A proposed Charles River ferry could cut down on Boston traffic

[@LL-bl8hd]

Such a great idea! I wish the MBTA had innovative thinkers like this. I hope their business is a huge success!

[@Lambda_Ovine]

what the MBTA lacks is money, they've been underfunded for decades now

[@eisenkeith]

hahahahahahaha​@@Lambda_Ovine

[@eisenkeith]

it's almost like the private sector is better at this stuff than the government

[@AdityaSUnboxings]

@@eisenkeith defund public transportation and support the politicians who do, and then wonder why it doesn't work well. see the UK to see how well privatization of public rail goes lmfao.

[@eisenkeith]

@@AdityaSUnboxings looks like it went debatably poorly

[@RAdaltonracer]

As a ferry operator on the Inner Harbor, I literally can’t think of a reason this hasn’t been done yet! Boston water transportation has so much potential!

[@Bobby_T_]

Can you think of a reason why Boston doesn’t have world class transit anymore? Why can’t they fix the mbta?

[@notmyname9625]

⁠​⁠@@Bobby_T_because people refuse to fund public transit like they should. We dump money into haphazard road improvements without complaint but if someone even mentions funding public transit ppl are up in arms. Its brainwashing by car lobbyists

[@notmyname9625]

@RAdaltonracer I agree and not just boston either massachusetts in general has massive potential for water transportation. I’ve always wanted to see something like this on the merrimack river with stops connecting the newburyport/salisbury/amesbury area and haverhill/ north andover/lawrence areas and with a larger ferry out of newburyport making stops in both Gloucester and salem. I also think the whole coastal area from salem to quincy should be connected with a range of ferry systems with stronger connections to the other already existing ferries like gloucester and p town and i’d imagine buzzards bay has some massive ferry potential too

[@Flavor88]

Man, if only Boston would have decent public transportation... I could only imagine how traffic would be

[@Bobby_T_]

We should be protesting about the mbta

[@putt7515]

Blue line goes everywhere wdym

[@kevinbrush7573]

Drinking Dunks and waving in the background could be the most Boston thing in this video.

[@StarlahMutiny]

I dont commute to Boston would take this for fun/relaxation lol

[@VictorMinchihLee]

"Just a couple of ducks" --- *pans to Canada geese*

[@elenaherwagen3529]

😂😂😂

[@gus473]

Actually "Canada geese." No -ian, Just "Canada." 🦆😎✌️

[@VictorMinchihLee]

@@gus473 Thanks!

[@Koopzilla24]

This was studied by the city and the MBTA before. The reason they didn't do it is because pretty much the entire lower Charles is a No Wake Zone and there are strict speed limits enforced on vessels especially larger ones that can create large wakes at pretty low speeds. There's also the concern of all the other maritime activity on the Charles like sailboats, kayaks, paddle boarders, etc that any transportation vessel would need to be very cautious of. These limitations make it so that even a pretty short trip from Harvard Sq to BU take longer than a traffic snarled 66 to B or Red Line to 47. Its slow speeds wouldn't be practical for anyone trying to do anything other than take it for a leisurely boat ride on the river. Which is fine and all but don't expect anyone to use it as a traffic bypass rather than a bus or train

[@Koopzilla24]

Replace Storrow with a Blue Line extension and turn Soldier's Field into a surface level 4-lane boulevard with light rail in the median if you want to reduce traffic

[@counterfit5]

​@@Koopzilla24 I've been thinking the blue line could be extended west on the north bank of the Charles.

[@az55544]

This is the kind of thinking we need for our future. Be an awesome ancestor! If I lived along this route. I'd support it. Awesome.

[@gregl1927]

Most of the Charles River is a no-wake zone. This will be incredibly slow. There's a reason that the T doesn't run ferries on the river.

[@elenaherwagen3529]

Also, there are several old dams along the river from Watertown to Boston - are they passable for boats?

[@Bobby_T_]

Just build another river without a no wake zone then

[@bensmith6868]

@@elenaherwagen3529locks

[@foreveranuj]

Genius, and yet a simple, novel idea. I get to work from home mostly (Winchester > Wellesley when I do have to go to work), but I'd be down to taking a ride to support this - I hope they do weekends too. Staring at geese over bumpers - about as clear as it gets which one's better. We're lucky we got a river that meets the ocean pretty much smack in the city, and we're not as big a city as Los Angeles - lets use it to our advantage! I hope this is a huge success, and that they expand it to Mystic River too, and not just the Charles.

[@ani2595]

Now if they can extend the other lines and maybe put a crosstown subway that would be amazing!

[@Bobby_T_]

How can we convince them that we want world class transit again like what Boston used to be famous for?

[@ani2595]

Show them the plan and the ridership that comes along with it and the economic benefits that’ll come as a side effect

[@Bobby_T_]

After this they need to use our funds to dig another Charles River under Boston. One day, The Big Dig 2 will finally solve all traffic in Boston.

[@phillippereira7]

Good luck with that in the winter time

[@slimsantilli4476]

Imagine having the T. And Its unusable. Sad.

[@Bobby_T_]

It’s literally abysmal and needs to be investigated immediately

[@InternetKilledTV21]

Seriously, unless your trip begins or ends downtown I've found that walking times compete with the T. It's atrocious.

[@Paul1958R]

They said that about the big dig too...

[@musarra195]

Wow. Love this.

[@blipco5]

Then there’s a matter of ICE in the winter.

[@yagerr4279]

It hasn’t gotten that cold in years

[@blipco5]

@@yagerr4279 Agreed but you can’t discount it.

[@mr.factoid105]

Does the Charles freeze over?

[@johnpersechini4951]

@@mr.factoid105yes especially by Watertown where it is narrow.

[@schmitty8225]

Iceskate

[@tooniami]

This is sadly not going to work. Can't go more than a few knots due to kayaks and rowers and it's really hard to make profit running high demand in only one direction. The MBTA bleeds money to make the commuter ferrys work. The water taxi in Boston harbor barely works financially as there is enough demand in both directions, but without a subsidy from the towns or state I don't see this venture being sustainable financially.

[@kristinamullen4066]

Geese are ducks now?

[@rooseveltdev]

Guy in the back having Dunkin’s

[@hrysivjt67]

Nice idea. Makes a good story. It can’t scale. 600 cars is nothing, and 18 inches of depth is about as shallow as it can get.

[@michaelmccollum9708]

1 lane of traffic is 1000-2000 people per hour. So 600 is 20-30 minutes of max traffic in a lane eliminated. That's not that bad.

[@az55544]

It's not always about scaling. It's about change, possibilities, pushing boundaries for the future. But you sit at your desk and don't take any risks now, k?

[@bethgoldman2560]

Hell expand it down to Newton Lower Falls region!

[@kristinamullen4066]

Wotta Hoppa

[@shape816]

Love it

[@Larry26-f1w]

The MBTA built new lines while the existing lines crumbled from disrepair. That’s not a funding problem , it’s something else entirely. The Green line extension had lots of cheerleaders …. Look closely at who they were and why . Oh sorry that would be journalism, let’s raise taxes instead. Mean while Hospitals , transit systems, the train wrecks of Massachusetts await more “funding”. Watch out for your wallet when the cheerleaders return !

[@AgnesCarpenter-p1o]

Walker Donald Jackson Frank Clark Timothy

[@MissJIF]

Name is wicked cute

[@bethbudner50]

Yes, so do I! Any innovative ideas for reducing traffic back-ups would help our fellow T commuters & I, respectively. Beth

[@anthonybarton2103]

Can I ride my bike 😅

[@Bobby_T_]

You’ll want to bike because they can’t figure out how to make our trains work correctly like they can in other countries. What an embarrassment

[@JuliaWeber-o7q]

Thats a wonderful idea

[@Bobby_T_]

A wonderful idea would be to fix the mbta

[@schmitty8225]

I think it would be better to ask for forgiveness than permission. Will probably take 10+ years to get this to work. The scooters and rental bikes where dropped without any heads up and now the cities are trying to build out infastructure for them.

[@jennifershanks453]

Those were geese! Lol! Not ducks!

[@helixfire1198]

wada hoppah!!

[@twinkle2679]

Please allow people who want to work remotely to do so. Thousands of workers who were fully able to work remotely at the height of the pandemic are being forced to go back to offices in Boston.

[@Bobby_T_]

How about give us decent public transit, so people want to go back to work? Productivity would skyrocket

[@JamesBerlo]

Fantastic Idea, they need a few more Docks on the Northern side (Cambridge side) but they will have opposition from the Colleges that think they own the Charles, I was in my 18 Foot Runabout going slow not to cause a wake when one of these Rowing Crews started screaming at us, and they were over 200 Feet away? it was not that it endangers them its they say it effects their Speed, I said Go F yourself of course, I'll maintain the Speed and go call the Cops. But being a Boston Fireman I have a lot of experience with these College Pukes (sure there are some very nice ones) that consume City Services and cause a lot of problems and contribute nothing to the City, I have little Patience with them.

[@fignewtoneater]

Name is condescending. I'm not getting on a river boat to get downtown, thanks.

[@az55544]

I bet your feelings get hurt all the time. You must be a pleasure to be around.

[@timregan1005]

wow. 300 years and this stupid state finally thought of a good idea

[@Bobby_T_]

Plenty of good ideas that haven’t happened yet like fixing the mbta