These connect the new roadways with the existing regional highway system. The project also included four major highway interchanges. It is the widest ever built and the first to use an asymmetrical design. The larger of the two Charles River bridges is a ten-lane cable-stayed hybrid bridge named the Leonard P. It also excavated more than 16 million cubic yards of soil. This is equal to 2,350 acres, one foot thick.
In total, the CA/T placed 3.8 million cubic yards of concrete. The project spanned 7.8 miles of highway, 161 lanes miles in all, about half in tunnels. Putting this underground was one of the more challenging infrastructure projects ever in the United States. This limited these areas' ability to take part in the city's economic life. It also cut off the North End and Waterfront neighborhoods from downtown. The elevated highway displaced 20,000 residents. Costs included a high accident rate, wasted fuel from traffic, and late deliveries.Īnd traffic wasn't the only problem the old Central Artery caused in Boston. The annual cost to motorists from this congestion was an estimated $500 million. Without major improvements, Boston expected a traffic jam for up to 16 hours a day by 2010. The two tunnels between downtown Boston and East Boston/Logan Airport had the same issue. The accident rate on the Central Artery was four times the national average. Traffic crawled for more than 10 hours each day. In the early 1990s it carried upwards of 200,000 making it one of the most congested highways in the United States. When it opened in 1959, the Central Artery carried about 75,000 vehicles a day. The Central Artery was an elevated highway running through the center of downtown. The Problemīoston, Massachusetts had a world-class traffic problem called the Central Artery. Three major milestone openings took place in 2003. Named for baseball legend Ted Williams, majority completion occurred January 13, 2006. The first major milestone was the opening of the tunnel. A third tunnel to cross Boston Harbor was also begun. This took truck traffic off neighborhood streets. Congress approved federal funding and the project's basic scope in April 1987.Ĭonstruction began in September 1991 on a bypass road through South Boston.
When planning for the CA/T Project began in 1982, experts could not have predicted the challenges that lay ahead from design to construction. This project created more than 300 acres of open land while reconnecting downtown Boston to the waterfront. It also extended I-90 to Boston's Logan International Airport, and Route 1A. It did so with an underground highway that is state of the art and two new bridges over the Charles River. The project replaced Boston's deteriorating six-lane elevated Central Artery (I-93). Additionally, it improved the local environment. It built a framework for continued growth in Massachusetts and New England. It reduced traffic and improved mobility in one of America's oldest, most congested major cities. The Central Artery/Tunnel Project was the largest, most challenging highway project in the history of the United States.
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