Lowe's Unfamiliar With Massachusetts Culture

Lowe's may want to build a new home improvement store in Brighton Landing at the former Barry Controls building, but at a neighborhood meeting Thursday night Lowe's made it sound like the company doesn't understand Massachusetts culture.

One audience member asked, "Would you consider putting a Dunkin' Donuts in?"

Lowe's site development manager Larry LePere responded that he had actually raised the issue with Lowe's management before in other projects, but was always struck down by his bosses -- such that he got the message not to raise the issue again.

LePere didn't mention, however, that the nearest Dunkin' Donuts (aka Dunking Doughnuts) is far, far away from the proposed development site -- two blocks away, that is, at the corner of North Beacon Street and Market Street. You know, the one that used to have the 1957 sign [upper right] that was torn down nearly two years ago.


Image of former Dunkin' Donuts sign in Brighton:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/walkn/ / CC BY 2.0

Will Lowe's Continue to Misrepresent Traffic on Market Street?

Lowe's is scheduled on Thursday night to present to the Brighton Allston Improvement Association their revised plans for construction of a home improvement store in Brighton Landing. Lowe's is currently locked in a struggle with New Balance over competing development plans for those parcels.

Mayor Thomas Menino rejected Lowe's first proposal for the store in 2007 because of the traffic problems it would create.

A year-and-a-half ago Lowe's presented the first revision in their plans in which they first promised to spend $1.2 million to improve traffic signals on Market Street and North Beacon Street. If those improvements were found to reduce vehicle travel times, Lowe's representatives proposed that they should be permitted to construct their store.

In Lowe's traffic study, however, they substantially misrepresented the existing traffic situation on Market Street, stating travel times that are approximately three times longer than actual measured times. Lowe's characterization of travel times on Market Street are, simply put, way off.

Will Lowe's on Thursday continue to misrepresent the existing traffic conditions on Market Street?

In 2008 Lowe's representatives told the BAIA:

Lowe's traffic engineering consultants claim that it currently takes 14.4 minutes to travel along Market Street from Washington Street to Lincoln Street during morning rush hour, and the reverse trip during evening rush hour takes 17.6 minutes. They also claim that travel on North Beacon Street from Market Street to Union Square takes 10.2 minutes eastbound during morning rush hour or 15.0 minutes westbound during evening rush hour.

Their consultants were stating the travel times estimated from computer modeling of Market Street traffic patterns, not those actually measured in a vehicle on the street.

So what does the experimental physicist in me want to do? Measure the actual travel times. During morning and evening rush hour the past couple of weeks I made a series of timings of the travel time from crossing Washington Street to the time crossing Lincoln Street (or vice-versa). Morning timings were taken in a car and evening timings were taken from MBTA bus #86, which should be even slower than normal traffic because of the added time of allowing passengers to get on and off. [See the bottom of the post for more details on the measurements.]

Actual travel times: between four and seven minutes.

Predicted travel times from Lowe's computer models: between 14.4 and 17.6 minutes.

The results show that Lowe's predictions of travel times are three-and-a-half times too large for northbound travel on Market Street during morning rush hour, and two-and-a-half times too large for southbound travel on Market Street during evening rush hour.

The conclusion: Lowe's and their traffic consultants in 2008 massively misrepresented how bad the traffic is on Market Street.


Why Would Lowe's Massively Over-Estimate the Market Street Travel Times?

Lowe's proposed in 2008 that, if they could reduce the travel time by spending money on improving the timing of the traffic lights, then they should be allowed to proceed on constructing their box store in Brighton Landing:

[Lowe's and their consultants] claim that construction of their proposed, big box store will reduce average trip times along Market Street by 13-28% and along North Beacon Street by 3-11%...

...If there is more traffic on nearby streets, shouldn't this mean that it would take longer to go anywhere by car?

Not if Lowe's paid $1.2 million up front, prior to any approvals for construction of the store, in order to improve traffic signals in the area by synchronizing them. Lowe's insists that they will put a condition on their construction that they must first demonstrate a reduction in trip time from the signal improvements to Market Street and North Beacon Street.

But the actual travel time is already much better than Lowe's represented it to be; the existing travel times are a 50-67% improvement over their flawed computer models, much more than their proposed 3-28% improvement.

The cynical explanation is that Lowe's might be over-estimating the travel times in order to guarantee that it will appear as though their traffic signal improvements will improve the travel times. It's hard to know whether or not this is the real reason, but I am willing to bet that the BAIA asks some pointed questions at Thursday's meeting.

It's hard to imagine why a traffic consultant -- presumably paid by Lowe's for many hours, days, or even weeks of engineering work -- wouldn't bother to spend an additional hour or two driving up and down the street measuring the actual travel times. Unless, of course, the engineers made the measurements, found them less favorable than the computer model's predicted times, and chose not to make mention of the discrepancy. But that is a purely speculative conspiracy theory.

Their computer model travel times don't make any sense, either. The distance between Lincoln and Washington streets is 0.75 miles, so Lowe's model predicts average vehicle speeds of 3.1 mph in the morning and 2.6 mph in the evening. Those speeds are so slow that many young children could walk faster.

Let's hope that their traffic engineers have driver's licenses and own cars so that they can drive up and down the street a few times before Thursday's meeting.


Other Traffic Issues

Other things to look for in Thursday's presentation by Lowe's traffic engineers: whether they are using the same traffic study or a new one; if they are using the magical stroke-of-the-pen to declare "that 50% rather than 25% of the traffic would already be driving in the area on other errands"; how much the relocation of Briggs from one of the parcels is improving the traffic in the study, rather than other changes (such as a reduction in size of the store or traffic signal improvements); and how Lowe's deals with New Balance's counter-proposals to create a flyover on/off ramp to the Mass Pike and have a commuter rail station near Everett Street.


Measurements

Morning rush hour northbound [measured by car]: Average 4.0 minutes (individual measurements: 4:27 and 3:27), compared to Lowe's predictions of 14.4 minutes. Neither measurement was within a factor of three of Lowe's predictions.

Morning rush hour southbound [measured by car]: Average 4.2 minutes (individual measurements: 4:37 and 3:50); no Lowe's prediction given.

Evening rush hour southbound [measured on MBTA bust #86]: Average 6.9 minutes (individual measurements: 7:35, 5:30, 6:50, 7:30), compared to Lowe's predictions of 17.6 minutes. Not one measurement was within a factor of two of Lowe's predictions.

Evening rush hour northbound: No measurements or predictions.


[above right] Image of a traffic jam in India:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lingaraj/ / CC BY 2.0

New Balance Proposal for Brighton Landing Development Met With Skepticism From Current Owners of Land

New Balance unveiled their "vision" for a $250 million mixed-use development project, first described here, at a neighborhood public meeting Wednesday night.

Their development proposal was met with considerable skepticism -- from the current owners of the parcels of land New Balance wants to develop. The owners of two of the three big parcels tell the Boston Herald that there's no deal to sell the properties or their development rights to New Balance.

One of those property owners, Marathon Realty Corporation, has an agreement with Lowe's to develop the site for a home improvement store, but the city has previously nixed that idea due to concerns about traffic problems. David Wanger, president of Marathon Realty, told the Boston Globe:

“It’s inappropriate for New Balance to be presenting a proposal of what they would like to do on property owned by my company unless it’s a collaborative effort," Wanger said. “We’re not going to simply abandon our plans because New Balance has new ones."

It is clear from an earlier Herald article that State Representative Michael Moran was previously knowledgeable and supportive of New Balance's proposal; State Representative Kevin Honan was supportive, too, in his comments today to the Herald.

Why would New Balance present their proposals now before they have agreements on any of the parcels?

One theory is that New Balance is trying to preempt Lowe's when they re-propose their own box store idea in the next few weeks. By showing an alternate development vision, New Balance is offering the neighborhood and the city an alternative to undermine the Lowe's project. Over in revenue-strapped City Hall a $250 million development probably looks a lot better than a more modest Lowe's store.

But a more conspiratorial theory has been discussed around the neighborhood for the past few weeks: that New Balance is trying to win over public support for their project in order to pressure the current landowners into selling to New Balance instead of Lowe's. That would explain why New Balance has put so much preliminary effort into wooing the local state representatives over to their project -- and putting a commuter rail stop at nearby Everett Street.

But New Balance's publicized plan could also backfire on them. The owner of one of the parcels seems to be driving his selling price upwards:

“We talked last year and neither the price nor the arrangements were to our benefit,” said William Joyce, [B.L.] Makepeace’s president. “We appreciated the offer, but they were way below anything we consider reasonable.”

Update: Harry Mattison attended the meeting and offers his comments on the development proposal.

Rendering of New Balance's Proposed Development

A Brighton resident got a postcard with this picture in the mail today and forwarded it on to me. It's an artist/architect's rendering of the large development at Brighton Landing that New Balance is expected to put forward at a community meeting next week.

The view is looking east; the Mass Pike runs up from the lower right corner of the picture. I've labeled the various features in the image -- the red text is mine, not New Balance's.

The crossing of the Mass Pike looks to be more like a pedestrian bridge lined up with Litchfield Street -- not a flyover with on- and off-ramps -- which connects the proposed new development at Brighton Landing to the new Charlesview project a few blocks further north. Litchfield has residential buildings on its west side, light commercial on its east.

According to at least one source who was briefed on New Balance's plans, their presentation included an additional flyover with looping ramps that is not included in this artist's rendering.


Note: post was updated to clarify the issue of pedestrian bridge versus on-/off-ramp flyover.

New Balance to Propose Large Development Project at Brighton Landing

The economic downturn has given residents of Allston-Brighton a respite from major construction: Harvard University has stopped construction of their science complex in North Allston; and Boston College has announced a slowdown in capital construction on their main Chestnut Hill campus, with no word about construction on their new Brighton Campus (which is currently the subject of a lawsuit by two residents of Brighton).

It looks like the lull in construction may be about to change.

New Balance is poised to announce a major new project for Brighton Landing that would redevelop an industrial and commercial neighborhood into a mixed-use development.

Word has been leaking out for a number of months that New Balance -- whose corporate headquarters is located next to WGBH's "nuclear aircraft carrier" in the Brighton Landing area alongside the Massachusetts Turnpike -- wishes to initiate a large development project on the currently under-utilized industrial and commercial land between their current buildings and the Stop-and-Shop grocery store to the east.

The initial proposal that has been floated in the past months includes: two office towers (where one is for New Balance's own use to consolidate the corporate offices of their non-NB shoe brands); a movie theater/auditorium; luxury hotel; mixed residential housing and retail; and open green space running east-west in the middle of the project. The entire project is expected to be long-term and would be built in stages, possibly taking up to two decades to complete.

These details were provided and confirmed by a number of individuals who have heard presentations in the past few months from New Balance representatives. New Balance is expected to present details of their proposal in a community meeting next week -- which may include modifications to the plan based on feedback they have received during the past few months. (New Balance was contacted for this story but declined the opportunity to comment.)

The exact identification of the parcels involved was unclear to people briefed on the plans. The parcels in Brighton Landing have a variety of owners listed with the City of Boston assessors office and the Suffolk County Registry of Deeds, only several of which are Brighton Landing LLC, the proponent of the new development. (I have drawn the full possible area at right.) It is likewise unclear if they have entered into any purchase and sale contracts other property owners, but it would seem likely based on the maturity of their development proposal.

Lowe's previously proposed to develop part of the site with a large box hardware store that met with the opposition of both neighborhood residents and Mayor Thomas Menino due to its negative transportation impacts on nearby streets. Lowe's later floated the idea again, albeit without filing a new proposal with the Boston Redevelopment Authority.

The New Balance project concept would address its transportation impacts in two major ways: pushing for the state to locate a commuter rail station at Brighton Landing near Everett Street, which could also service diesel multiple unit trains; and building a new flyover on-/off-ramp for the Mass Pike (and/or a cloverleaf located further east by the Leo Birmingham Parkway). The current transportation constraints of the site are such that the Mass Pike ramps are a requirement for the project to move forward, according to those briefed on the plan.

While the office towers would likely be buffered from existing residential neighborhoods, the pike ramp flyover might be located relatively close to the residential neighborhood of North Brighton along Lincoln Street.

New Balance has not to date submitted their proposed development project to the BRA for review.


Community Meeting: NB Guest Street Planning & Development is hosting a community meeting to present their "vision" of potential future development of Guest Street. The meeting will take place on February 10th at 6:30 p.m., on the 2nd floor at Brighton Landing, 20 Guest Street in Brighton.


Update: Lowe's is on the schedule for Thursday's meeting of the Brighton Allston Improvement Association. Hard to know what that means, based on New Balance floating their own development ideas for what are likely to be some of the same parcels of land.


Image of New Balance's headquarters in Brighton Landing from the NB Store website.

Brighton Lowe's Redivivus

Last year Lowe's proposed a 200,000 square foot box store for Brighton Landing -- a location next to the Massachusetts Turnpike, yet about as far from a turnpike exit as it could possibly be.

The traffic study they conducted as part of the Boston Redevelopment Authority's review of their proposal showed so much added traffic on nearby streets that Mayor Thomas Menino opposed their proposal. Brighton Landing neighbors like New Balance opposed the proposal, too, based on the excessive traffic it would generate on shared Guest Street.

Now Lowe's is back with a proposal that looks very similar to the previous one: same location (albeit with 1.1 extra acres from a newly-available adjacent lot); slightly reduced in floor space (by around 20%); and the same traffic data.

What gives?


Switching Traffic Metrics

The proponents have decided to toss out the traffic metrics in the previous study, which was an increase in traffic volume of up to 150% on nearby streets. Lowe's engineering consultants are now focusing on a new traffic metric, the reduction in the trip time along major streets in the neighborhood.

They claim that construction of their proposed, big box store will reduce average trip times along Market Street by 13-28% and along North Beacon Street by 3-11%.

Huh? If there is more traffic on nearby streets, shouldn't this mean that it would take longer to go anywhere by car?

Not if Lowe's paid $1.2 million up front, prior to any approvals for construction of the store, in order to improve traffic signals in the area by synchronizing them. Lowe's insists that they will put a condition on their construction that they must first demonstrate a reduction in trip time from the signal improvements to Market Street and North Beacon Street.

A few years ago when New Balance moved their corporate offices to Brighton Landing, attendees at Thursday night's meeting of the Brighton Allston Improvement Association recalled, they promised to improve the signals on those same two streets. But nothing happened, and the Boston Redevelopment Authority never seemed to hold them accountable.

They said that WGBH then built their new nuclear aircraft carrier building at Brighton Landing, and promised as part of the approval process to make signal improvements on the same streets. Again nothing happened, and again the BRA didn't seem to hold the developer accountable.

Against this backdrop of "fool me twice, shame on you; fool me thrice, shame on me" the BAIA attendees were mostly skeptical Thursday of Lowe's proposal and whether or not traffic improvements would ever be installed in the neighborhood. A representative of New Balance expressed negative opinions about Lowe's substantial impact on, and proposed reconfiguration of, Guest Street, which were not discussed at the meeting.

Dick Marques, President of the BAIA, got the last laugh when he asked the New Balance representative, "Wasn't New Balance one of the causes of this traffic mess?"


Few Changes Evident in New Proposal

There are some small changes in Lowe's new proposal over the previous one. The square footage for the sales floor has been reduced by nearly 20%. A 1.1 acre part of a 2.5 acre adjacent parcel, currently used by Briggs, would be used in order to move large truck unloading further off of Guest Street. The owner of the Briggs parcel has apparently expressed a willingness to talk with the city about using the 1.4 remaining acres for a possible commuter rail station -- although the audience had to instruct the Lowe's representatives that commuter rail isn't under the jurisdiction of any city agency.

The new traffic caused by the new proposal is also reduced by 25% from their previous proposal, but it was unclear how much of that reduced traffic resulted from the fortuitous relocation of Briggs from the area rather than the revised Lowe's store proposal itself. Those previous traffic numbers, by the way, had themselves been reduced by 33% during the course of the BRA review -- not by new traffic data, but by a stroke of the pen which magically declared that 50% rather than 25% of the traffic would already be driving in the area on other errands.

Lowe's has come to the community with essentially the same proposal, the same traffic data, and essentially the same traffic study -- just repackaged to make it look better.

The news is that Lowe's now plans to sell lipstick.


Want To Collect Data?

Lowe's traffic engineering consultants claim that it currently takes 14.4 minutes to travel along Market Street from Washington Street to Lincoln Street during morning rush hour, and the reverse trip during evening rush hour takes 17.6 minutes. They also claim that travel on North Beacon Street from Market Street to Union Square takes 10.2 minutes eastbound during morning rush hour or 15.0 minutes westbound during evening rush hour.

While traffic along those streets are heavy, those times sound excessive.

If you travel along those route during your morning / evening commute, consider timing your trip between those two cross streets and post it as a comment below. Please note the direction of travel (north/morning vs. south/evening for Market Street; east/morning vs. west/evening for North Beacon Street), time of day, and time elapsed.

Bicycle commuter times not allowed: bicycles can travel those route much faster than cars at that time of day while still obeying all traffic laws.


Image of pigs by abbey*christine provided through a Creative Commons license.

City Cites Traffic Problems in Rejecting Brighton Landing as Site for Lowe's Store

Last week I went back-and-forth with the BRA getting a copy of the Project Notification Form for the proposed Lowe's store at Brighton Landing. It arrived on Friday; later that day, Mayor Thomas Menino announced (actually it was the BRA director) that he now opposed the proposal due to the substantial traffic impact at that location, according to the Banker and Tradesman (archive fee):

Until now, Mayor Thomas M. Menino has expressed support for the project.

But the mayor wanted assurances that the additional traffic could be managed...

"When we saw the traffic study, it became clear to everyone that this project would create an undue hardship for the neighborhood, especially on weekends," said John F. Palmieri, director of the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA). "We want to continue to work with Lowe's to find an appropriate location in the city, but the Brighton site is not viable for that use."

What was the traffic problem highlighted by the study?

I did not attend the public meeting last Monday at which the traffic consultants for Lowe's presented their traffic study. But the preliminary traffic study that was in the original PNF is probably close enough to understand why Mayor Menino changed course.

Assumptions. The number of vehicle trips that would be generated by the proposed Brighton Lowe's was based on 198,000 square feet of retail space (excluding parking), along with parking for 378 vehicles in a parking structure. According to national data, 48% of trips for a home improvement "superstore" are "pass-by trips," i.e., where the vehicle is already traveling in the area (commuting, going to another store, etc.).

In the PNF, the traffic analysis reduced the number of generated vehicle trips by 25%, not 48%, so as to create a conservatively high estimate of the impact of the store. According to one attendee at last week's meeting, however, the traffic presentation may have adopted a more generous 50% reduction in trips; if so, then the project may create significantly larger traffic impact than their latest study, indicating that the traffic problem could be even worse.

Results:

Time Period	Total Trips to Lowe's (100%)	Diverted Trips (25%)	New Trips (75%)
Weekday Daily	5,900	1,478	4,422
Weekday Morning Peak Hour (Entering+Exiting)	238	60	178
Weekday Evening Peak Hour (Entering + Exiting)	485	122	363
Saturday Midday Peak Hour (Entering + Exiting)	1,069	268	801

On weekday evenings, there will be 363 new trips per hour, i.e., one additional car entering or exiting the immediate neighborhood every ten seconds.

At midday on Saturday, it's more than twice as bad -- a new car every four-and-a-half seconds. According to one attendee at the meeting, the new Saturday vehicle trips would increase midday vehicle trips on at least one street by 150%!

There aren't many routes into or out of the site: a one-way to Everett Street by the Stop-and-Shop, a traffic signal at North Beacon Street by the Volvo dealer, or a traffic signal at Market Street by WGBH. Splitting up the exiting traffic to North Beacon Street and Market Street, roughly seven additional vehicles would have to make it through each two-minute green traffic light-cycle.

The Brighton Landing site is right next to the Massachusetts Turnpike, but it is nearly a mile away from an entrance to the Pike. The standard route to and from the Pike would have to pass through a one-lane bottle-neck on Cambridge Street southeast of Harvard Avenue at Allston Village. These kind of big box stores are usually best placed near to highway on-ramps.

If that location were to have a offices instead, 200,000 square feet would probably
result in 400 employees or around 1000 vehicle trips per day (based on methods used for the Harvard science complex traffic study) -- compared to the 4,422 daily vehicle trips for the 200 new, permanent jobs that would be created by the store.

I bet that Mayor Menino looked at the trade-offs for the site, traffic, and the nature of the mostly low-paying jobs that would be created, and decided that it just wasn't worth all the expense and bother.

There has been some amount of discussion about the topic on the AllstonBrighton2006 Google Group.


PNF (June 2007) Preliminary Traffic Study: