Eyes On the Street: Somerville Fits In Some New Bus, Bike Infrastructure Near Union Square

9:09 AM EDT on September 2, 2024

A new sidewalk-level bike lane under construction adjacent to a two-lane city street. Cones and construction barrels litter the bike lane. In the foreground is a raised crosswalk next to a traffic signal. — The newly-reconstructed Washington Street near the Argenziano School entrance. The project has added several raised crosswalks like this one. On the right is a new sidewalk-level protected bike lane, still under construction, and a new floating bus stop in the middle distance.

This summer, the City of Somerville is re-building Washington Street, a key bus and bike route west of Union Square.

The project is reconfiguring a relatively narrow neighborhood street to fit in some new protected bike lanes, several raised crosswalks to slow down traffic, and dedicated bus boarding platforms for speedier bus rides.

In its former condition, Washington Street was a fairly typical neighborhood street: about 40 feet wide from curb to curb, it had two rows of on-street parking on either side of two travel lanes.

As the most direct connection between Harvard and Union Squares, it's long been a busy route for people on bikes and for riders of the MBTA route 86 bus. But as long as there was parking on both sides of the street, bikes, buses, and cars all had to share the same two lanes.

A newly paved street with orange construction barrels and cones along the curb in the foregound, where the sidewalk and bike lane are still under construction. — The newly-reconstructed Washington Street near Union Square, looking west towards the overpass over the Fitchburg Line commuter rail tracks and the Argenziano School (the brick building at left on the other side of the bridge). On the left side of the street, in the middle distance, is one of the street's new bus stop platforms.

But the on-street parking never got all that much use, as you can see on historical Google Street View imagery. During the pandemic, in 2020, the city tested out a "quick-build" reconfiguration of the street that consolidated parking to one side of the street only, which made room for painted bike lanes that intermittently merged into red bus-and-bike lanes.

This summer, the city is tweaking that design to make it permanent, with some refinements. The project is building several dedicated boarding platforms to let MBTA buses drop off and pick up passengers without pulling over (later this winter, a new frequent-service route 109 will replace the 86 on this route).

A map of the northern part of the Boston region showing proposed changes to five bus routes in Chelsea, Everett, Malden, Revere, and Somerville: the 86, in the lower left of the map, which runs between Reservoir Station and Sullivan Square today, but would be shortened to end at Harvard Square in the future; the proposed "frequent-service" 109, which runs through Everett to Sullivan today, and would extend to Harvard in the future to pick up the discontinued segment of the 86; the frequent-service 116, between Maverick and Wonderland, the frequent-service 104, between Airport and Malden Center, and the frequent-service 110, between Wellington and Wonderland. — A map of bus route changes proposed under the first phase of the MBTA's bus network redesign. Dashed lines indicate existing bus routes that would be modified; thicker lines denote proposed "frequent-service" bus routes that would arrive every 15 minutes or less all day.

Crews are also building several raised crosswalks with curb extensions to shorten the distance from one side of the street to the other. The first two raised crosswalks, on the eastern end of the project area near the the Argenziano elementary school, have been finished in time for the start of the school year.

More work remains on the western end of the project area, near Beacon Street (pictured below). Over the weeks to come, workers will build a three more raised crosswalks between the school and Beacon Street, finish the remaining bus stops, and lay a final course of asphalt on the roadway and the new protected bike lanes.