Is there a reason MA 25/I-495 doesn't connect to 3/6?

[Voyager]

I remember travelling from Cape Cod to Newport last year that there was a section by the canal where you were forced to take a 2 lane road between freeways, and looking at Google Maps it looks so strange how 25 doesn't even look like it was intended to ever connect. Was there ever a plan for this?

[The Ghostbuster]

An explanation of the formerly proposed Southside Connector proposal can be found here: http://www.bostonroads.com/roads/MA-25/. There's no way any sort of connector could be built today.

[roadman65]

I remember starting a thread similar to this, but from what I've heard the current joint ending of both I-495 and I-195 is as good as it gets. Considering the US 6 freeway doesn't connect to MA 25, having one non interstate route won't improve things.  Also look at years ago when there were no freeways on Cape Cod or the Mainland and we had to use local roads then. At least we have it better.

[vdeane]

An explanation of the formerly proposed Southside Connector proposal can be found here: http://www.bostonroads.com/roads/MA-25/. There's no way any sort of connector could be built today.

The page doesn't load for me.

[Rothman]

An explanation of the formerly proposed Southside Connector proposal can be found here: http://www.bostonroads.com/roads/MA-25/. There's no way any sort of connector could be built today.

The page doesn't load for me.

Takes forever and only half-loads for me.

[pderocco]

My obsession is that they should build a freeway connecting MA-25 over a new bridge between Bourne and Sagamore to US-6. It would involve moving a lot of earth on the mainland side but it wouldn't involve tearing down a hundred houses.

[Ted$8roadFan]

It must have something to do with the fact that 25 wasn't completed until 1987. By that time, anti-highway forces were c certainly powerful enough to stop any connection.

[froggie]

Everyone's ignoring the elephants in the room.  Namely:

• Steep topography on both sides of the canal
• A lot of protected conservation land, especially on the "mainland"
• A former quarry now becoming a large solar farm

IMO, the only semi-realistic way to connect MA 25 with the Mid-Cape today is to build the replacement Bourne Bridge, then run a corridor across the northern fringe of Otis.  Though this itself would not be easy and would also require coordination with DoD and possibly Federal legislation.

[pderocco]

It must have something to do with the fact that 25 wasn't completed until 1987. By that time, anti-highway forces were c certainly powerful enough to stop any connection.

That was my backyard back then, and I don't recall ever hearing anyone speculate about making a connection like that. Massachusetts never thought big about roads (except the Big Dig, which was a one-off). They still have that stupid super-2 from Dennis to Orleans after more than 50 years.

[RobbieL2415]

They should have just connected I-195 to MA 3. I feel it would have achieved a similar result. There's no real fast way to get to Plymouth from Providence and points west.

[The Ghostbuster]

Good luck building an Interstate through the Miles Standish State Forest, or any of the other many natural preserves standing in the way of a 195-3 direct connection.

[pderocco]

They should have just connected I-195 to MA 3. I feel it would have achieved a similar result. There's no real fast way to get to Plymouth from Providence and points west.

There's another road that has been crying out for fourlaning for half a century: US-44 from MA-58 to MA-24. There's room. Use it.

[SectorZ]

They should have just connected I-195 to MA 3. I feel it would have achieved a similar result. There's no real fast way to get to Plymouth from Providence and points west.

There's another road that has been crying out for fourlaning for half a century: US-44 from MA-58 to MA-24. There's room. Use it.

I've had a suspicion that when the bridges on it start hitting end-of-life that making the rest of 44 there a freeway could happen. It's unfortunate that the freeway part in Plymouth and Carver has been open for 20 years and yet the super-2 part still persists, especially with it still having traffic signals.

[Ted$8roadFan]

I would imagine that there is some NIMBY resistance to finishing the US-44 freeway in middleboro and carver. That or lack of money.

[pderocco]

I would imagine that there is some NIMBY resistance to finishing the US-44 freeway in middleboro and carver.

I don't know the accuracty of the faint propertly lines that Google Maps shows when you zoom way in, but it looks to me like they reserved sufficient ROW on the north side from the very beginning. NIMBYs are a fact of life, but don't have to be indulged if they don't own anything.

[Rothman]

I would imagine that there is some NIMBY resistance to finishing the US-44 freeway in middleboro and carver.

I don't know the accuracty of the faint propertly lines that Google Maps shows when you zoom way in, but it looks to me like they reserved sufficient ROW on the north side from the very beginning. NIMBYs are a fact of life, but don't have to be indulged if they don't own anything.

Might want to look up the history of opposition to Boston's proposed highway system...

[roadman65]

On the north side of Boston current US 1 functions well as a New Jersey style expressway.  The route is free flowing with no stoplights as built with a completely sealed median with no crossovers and and cross roads. It interchanges with all perpendicular roadways and is RIRO at driveways and side streets and built like NJ routes 3, 4, 17, and 208 are which are like freeways, but not.

So an argument was most likely made that why build another road when this set up is fine.

[SectorZ]

On the north side of Boston current US 1 functions well as a New Jersey style expressway.  The route is free flowing with no stoplights as built with a completely sealed median with no crossovers and and cross roads. It interchanges with all perpendicular roadways and is RIRO at driveways and side streets and built like NJ routes 3, 4, 17, and 208 are which are like freeways, but not.

So an argument was most likely made that why build another road when this set up is fine.

As someone who drives on that stretch of US 1 every few weeks, you are making its utility sound more elegant than it actually is.

This is a road that for years in the late-2010's on Saturday nights had a 2-4 mile backup southbound because a guy was standing on the side holding a political sign (near the Lynn Fells Pkwy exit). It's that much of a garbage roadway that something like that can reduce it to a crawl in a non-work-commute timeline. The three cloverleafs are three of the most accident-laden intersections in Massachusetts.

I-95 parallel to it would be quite helpful. The argument that stopped 95 was never that 1 was better, it was that 95 was going to be environmentally destructive.

[pderocco]

I would imagine that there is some NIMBY resistance to finishing the US-44 freeway in middleboro and carver.

I don't know the accuracty of the faint propertly lines that Google Maps shows when you zoom way in, but it looks to me like they reserved sufficient ROW on the north side from the very beginning. NIMBYs are a fact of life, but don't have to be indulged if they don't own anything.

Might want to look up the history of opposition to Boston's proposed highway system...

I grew up there, and lived through it. The Inner Belt and the Southwest Expressway involved condemnation of huge numbers of properties. Canceling those projects wasn't an indulgence. But a few homeowners complaining that traffic will be twenty feet closer to their house isn't going to elicit much sympathy, especially since many of those whose properties abut US-44 also use US-44 a lot, and don't like the super 2 config either. Add in the likelihood that the widened road would also include sound walls which don't currently exist at all.

I think the more likely resistance will be small environmental groups using lawfare. But their tools are creations of law, and can be modified by law.