The State Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) was represented by Karst Hoogeboom, Deputy Commissioner for Planning and planner Karl Haglund. There were also some engineering and public relations consultants.

Councilor Kelley was chair. Present were Councilor Davis, Deputy City Manager Rossi, Police Commissioner Watkins, and traffic department chief Clippinger.

The DCR presented data supporting its position that Memorial Drive is at 21 percent capacity in the morning and 57 percent capacity in the evening.

However, in response to Commissioner Watkins' question about the effect of Mem Drive's traffic lights on traffic flow, the DCR’s traffic engineers said the traffic signals rendered their data meaningless. The DCR will have a better idea of Mem Drive's capacity by September.

Officials praise the DCR for its open process, but if they present data they know to be flawed, what does "open process" mean? The results of other traffic surveys, including the origin-destination study will be done this spring. With respect to that study, Watkins noted the DCR plans indicate no traffic count at the Mass Pike exit into Cambridge.

The DCR is focused on four options to replace the present tunnel:

• rehabilitate the existing Storrow tunnel to achieve 40-year service life,

• build an at-grade parkway with traffic signals,

• rehab the old tunnel and add a new one, eliminate the Arlington Street westbound exit—with vent buildings,

• build new tunnels with at-grade local traffic—without vent buildings.

Haglund said the size of vent buildings would depend on traffic volumes.The DCR's previously stated goal was to permanently reduce traffic on Storrow by 30,000 to 50,000 vehicles per day.

No can do

But the DCR seems to be backing off the goal of a permanent reduction, saying they're looking at whether it would be possible. Traffic on Storrow is heavy all day long. Would traffic diverted to Mem Drive assume this pattern?

Haglund asserted that the Storrow tunnel is in imminent danger of falling down, hence the urgency of the environmental review and making a choice among the options. However, at earlier meetings the DCR had said there could be no work on the Storrow tunnel until the Longfellow Bridge is fixed, and mentioned a five-year timeline. So

I asked Haglund about the connection between the Storrow work with the Longfellow work and work on Mem Drive. He didn't comment on the bridge, but said the Mem Drive "Historic Restoration" wasn't connected to the Storrow work. The DCR always refuses to discuss the timing of these three projects or their relation to each other.

On April 12, a consultant for the State Executive Office of Transportation (EOT) said it was reasonable to assume the DCR is waiting for the results of the Harvard-funded study, "Transportation Alternatives in Allston," before going public with its own plans.

The Harvard-Allston report will be out in six to eight weeks.

Of course these projects are physically and logically connected, even if they are bureaucratically separate. He commented that the Mem Drive project reduced the number of travel lanes as though that would mean reduced traffic—but Storrow has two lanes in each direction and carries a very intensive load.

It doesn’t make sense

More important than the number of lanes is limited access, such as Storrow has now. With the removal of over 300 parking spaces between the BU and Longfellow bridges, Mem Drive has much more limited access than before that phase of "restoration." The Director of the EOT plan couldn't figure out why, if the DCR's goal was to reduce traffic on Mem Drive, they would limit access by removing the parking spaces.

Further plans for "Historic Restoration" call for straightening out Mem Drive. Westbound turns from Mass Avenue—toward the BU Bridge—are already finished. Cutting down hundreds of trees will improve the sight lines for the DCR plan to increase Mem Drive's traffic capacity. This is called historic restoration because "the original plans for Mem Drive didn't include all those trees."

The DCR presents its Storrow tunnel crisis as a problem but also as an opportunity. I believe all Storrow tunnel options are said to increase parkland. “Increasing parkland” has allowed the DCR to eliminate public parking on Mem Drive even as they work to make it Storrow's equivalent.

Failing at maintenance, allowing its assets to deteriorate and then billing the crisis as an opportunity sounds like the DCR's very familiar method with its parkland. This keeps its planners in business, sopping up money from mere snow clearing, trash pickup and other maintenance of swimming pools and their former skating rinks.

The DCR elides the problem that new tunnels couldn't support canopy trees and that such trees would be destroyed to construct the tunnels. On Mem Drive DCR will cut down hundreds of mature canopy trees, even without a tunnel. So many opportunities, so little actual green.