Greater City Providence

12 comments

  • I watched on my cell phone because I’m traveling in Europe without a bigger screen so reading the features that popped up from time to time was not realistic. Still looks like a lot of stairs to covered walkways with no amenities. Is the bus stop really just a covered bench?
    Less dramatic music and a better concept and site plan would be more welcome

  • glad to see the Pawtucket’s rr station advance, kudos for RIDOT for getting this done, but what bus hub?? RIPTA riders have had an indoor shelter, access to bathrooms and schedules downtown at the Visitors Center but if that hub is closed those amenities, for rail passengers too, should be in this project. Some of the $35 million bond for bus hubs voters approved in 2014 should be available, especially as it seems no new bus hub can be built, or is needed, at the Providence train station.

  • A reader asked me to post this comment:

    The bus hub in the Visitors’ Center/old Peerless building offered shelter from cold as well as wet and dark.  It also offered bathroom access.  The new hub offers only minimal shelter from rain or snow, and is well away from any other centers of activity, like City Hall.  We’re all much worse off than we were before! 

    – Ed Benson
  • This rendering gets one thing right. The trains don’t stop at the station: which could ultimately happen. The MBTA does not support this new station nor does Providence. Rhody should support fixing the MBTA South Attleboro station (aka the existing MBTA Pawtucket station) before pitching another MBTA train stop, especially after the Wickford disaster

  • We used to build beautiful train stations and depots. Now we build this junk. I vote to take the 1910 model and replicate it.

  • How about a story where you discuss the fact that over 47 million is being spent on this project, yet there will be no bathrooms for passengers or indoor waiting space for them? Passengers will have little more than a bus shelter to protect them from rain, wind and snow. And they won’t be protected from the cold.

  • I agree with Amy’s point. Remember the context that those amenities will be lost at the bus hub downtown Visitor’s Center.
    That said, it should be noted that the site of the RR station is mostly quite desolate for now, so most bus passengers will still want to go downtown (even to transfer?) so it is important for bus passengers that all the bus lines still go downtown. So the site is likely to be more used by train passengers who also can benefit from shelter, bathrooms, information. RI voters approved $35 million for statewide transit hubs in 2014 presumably to be used to leverage TOD in the Providence train station district but this seems less likely now. So the money could be used to help construct passenger amenities in Pawtucket (as well as improvements at transit hubs at TF Green (e.g. real time bus and train info) Wickford Jct, Woonsocket, KP, even at the Providence train station (real time bus info, a canopy for shelter on Gaspee….)

  • since RIDOT has no Marketing staff and the MBTA doesn’t market in RI, I want to call attention to the MBTA restoring the $10 weekend pass starting this weekend, apparently for at least 6 months. The pass is good on the entire mbta commuter rail (not just Boston but south shore, Concord, Lowell, Salem, Rockport etc) from the 1st train Saturday thru the last train the following day, Sunday. There are 9 Boston-Providence round trips on Saturdays, 7 on Sundays. Schedules at mbta.com. And weekend trains carry bikes at no extra charge

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