Boston Central Artery/Tunnel Project (Big Dig)

[blahdy 21]

lol, it's the rainy weekend man.. what more is there to do i like modelling when i got free time.

[blahdy 21]

more pics!

Adjusting the cables to proper angles, one by one:

The precise and perfect cabling, not just in modelling, but also in the number of cables used, and their specific position on the tower, is a serious business .  Even the number of cables and their specific location at each tower have been counted and replicated on the model, exactly as it is on the real bridge.  (16 on southern/mid span, 17 on each center span, 17 on northern/mid span)

[lrfox 2]

Rainy isn't even the word for it. I am back in the baystate for the summer, and wow is it nasty out there. worried about the basement flooding. but yeah way to take advantage of the weather, the cables are looking great, and its nice to see that you're paying attention to getting the exact details right. good luck continuing work, this weather is not supposed to change much before the middle of the week, so i'm guessing you'll have plenty of time on your hands.

[blahdy 21]

hehe yea... The model bridge, when completed, will have total of 116 cables holding it all together, which is the same exact documented number of cables in real Zakim bridge's specification.

Last update for today:

Cabling work at the South Tower is now officially completed (milestone reached!):

Preparing to create the landing zone for northern approach, so that cabling work at the North Tower can continue.  North approach zone is where the highway will transition into Maxis' SC4 elevated highway.  You can see a piece of Maxis' SC4 el. highway component in the far left, eagerly waiting to be connected to this magnificent bridge

And a magnificent view of the bridge in its current state.

[thatmonkeysim 8]

Just wondering... though this is the most stunning work on ST ive seen in awhile... [and youve probably already been asked this]

but is the Bridge going to be able to be Stand alone? like to were you can span small distances with this bridge with a EL-highway on both sides? because i know exactly where i could use this bridge because it could add a kind of Identity to a city... just like how it did with Boston... and add to the Skyline in a great way

[blahdy 21]

Originally posted by: thatmonkeysim Just wondering... though this is the most stunning work on ST ive seen in awhile... [and youve probably already been asked this]

but is the Bridge going to be able to be Stand alone? like to were you can span small distances with this bridge with a EL-highway on both sides? because i know exactly where i could use this bridge because it could add a kind of Identity to a city... just like how it did with Boston... and add to the Skyline in a great way

quote>

Thanks;  Unfortunately, the bridge won't be able to stand alone to accept elevated highway on both sides.  It's because the Southern side of the bridge deeps and sinks toward the ground in order to meet with the underground transition tunnel portal.  This means, every segment on southern side, including every single cables on that side have to be readjusted if you were to change that height to accept elevated HW.

However, while doing this is not possible for version 1.0, I will definitely put more thoughts into doing an elevated-to-elevated transition bridge like this as one for future projects.

[thatmonkeysim 8]

well that was quick! thanks for the fast response and good luck on the rest of your project!

[mightygoose 92]

this guy never ceasesto amaze me, so blahdy what you got planned for post BBD

[sparkythepenguin 90]

All I can say is WOW! I am now impressed, as BATing Bridges, is quite a labor of love. Especially when they have weird numbers of freeway lanes like the Zakim-Bunker Hill does!

I am very interested in how you connect it into the Maxis-made world. Perhaps I  could commission a bridge out of you in the future for the Portland project?

[blahdy 21]

okay, a little update..

Between the bridge decks, they placed holes in the space between, because the environmentalists were worried that fishes would lose navigation when they cannot see the light.  So to be more environmentally sensitive, the designers decided to put holes like these so that fishes can see the light below.  Below the hole, you can see a lighting system that will provide beautiful night lighting against the cables during night time.

A Gmax illustration of a light hole piece.  It's reasonably detailed, but additional specific little details were thrown out, as those little details will not even be visible inside the game.

First light hole going up!

BEFORE....

... AND... AFTER...

Now even your fishes can feel the love!   (and you can tell those annoying environmental activists to go away)

[buddybud 63]

i cant say how impressed i am....wow...keep up the work....this is by far the most impressive modeling ive seen in some time

[Rayden 7]

Is there any other minor detail you might have forgotten?

Great job man!

[Andreas Roth 629]

Originally posted by: blahdy

Between the bridge decks, they placed holes in the space between, because the environmentalists were worried that fishes would lose navigation when they cannot see the light.  So to be more environmentally sensitive, the designers decided to put holes like these so that fishes can see the light below.  Below the hole, you can see a lighting system that will provide beautiful night lighting against the cables during night time.quote>

Heh, this is too funny - now the fishes have some light below the bridge, but the lighting system shines up in the sky, distracting birds and insects.  Anyway, the amount of detail you put in there is amazing, and even if a good amount of it gets lost during the rendering, it will make a difference!

[mightygoose 92]

omg this gets better by the day

[lrfox 2]

Eh it's alright.... it'll do i guess.

lol this is great work i can't get over how well you pay attention to details, even the most minute ones. my simfish will be very grateful for this. keep it up.

[Madhollander 0]

kfdhngbfngbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb

*picks up jaw from keyboard*

WOW, you are insane you know that !

Looking great so far, insane project, great work !

hmm, on a side note, is it me or is there a connection between the service road and the highway where the bridge meets the tunnel? would be dangerous in real life.

Great work, keep it up !

[purpledaddy 6]

I saw the signs on the STEX selections on the Home Page. You've really done a great job! [thumbsup]

[mightygoose 92]

don't die thread please ofr the love of god don't die

[blahdy 21]

hehe, thanks everyone for the kind comments.

mightygoose: nah, it's not dead. I've been quite busy this week so didn't have chance to really visit the forums often. I'll be resuming works on this this weekend, so no worries!

[lrfox 2]

Good, this is still one of the better active projects out there, keep it up

[blahdy 21]

Okay, updates first, then I'll respond to comments/questions that have been piling up since last week

Northern Approach (Tunnel Entrance) Construction

Although the bridge is starting to take shape, you probably noticed in my signature that the model status is still 25% completed.  That's because the bridge is still quite far from done (many little details are still awaiting to be added onto the bridge itself), and the amount of complexity in both northern and southern approach areas are equally extensive, if not even more of a headache/nightmare.

While the bridge 'construction' or modelling whatever you call it, is gaining its momentum, modelling work of the northern approach zone, where the bridge descends into the ground to enter the underground highway, has been started.

And no, it doesn't stop there, it is not as easy just resurfacing the road to level it out with the angle of descent from the bridge's terminus.  To further complicate the matter, there is a tunneled on-ramp (oh dear! ) coming in from Storrow Drive/Leverrett Circle that goes underneath the north station / TD Banknorth Garden area.  All of these details must be taken into account.

Images of northern approach 'construction', in its beginning stage:

1. Resurfacing the road and re-shaping the tunnel boat superstructure to add Leverett Circle on-ramp, which you can see to the bottom right:

2. Another view.. The Leverett on-ramp needs to be properly merged into the main highway.  The external tunnel boat superstructure has been merged.

3. Another view:

4. The Leverett Circle/Storrow Drive incoming on-ramp itself:

5. Top view..

6. How the whole thing looks like in real-life:

How the whole thing looked like back in January 2004, where the old ugly looking green POS bridge built in the 1950's is about to get demolished.  You can just realize how expensive this whole project was just by looking at this picture.  Before they opened the new bridge and underground tunnel system, active production traffic was riding on top of that green old bridge, while construction was happening right underneath it, without any disruption to traffic flow.  The new tunnels they were building actually had to support the old bridge sitting right on top of them.  Talk about a lot of money spent because we can't afford road closures in such tight space  

If you look closely in the picture below, you can see that they actually built temporary H-beam pillars (black/dark-brown colored as opposed to green) to replace the old bridge pillars so construction can continue unabated (the old green pillars built back in the 50s was sitting right on the area they needed to build the new highway on).  And they actually replaced the pillars while there was traffic on the old elevated bridge.  very funny, and yet amazing how there wasn't any accident during all of that process.

[blahdy 21]

sparkythepenguin All I can say is WOW! I am now impressed, as BATing Bridges, is quite a labor of love. Especially when they have weird numbers of freeway lanes like the Zakim-Bunker Hill does!

I am very interested in how you connect it into the Maxis-made world. Perhaps I  could commission a bridge out of you in the future for the Portland project?quote>

Thanks!  Regarding the bridge, may be   One of the hardest parts of this project is having to find all the required details, even the little ones, such as the degree of the angle where on-ramp merges into the highway, etc... you start appreciating the work of photographers after all... ;P   So if you have lots of detailed pics available, may be something i could consider doing in the future

insanehollander:hmm, on a side note, is it me or is there a connection between the service road and the highway where the bridge meets the tunnel? would be dangerous in real life.quote>

Actually, that's not a service road   That is actually US/1 highway northbound that merges into the I-93 highway stack as it crosses the river.  It's cheaper to take advantage of the Zakim bridge's hybrid-cablestayed capability by cantilevering another road than building two bridges.

Believe it or not, there are no breakdown/service lanes in the underground highway system.  There's just not much room/space to go around in such an old city like Boston where they never had the time to redo the urban planning since 1700's.

Thanks for the kind comments also (same goes to everyone else!)

[mightygoose 92]

so blahdy your potentially, with enough photos offering yourself out to do highway stuff, hmmmm *goes off to rummage through photo archives

[lrfox 2]

Looks great. i love the back story. i remember driving on the central artery while they were still constructing the new stuff. My favorite story is how they froze the ground with HUGE pipes (even during summer) around South Station. they did this because they had to build the new tunnel under the existing (redline) subway tunnel. The reason they froze it is so the frozen ground could support the existing tunnel and keep it from moving or shifting so they didn't have to shut the entire redline down.  i remember taking the train into South Station when this was happening and looking out the window in July and seeing frost when it was 80 degrees and thinking, "what the hell?" but i saw a documentary on it on a Lufthansa flight from Logan to Frankfurt actually.

But you're Zakim bridge and tunnel connectors are simply incredible. keep it up i am so amazed.

[blahdy 21]

hehe, thanks

Reconfiguring the tunnel boat to bring it more closer to the real one:

The Leverett Circle on-ramp's tunnel boat is about to be joined with the main highway's:

On-ramp joining completed, work to re-surface the road has been started:

The tunnel boat on approach is starting look similar to the real one now

[sloppet 3]

great work blahdy!! this will be one of the greatest downloads here at ST!

[mightygoose 92]

it will indeed sloppet, i cannotwait for the retexturing to be done, aaah

[blahdy 21]

hehe yea, i can't wait myself either.  Unfortunately, preview shots are not available right now, because it takes nearly 30 minutes to render just one view (south side) even in low quality, but preview shots will come when the model nears completion.  The model file alone (excludes all textures, etc) is now 30MB.

Leverett Connector on-ramp's tunnel boat is nearly completed now:

Road surfacing work for the northern approach area is now completed!   We can now proceed to "draw something" on this new surface (i.e. placing median dividers, barriers, etc etc).

View of the northern approach from south side.  The road surface had to be perfectly smooth in its descent to underground tunnel entrance.

[kaji 0]

clearly one of the most unique / and top ranked projects on ST in awhile that is developing at quite a pace (even if it is still a long way from being finished in your eyes). it will definetly be one of those "must haves" that im sure i will make space to accomodate when finishjed =)

but whatever you do dont forget about walnut creek

~kaji

[blahdy 21]

Thanks kaji, I've also admired some of the BAT models you presented, they are nicely done in every detail

As many are probably aware, I do have RL business to do and it's getting busier, so my time to work on modelling is mostly restricted to boring times available over weekend or some night times.  But so far, I think we are still on schedule for version 1.0 delivery, and I don't forsee any problems with RLS eating away this project.  I'll have more update coming soon in a few days ;-)

With respect to Walnut Creek/Pakkusena airport stuff, yea, agreed.  But! I am glad to hear that you and I will be working together to complete that 32 billion simoleons worth of airport project soon with your work on key buildings/facilities ;-)  Joint venture works on massive projects like this only makes it more realistic for CJ purposes