James Kennedy: Why Routes 6/10 should be redeveloped as a surface boulevard

James, thanks for all the energy you are putting into getting attention to this, especially from the Providence City Council and Planning Departments (Mayor’s Office?) that will be a major part of the decision process.
Further follow up for all interested: lets bring this up to RIPTA planners and Board members, maybe at their next meeting (normally 1:30pm on third Mondays presumably June 15) where public comment is welcome and early on the agenda. They should be sympathetic as a bus lane on the expressway may sop up a lot of Federal Transit funds without doing much good.
Another venue to call attention to the idea of a boulevard is at the Transportation Advisory Committee which also allows public comment, they meet 6:30pm on 4th Thursdays, presumably on June 25.
But the main decision makers will be the Governor and her RIDOT team. At a conference call with transportation advocates they certainly indicated they were both open to all ideas, and to being sensitive to abutting 6/10 neighborhoods.
Finally, perhaps a walk around the abutting streets could be organized, inviting Olneyville and Federal Hill interests to participate, so we all see the opportunities and challenges and share ideas on-site.

James, it’s a very inspiring proposal. Please keep me on your mailing list if you plan to start one,

This is something I had day dreamed about but never thought it would be actually feasible, would be really inspiring to have that pessimism crushed because this is really a great idea. Never too late to heal an old wound I guess!

The “surface level” of the route 6/10 corridor was largely excavated during the creation of the highway. Before this, most of the major streets were once at surface level. The highway excavation created a steep cliff around Federal Hill which necessitated bridges to connect streets like Broadway and Westminister to Olnyville. Removing the highway could allow for most of those bridges over route 6/10 to be replaced by raised earth. That would leave only the small bridge spans over Amtrak’s North East Corridor. I’d like to imagine it’s fairly easy to get federal funding to replace failing bridges over Amtrak’s important north east corridor.

I think the issue with this project is re-grading the canyon left by the removal of route 6/10. Otherwise we’re still looking at many state funded expensive bridges. Perhaps this project could coincide with the dredging of the Providence River and reclaimed silt and soil could be used and earth fill, but that’s just fantasy.

If a 6/10 boulevard were regraded, there would likely be a drop-off or retaining wall adjacent to the Amtrak right-of-way. Where new development or urban infill could happen is along the Federal Hill side of a new 6/10 boulevard.

The section between Broadway, the Tobey Street Bridge and just south of Atwells has a depth of100-feet+/-,which is generally the depth of a house lot. This segment is roughly 4.5-acres, New infill along this area could be more characteristic of traditional Federal Hill scale. 35 to 40 new lots could be created, which could mirror Ridge Street’s typical 3-story building heights. Alternately a series of row houses could be built or slightly taller low-rise buildings.

Large-scale development would be more appropriate in the triangular shaped section north of Atwells to the Dean Street ramps, as the distance between the 6/10 and Spruce Street fans out from 100 to 500-feet or about 8-acres of land area. Both a new boulevard and Dean Street would have wide street widths, which could accommodate larger buildings.

The approximate 12.5-acres next to the 6/10 right-of-way is similar to the developable area (non-park or non-ball park) of the 195-land west of the river, which is about 13-acres.

Whether it’s a new boulevard or a simple replacement of the highway, the state and city needs to reserve a minimum of a 4-track right-of-way for Amtrak.

For a future Olneyville train station, whether it’s to be located adjacent to Harris Avenue as from the most recent proposal, or if the station were shifted between Broadway and just south of Westminster, a similar right-of-way width to the Pawtucket/Central Falls train station proposal of 5-tracks with two12-foot wide platforms should be reserved.

Raised earth sounds like a good proposal, although I must admit that I had imagined the kind of carved-earth, tree-lined hills that either side of the Cranston bike path has, to give the whole thinga feeling like a shaded forest area. Arman’s propsal is probablymore practical though.

I’d like. to see the car lanes go down to just two on route 10, but have a wide bike path and two bus lanes.

I’d like to see no more than two lanes of car traffic on the boulevard (but two for buses or additional rail, and a bike path). So my vision for the amount of car traffic coming through is different than what currently exists. A lot of cars can be moved on two lanes, especially if the transit and bike component is thought-out well. Many more people could be moving through this corridor that currently do, but with fewer cars.