In the past year, Massachusetts trailbuilders cut the ribbon on about 15 miles' worth of new car-free bike and pedestrian trails.
Those projects include several we've written about here on StreetsblogMASS, including the 2.5 mile Waltham Wayside Trail, which was mostly finished in 2023 but had its official ribbon-cutting this year, and the Ashuwillticook trail extension in Pittsfield.
But 2025 is shaping up to be an even bigger year for trail openings. Ten projects are expected to wrap up construction in the next few months, and will open up another 30 miles of new trails across the Commonwealth.
Mass. Central Rail Trail in Sudbury and Hudson: 7.5 miles
Two more big segments of the Mass. Central Rail Trail (MCRT) in suburban Boston and central Massachusetts will open in 2025, after trailbuilders formally cut the ribbon on a new 2.5 mile segment in Waltham earlier this year.
The longest section opening up, at 7.5 miles, will be paved next spring on top of a new Eversource underground power line that just finished construction in Hudson and Sudbury this fall. The new trail will connect connect the existing Assabet River trail in Hudson to a point near the Sudbury-Wayland town line (see map below).
Even though paving won't start until next spring, Eversource has left behind a smooth, dry gravel surface and several new bridges that hikers and bikers have already been using (see photo at left).
There will still be a 1.5 mile gap (marked with a 3 in the map below) between this new trail and the existing MCRT in Wayland, but the Department of Conservation and Recreation is working on designs for that segment to be built in a future construction project.
There are also two smaller MCRT projects happening in Waltham this year.
A project to connect the Waltham and Weston segments over the city line, which we reported on when it started construction last spring, will extend the MCRT over a rehabbed bridge over the Fitchburg Line commuter rail tracks near the Weston-Waltham border, then continue 0.3 miles further east to meet Jones Road in Waltham.
Future plans call for the trail to continue east over another abandoned railroad bridge over Route 128 to meet the recently-opened Waltham segment of the MCRT near Main Street in Waltham. This segment is represented as the short dotted line next to the number 2 in the map above.
In the eastern part of Waltham, the state's Department of Conservation and Recreation will start work this spring to rehab the Linden Street Bridge for trail use (marked with a 1 in the map above).
MCRT in Holden: 2.5 miles
In the Worcester County town of Holden, a new 2.5-mile trail is under construction between Manning Street and Wachusett Street.
Worcester County is a region where a lot of the original railroad right-of-way has been lost to suburban development, so the planned Mass. Central Rail Trail will hopscotch between the old railroad and other publicly-owned lands.
This particular project is upgrading an existing 1.1-mile trail segment that follows public right-of-way above the Quabbin Aqueduct, a route that unfortunately takes the trail over a considerable hill.
Wachusett Greenways, the regional trailbuilding organization, has received two MassTrails grants to make the climb gentler "by rerouting the western and eastern portions to achieve accessible slopes."
Bruce Freeman Rail Trail in Sudbury: 5 miles
Another big MetroWest trail project that's about to celebrate an official ribbon-cutting (although it's already pretty much finished construction) is the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail extension through Sudbury.
This project connects the previously-built segments of the Bruce Freeman Trail, between Lowell and Concord, to a junction with the Mass. Central Rail Trail near the historic Sudbury train station:
The City of Framingham owns the right-of-way and has started commissioning design work on the next extension of the Bruce Freeman south of this junction (marked with a 4 in the map above), but it likely won't start construction for several more years.
World War II Memorial Trail in Norton (5 miles) and Service Road Path in Sandwich (4.1 miles)
Norton's new rail trail was a project we'd included in last year's roundup: it will extend the existing WWII Veterans Memorial Rail Trail in Mansfield into and across Norton.
It had already gotten a first coat of paving in November 2023, but the official completion for this trail has been delayed until summer 2025.
Similarly, the new Service Road Path in Sandwich, another project we'd expected to be open this year, is still waiting for a few final punchlist tasks to get done before they officially cut the ribbon.
When that happens, the new path will fill in a lengthy gap between the existing Cape Cod Canal paths and the Cape Cod Rail Trail, which currently ends about 10 miles to the east in the Town of Yarmouth.
Neponset River Greenway Extension in Dorchester (0.75 mi.)
In Dorchester, MassDOT and the Department of Conservation and Recreation have been building a short extension of the Neponset River Greenway from Tenean Beach to Morrissey Boulevard next to National Grid's "rainbow swash" methane gas storage tank.
The route (mapped at right) creates two new shared-use pathways along Conley Street near Tenean Beach and on Victory Road near Victory Park to improve access across Interstate 93, which otherwise blocks Dorchester from Dorchester Bay.
In between Conley Street and Victory Road, there will be a new greenway running along the western embankment of the expressway. North of Victory Road, the greenway climbs along the I-93 off ramp to Morrissey Boulevard to a new boardwalk that ends near the Beades drawbridge:
Three more greenways in Greater Boston
In the Boston region, three more greenways that we've previously covered are expected to wrap up construction during 2025, including:
More trail projects breaking ground
While they wrap up the projects listed above, MassDOT officials told StreetsblogMASS that they also expect to break ground on more than a dozen additional trail projects in the coming year, including:
- Peabody - Independence Greenway trail crossings of Route 1 and I-95, with connection to Danvers Rail Trail (1 mi.)
- Peabody - Independence Greenway extension from Northshore Mall to Endicott St. (1.3 mi.)
- Yarmouth and Barnstable - Cape Cod Rail Trail extension (4 mi.)
- Medford - Mystic River Greenway underpass of Route 28 Wellington Bridge (0.25 mi.)
- Bourne - Bourne Rail Trail Phase 1 (.5 mi.)
- Natick - Car-free Spring Street bridge replacement over MBTA tracks (200 feet)
- Northampton - Rocky Hill Greenway connection to Manhan Rail Trail (0.5 mi.)
- Nantucket - Wauwinet Road shared-use sidepath (2 mi.)
- Billerica - Yankee Doodle Rail Trail Phase 1 (2.5 mi.)
- Lawrence - Lawrence & Manchester Rail Trail (1.4 mi.)
- Fitchburg - Twin Cities Rail Trail downtown extension (0.5 mi)
- Somerville/Everett - Mystic River bike and pedestrian crossing (0.25 mi.)
- Cambridge - Memorial Drive road diet and trail improvements between Eliot Bridge and John F. Kennedy Street (0.8 mi.)
