The Upper Falls Greenway is a project to turn the old railroad tracks behind Needham Street into a new mile long park and trail for walking, jogging, bicycling, whistling and skipping.
The project began in late autumn but shut down for the winter once the ground froze up. The Iron Horse crew’s been back on the job in recent weeks and it’s all taking shape. The rails have all been removed. Most of the railroad ties are gone and the crew will probably have the remaining ties near the river removed today or tomorrow.
Next up, is laying out a 90′ x 5′ vegetation border behind the Biltmore restaurant. Once Iron Horse builds the frame, the Biltmore will donate and plant the trees and shrubs and will be tend and care for them.
After that, comes the “Sunset Deck” – where the trail ends at the Charles River they’ll be building a wooden deck at a scenic spot out over the river.
The final part of the project for Iron Horse is to grade the whole trail and then lay down and roll the stone dust path. They say that’s the easiest part. The stone dust trail will run from National Lumber to the Charles River with a spur about halfway down that will lead out to Needham Street
Meanwhile the city’s Parks & Rec Dept have ordered all the extras – signs for Chestnut and Easy St featuring the lovely logo (above) that local designer Heidi Werner donated, benches donated by Northland Development, information kiosks donated by Trip Advisor. Once the trail’s complete the city will install all the extras.
An anonymous donor has funded an effort to beautifully restore two of the old railroad switches and Newton North student have been doing much of the work over the last few months. Once they’re done the city will install these pieces of local history back on the trail.
Lastly, the city is repaving Oak St this month I believe. As part of that job they’ll take care of the Greenway’s Oak St crossing.
It’s all coming together nicely and a big honking Upper Falls party is now being planned for (tentatively) Sunday, June 29 to celebrate the official opening of the Upper Falls Greenway to the public.
Special shout-outs go to Frank Nichols, the city engineer who’s been overseeing the whole project from the start and Carol Schein from Parks & Rec who’s been taking care of myriad details throughout.
Jerry – glad to hear things are progressing. Wonder if you might be able to share what you’ve heard about the following –
1. Will there still be a fence on the Charles River bridge?
2. Has there been any movement on the Needham side? Are the obstinate Needham selectmen still stalling by claiming that they’re “investigating” a nonsensical plan to run MBTA buses down the Needham right-of-way (even though they never made any such mention of their plan to the MBTA, and even though the existing 59 bus encounters zero congestion on the Needham side)?
3. Has MassDOT made any provisions for replacing the railroad bridge over 128 after they remove it?
@Michael –
1. There will be wooden railings around the deck to about halfway across the bridge. On the Needham side at the moment there is a chain link fence with a hole in it. Our lease doesn’t extend to the far side so we have no direct say about the fencing over there. I believe that’s up to the MBTA, though of course we could try nudging them if we wanted something else
2. No the Needham selectman have not budged at all about doing anything on their side of the river anytime soon. Needham is moving very quickly though to convert 2 miles of this same track at the southern side of town to a trail. There’s a good chance they may at least start that project this year sometime. That stretch will be quite nice when its done. Where it meets the Dover border at the Charles River is a stunning spot. Let’s hope that once we have a mile at this end and they have two miles at the other end of town, the logic of connecting them will become more compelling to the selectmen.
3. No there is nothing going on about replacing the 128 bridge and I do find that worrying. Mass DOT has made very definitive sounding statements at public meetings about how they will be obligated to replace it. However once the bridge comes down and the Add-a-Lane project is completed, that “obligation” without allocated funding isn’t worth much.
DOT says they can’t replace it now because Needham doesn’t know what kind of bridge it will need – (e.g. rail, bus, pedestrian). Needham hasn’t asked for an inexpensive bike/pedestrian bridge because they say may eventually want a rail bridge but that can’t be built without an associated rail project.
The upshot of it all is that the right-of-way will soon be severed and it will then become a very expensive project to put it back together again. Needham’s position on the matter does not appear to be changing. I think the most important job in the short to medium term is to make sure that once the right-of-way is broken that any future effort by anyone to take any other pieces of that orphaned piece of the right-of-way be fended off vigorously.
Michael, glad you asked! The fate of all three is really in Needham’s hands. The bridge over the Charles, a historic bridge, ought to be made safe for crossing, but the state won’t do anything unless Needham agrees. The bridge over 128, once it comes down, will ruin any chance of future public transit Needham feels so strongly about. That’s totally in Needham’s territory, and MassDOT is simply waiting for Needham to make the request… again, Needham remains silent. And the bus plan used for FUD, that’s just never going to happen. Newton would never allow a bus route which would carry a mere dozen or so more passengers, only to have to merge back on to a busy Needham and Winchester Streets. The state would never go for it either.
Needham’s motto is “Live, Work, Play.” So why does Needham insist on letting its side of the railway rot? The stretch from Muzi to the Charles doesn’t hold any promise short-term for public transit. A trail wouldn’t interfere with heavy rail extension to the south nor prevent future conversion to light rail. A trail wouldn’t have to connect to the south section Jerry mentioned, but bike/ped connections to Newton and the green line could be a huge benefit. Needham is desperately trying to build the “N2 corridor” to attract high tech businesses from places like Kendall Square. One would think that a recreational facility with riverfront access and bike/ped facilities would be the key to creating a vibrant place for business. That’s one thing that makes places like Kendall Square different from typical suburban office parks.
Newton is setting a great example. Hopefully, when Needham residents see what can be done, they’ll start asking similar questions.
Thanks Jerry.
The stalling on the Needham side is incredibly frustrating. There were huge economies of scale to be had by coordinating the Iron Horse work on the Upper Falls side with at least some preliminary route preparation on the Needham side, but now that opportunity will be squandered.
Having lived in Needham for 37 years until last year, I can attest that the selectmen and planning board have a very unique worldview that borders on isolationism. Their claim to be exploring options for mass transit along the right-of-way are disingenuous – there’s never been a smidgeon of willingness to do anything of the sort in the last 40 years.
I wasn’t aware that there had been progress on the Dover side of town – and yes that area is a hidden treasure. My wife and I tried to walk the rail line there last summer but had to turn back after getting our legs cut up by thorns and bitten by deer ticks. It’s a nice walk over the bottomless (tie-only) rail bridge at Red Wing Bay, though.
Interesting that Needham is more likely to build a trail on a side of town where it would be almost exclusively recreational (save for a few millionaires from Dover who might decide to ride their bikes to the commuter rail two or three days a year) as opposed to the side of town where it could actually offer a viable commuting alternative for thousands of Needhamites, and reduce traffic along one of the most congested corridors in MetroWest.
I greatly admire the speed and efficiency with which the Upper Falls Greenway was developed. It will be a real asset to the community but it could be an even more amazing asset with a little bit of intergovernmental cooperation across the river.
@Greg Reibman, as president of the Newton-Needham Chamber – any thoughts as to why it’s been impossible to get Needham on board with a project that’s so clearly win-win?
@Adam – our posts came up one after the other so I didn’t have a chance to read yours before I’d written mine.
I’m in absolute agreement with you. And the option to convert any trail back to mass transit should keep the Needhamites happy if their claims to want a mile-long tramway ever materialize (I won’t hold my breath on that one!).
I suspect that Needham would build a moat along 128 if it could – already, at night there are Needham cops stationed on Kendrick, Highland, and Central to keep an eye on anyone entering town. Maybe they’re afraid of having a bridge that people can walk across. (Although there’s actually a hidden rail bridge across the Charles just south of Highland that nobody ever seems to use).
Michael, for what it’s worth, several planning board members said on the record that it was a bad idea to let MassDOT take down the 128 bridge without a replacement. Unfortunately, the planning director tabled that discussion.
The bridge over the Charles between Needham and Newton is pretty close to tie-only also, though the structure seems sound.
This is great news and thanks to Jerry and everyone else who made this all possible. The old ties on the Charles River Bridge will have to be replaced if a viewing platform is built. I almost went into the River when one of those ties collapsed under my feet while I was walking over the bridge a year or so ago. I like the logo. The behavior of the Town of Needham is frustrating and a bit puzzling. I also have a hunch that many will come to regret the decision to tear down the railroad bridge over 128.
Does anyone know if the Add-a-Lane project include a footbridge over 128 so people can walk from the Echo Bridge onto the Sudbury aqueduct trail in Needham? I find it so unpleasant to have to leave the trail and go under 128!
@Isabelle – No new footbridge over 128 is part of that project. Wouldn’t that have been nice though.
Congratulations Jerry on your focused enthusiasm and tireless legwork to make the Greenway a reality. What will you think of next — a bowling excursion? (well, yes)
Illustration I stumbled onto: a Google search for “Red Wing Bay” turned up this map showing the two trails (I think these are the two discussed in this thread)- are these accurate? Good job by Maps if so.
https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&msid=205844905696843478712.00046f9adc21897db182c&dg=feature
@Steve Siegel – Yes, the Back Alleys of Newton has not been forgotten. Stay tuned
@Doug Haslam – Yes, that’s them. The top half of the blue trail is the Upper Falls Greenway. The bottom half of the blue trail is the Needham portion that is not being built.
The top 1/4 of the green trail, to the marked bridge by the Charles River Peninsula is the two miles of Needham trail that they are planning to build. South of that on the green trail is Dover. There’s a group hoping to continue the trail there but Dover is most likely to move pretty slowly. They usually do.
There’s also a group down in Medfield at the bottom of the green trail hoping to build that portion.
Taking both the blue and the green together is the overarching Bay Colony Rail Trail, the long range plan for one day having a continuous bike trail from Newton to Medfield through some really beautiful countryside.
It’s an impressive feat on the part of the City of Newton that they’ve been able to move so quickly to get our portion built while it’s likely to take years more for other portions to be built.
@isabelle: MassDOT is going through great pains to preserve the Central Street bridge @ 128. Amazingly, it’s considered historic.
@Jerry. Amazing. Dover wants Newton’s dispossessed bikers and hikers, but Needham doesn’t. What a sea change from when we used to bicycle through there as kids. Dover had no liquor store, but they sold all the booze you could drink in the pharmacy. Reminds me of the old Yankee lady from Beacon Hill in one of Cleveland Amery’s books who was planning a car trip from Boston to San Francisco. Her nephew asked her how she was planning to drive that long distance. “Oh, by way of Dover I suppose”—
@Bob – Great story!
So far, no one’s talking about connecting to the next town yet. It looks like every town’s first round of construction will just be an internal trail. Aside from technical issues surrounding bridges they also do raises the specter of invading hordes from fill-in-the-blank.
Frankly, as some one just over the river here in Newton I live in fear of two-wheeled marauding Doverites pouring into Upper Falls 😉
Construction photos are on the Newton Conservators website at
http://newtonconservators.org/upperfallsgreenwayphotos.htm