doubt causing many new residents and employees to drive rather than use the MBTA. ELECTED OFFICIALS: Mark S. Sideris, Council President Caroline Bays, Councilor At Large Anthony J. Donato, Councilor At Large Susan G. Falkoff, Councilor At Large Anthony Palomba, Councilor At Large Angeline B. Kounelis, District A Councilor Lisa J. Feltner, District B Councilor Vincent J. Piccirilli, Jr., District C Councilor Kenneth M. Woodland District D Councilor • The Pleasant Street Corridor needs bus service. There are 800 new residential units on Pleasant Street, and over 200 under construction Yet there is no bus service at all on most of Pleasant Street in Watertown. The vast majority of those residents must drive to work, as do employees of Riverworks. This corridor is in desperate need of public transit that connects to the broader MBTA system. • The Arsenal Street corridor needs more service. The 70/70A bus connects Watertown Square via Arsenal Street to Central Square in Cambridge. Existing bus service is inadequate to serve the almost 300 newly occupied units, 280 nearing occupancy, and another 424 in the pipeline. In addition, employees at the Arsenal on the Charles project, which contains athenahealth and other tenants, and the new Marriott Hotel could be using the bus more if service was better. The Marriott offers an on-demand shuttle, which could be used less if bus service was more reliable. This bus line is in need of examination and expansion. The routes 70/70A, which start in Waltham and provide service for Watertown residents to Central Square Cambridge, are very long routes which have schedule reliability and capacity issues. The 2017 MassDOT funded Arsenal Street Corridor study had a number of suggestions for improving service, including potential termini adjustments, splitting up the routes into distinct shorter routes, adding limited stop express service, or consolidating stops. These routes should be re-evaluated. • The Mt. Auburn Street corridor is underserved by the 71 bus line. This is a designated Key Bus Route because of its high ridership. Watertown Square has also been the site of new residential development. The route suffers from over-crowded and unreliable bus service during peak hours. Additional service would relieve some of that pressure. The Town and the MBTA are currently planning bus priority improvements along this corridor. • Watertown has no public transit connections to commuter rail, with stops in close proximity in Belmont, Newton, and Allston; nor to the Green Line, in Newton. The MassDOT Arsenal Street Corridor Study recommends exploring express bus service on North Beacon Street to connect Watertown Square to the MBTA Commuter Rail at Boston Landing, the Green Line, and/or the Red Line. • Watertown Yard is a deteriorated and underutilized site in the center of our community. We would strongly support improvements to the Watertown Yard, in the form of an upgraded waiting area, and overall redesign of the existing site. Its function as a transportation hub can be enhanced either with a public sector project, or as part of a public private partnership as previously discussed. • We also support exploration of replacing existing buses with low emission electric buses here and at other locations. Again, thank you for considering the service needs of our many bus riders. We look forward to discussing these and any other issues with you as part of the Better Bus Project. Sincerely, Mark Sideris Council President Cc: Rep. Jonathan Hecht Senator William Brownsberger Micheal J. Driscoll, Town Manager Steve Magoon, DCDP Director, Assistant Town Manager Laura Wiener, Senior Transportation Planner Heather Hume, MBTA Director of Service Planning Wes Edwards, MBTA Director of Operations Planning and Outreach Andrew Smith, MBTA Service Planner