Month-long Sumner Tunnel shutdown nears as work crews prep for renovations
Walk halfway into the Sumner Tunnel on a weekend and the acrid smell of construction quickly takes over as workers pound nearby walls in an effort to repair the 90-year-old road.
The sites and smells are all part of a $160 million renovation project that will see the central link between East Boston and downtown fully closed from July 5 to Aug. 31. And on Saturday, crews with J.F. White Contracting were making final preparations before the month-long shutdown forces drivers to the Tobin Bridge, Ted Williams Tunnel, or public transportation.
But first, those construction workers had to deal with a throng of media who were led on a short tour of the tunnel and at one point, took a group photo in the active construction zone with some Department of Transportation officials and Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll.
State officials have acknowledged that shutting down the tunnel will create a headache for any driver coming to Boston from the North Shore or East Boston. About 40,000 vehicles pass through the tunnel each day and traffic in other parts of the city will suffer as a result of the shutdown.
In an effort to ease some of the pain, the MBTA is offering free Blue Line service, the fare for the Newburyport/Rockport Commuter Rail Line will sit at just over $2, and a handful of bus lines will offer free rides. Taking the ferry or a water taxi are also viable options.
Still, state Rep. Adrian Madaro, an East Boston Boston, knows the closure will be a royal pain for his constituents who need to get into the city.
“There’s no doubt that this impacts our quality of life,” he told the Herald at the entrance of the Sumner Tunnel as work crews hammered away in the background. “This is the major artery to downtown Boston for East Boston residents. And anytime there’s a ton of work, let alone a full closure, it has significant impacts.”
The “mitigation package” the Department of Transportation put together, he said, was “intentional and thoughtful.”
MassDOT Highway Administrator Jonathan Gulliver said there were about 75 workers working on the Sumner Tunnel Saturday ahead of July 5, when the tunnel closes and another contractor moves in.
“They’re gonna roll in and they’re going to start right away, getting their staging setup, and then removing the existing suspended ceiling system and then going back in and prepping the remaining parts of the tunnel arch to replace the actual arch with new precast concrete that will be permanently bonded to the new arch, thus improving the strength and the longevity of tunnel for many more years to come,” Gulliver told reporters.
Gulliver said drivers will notice a brighter, more open tunnel once the project is done. After the month-long shutdown this summer, weekend closures resume in the fall and winter before another summer shutdown in 2024.
“The center portion will still have the ceiling in it but that first part that you come in and the remaining part on the way out, will feel much more open because you have more space as you look up,” he said.
Driscoll said anyone who uses the tunnel on a daily basis — herself included — is “going to be impacted, frankly.”
“We really want to make sure folks understand when this tunnel is closed, what the mitigation efforts are, other opportunities to get into the city if you need to, using public transportation and alternative routes,” Driscoll said. “We know when you lose a major artery like this is going to have impacts.”
A full list of alternative travel options is available online.
MassDOT officials have said corrosion and wear-and-tear “deeply impacted” wall panels and gutters inside the tunnel. Exposed rebar on the ceiling and poor pavement conditions make the driving experience less than ideal.
“Ventilation, drainage, security, and fire suppression systems all must be brought up to modern code,” MassDOT said in a description of the project. “At this point, we’re well beyond patches and repairs: the only way to keep the Sumner Tunnel in service is with a top-to-bottom restoration.”
The original plan had an earlier end date and lower cost. But state transportation officials ditched that in favor of reduced disruption to drivers. Gulliver said in February MassDOT planned to scrap a four-month closure of the tunnel and replace it with shorter shutdowns, like the one next month.
The shift was expected to increase the cost beyond the $160 million officials projected last year. And on Saturday, Gulliver said even though the project is on-budget, there is always the potential for overruns with a renovation project.
“The risk whenever you have a project that’s rehabilitation like this is that there’s certainly some things that you get into that you don’t expect,” he said. “That $160 [million] includes a buffer that we’ve built in already. So right now we’re on budget. The final tally … we’ll know about a year and a half from now.”
Materials from the State House News Service were used in this report.
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