1956-02-27 - Laserfiche WebLink

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The Chaimman said it was too much to ask Mr. Snow, with all he had to do, to make a traffic study to plan for Worthen Road and that the Board desired to hire a firm to make such a study. It was thought that Messrs. Kelly and Greeley would have some sug- gestions on firms undertaking these studies and some advice concerning the problems involved in the Worthen Road project. Mr. Roland Greeley arrived at 9:35 P.M. at which time the Chairman repeated for him the gist of the ex- planation given Mr. Kelly. Mr. Kelly began the discussion by stating that he thought the problem was more one of land use than traffic tests. He said that Mr. Duffy of the Fisher Company would be worth his weight in gold if he could give some idea of where major streets should be loca- ted, especially in view of the fact that Lexington will have a population of 40,000 before too long. He felt that when and where a sub by-pass should be located, such as the proposed Worthen Road, was a problem. It was pointed out by some members of the Board ' that people do not use Route 2 and 128 to drive around Lexington but drive through town via Bedford Street. Mr. Snow stated that to his knowledge there was no information available as to the origin and destina- tion of this traffic and felt that, if most of it were through traffic, much of it might be reduced consider- ably if Route 3, as a limited access highway, were ex- tended from Route 128 through Woburn and Winchester Mr. Greeley said that the major problem, as he saw it, was traffic that had either an origin or a destination in Lexington and related to the land use in town. An engineering firm which knows something about highways could help the Board to a great extent with its traffic problem but might not concern itself with traffic originating from or destined for Lexington. Citing an example, he stated that what was finally done about the Worthen Road project might make little dif- ference to people who drive to Waltham. The Chairman said that people were driving off side streets onto Massachusetts -Avenue and Bedford Street to continue into Boston to work and that rather than widening the avenue, the Board was considering recommending the construction of Worthen Road, a pro- -ject which would cost between two and three million dollars. ' Mr. Kelly stated that if Worthen Road were not made a limited access way, it would become nearly