We're getting off thread and this is pointless anyway.
When the report on the Gardiner came - and everyone knows this - there were 3 scenarios with different costs and benefits. The long-term cost of keeping up the highway, even with the Hybrid option, was more than the cost of taking it down.
It is correct that it is "not true" that no alternative was presented in the take-down scenario. (Or, to put it a more clear way, there sure as heck was a proposed alternative.)
Rapid Transit is already being provided (on paper, so far!) via "SmartTrack" and the extended LRT and the proposal included transforming Lake Shore into a boulevard. The combination of improved transit, improved Lake Shore and induced demand was the "alternative."
The traffic on the East Gardiner, which is what we're talking about here, is not remotely comparable to what Boston was dealing with and the idea that you only have an alternative if you build another piece of mega-infrastructure, even when the EA shows it's not needed, is non-sensical. That's like telling someone getting divorced they don't have an alternative if they feel like staying single makes more sense than getting married again.
To again try to rope things back on thread, the relevant discussion is here is the City's finite resources and whether the cost savings of not leaving the Gardiner up could be used to build more transit or - more to the point - something like Rail Deck Park. The City does not spend $1B on a lot of things because it rarely has $1B to spend. Whether spending all that on the Gardiner is the best use of tax $ remains a fair question, particularly in our evolving urban context.