How long have you lived here?

Java King

Java King

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After reading the press release that The Association for Public Transit was merging with Transit Matters, I had to dig up my Car Free in Boston book. It's the 4th Edition of Car Free in Boston from 1984. I moved here from Nebraska in 1987. So, that's 37 years watching the Boston area transform and become more urban and transit rich.

I've posted before how far we've come despite all the current MBTA failings. In my opinion, the Boston area has only gotten better, more urban, cleaner, and easier to get around. YES, it's expensive, and we've lost so many great restaurants, bars, clubs, and gritty experiences. However for me, there is no place that I would rather be.

How long have people lived here, and what are your top things we've lost and the top things we've gained?

I'll start:

Things I'm so proud to be from Massachusetts architecturally, urbanistically, and socially within the last 37 years:

The Big Dig and the Rose Kennedy Greenway are amazing.
The Seaport is NOT perfect, but it has many wonderful elements.
The transformation of Slummerville into high-tech hipster Somerville.
East Cambridge, Cambridgeside, and Cambridge Crossing.
The Orange line relocation.
General expansion of Commuter Rail to many communities that had no service in 1987. (Including where I live now in Scituate.)
Prudential Center transformation from wind-swept concrete to a really nice indoor shopping arcade & observation exhibit.
Infill of countless surface parking lots.
Marriage Equality - first in the nation in 2004!

Things I miss from the last 37 years:

Gay Bars: Chaps, Luxor, Machine, Napolean's, Ramrod, Sporters, Buzz, Bobby's............just to name a few off the top of my head.
(We have a brick from the original Chaps in our living room.)

After hours dance clubs that were open until the next morning.
Brand new Porter Red Line Station was so impressive!
The grittiness of Cambridge, Somerville, and Medford.
The Channel nightclub for live music.
The emptiness of the Boston Waterfront (Pre-Seaport) just because it had a working port industrial vibe.
Anthony's Pier 4 (........kind of) It was my first Boston Thanksgiving.
The possibility of a Watertown streetcar before they ripped up all the rails in the road. (A Line)
The possibility of the streetcar to Forest Hills through JP. (E Line)
The removal of all the Cambridge, Belmont, and Watertown electric trolley buses.
The "promise" of a streetcar along Washington Street in the South End.

I'm sure there is MUCH more, but hopefully this starts the conversation. :)
 
I miss the esoteric retail in the various squares. Bookstores like Wordsworth in Harvard or McIntyre & Moore in Davis. Cybersmith in Harvard with the pay by the minute video games. La Contessa for the cakes. Walking up to Central on Brookline past the old auto repair shops and the original Man Ray.
 
I was trying to think of buildings we lost in the last 37 years that I miss as well.

The original buildings in Kenmore that were demolished for the Whoop Building are certainly a disappointment today. The Narcissis Club Building was no architectural wonder, but that corner building had nice character.
The building on Boylston that had Machine and Ramrod was again no amazing structure, but I do miss the character along with the Baseball Tavern, which used to be 1270.
The buildings at the corner of Arlington and Boylston that are now currently a big hole. I'm waiting to see how this turns out.

Generally speaking, I think Boston has done a pretty good job of incorporating older buildings into new structures and building on empty lots or parking garages since the preservation movement started in the '70's.

I think quite a bit of the damage done in the '50's, '60's and '70's has been improved as much as possible. The West End is still kind of a pedestrian disaster, but it's denser than it was when I moved here in 1987.
 
I was born in Boston in 1991 and grew up in Winchester until I moved to NYC at 18 for undergrad! Have been in NYC since (three boroughs over 14 years) and currently work in Stamford in commodities trading (metals) and mining.

My house growing up was 7 mins walk from Wedgemere on the Lowell line so I just took the train into town as I wanted to, alone and with friends, starting at 13ish. My parents/siblings have since moved to Somerville, Charlestown and Watertown and I come visit about 5x/year by Amtrak. Have never owned a car in my life! I consider myself equal parts Bostonian and New Yorker and love both my home towns ❤️
 
First moved to the Boston area in 2015, moved to where I am now in South Medford 2018.

Even in that short amount of time, there has been so much to celebrate: way more bike infra, government center garage demolition, rise of Assembly Row into a place worth visiting, and now the new Pike decking. The biggest game changer on this side of the Charles though, far and away, has been the GLX and its bike path.

Biggest loss I've noticed is the steady degradation of Harvard Sq into banks and chain retail. RIP Tealuxe.
 
kdmc said:
First moved to the Boston area in 2015, moved to where I am now in South Medford 2018.

Even in that short amount of time, there has been so much to celebrate: way more bike infra, government center garage demolition, rise of Assembly Row into a place worth visiting, and now the new Pike decking. The biggest game changer on this side of the Charles though, far and away, has been the GLX and its bike path.

Biggest loss I've noticed is the steady degradation of Harvard Sq into banks and chain retail. RIP Tealuxe.
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Totally agree about Assembly. I remember the indoor mall in the late 80's. It was pretty sad, even back then. LOL
I lived in both Somerville and Medford in my late 20's. It has wonderful memories for me, and has only gotten better in my opinion.
I certainly agree that Harvard Square isn't what it used to be. It was so fun to hang out there on a weekend night with large crowds, street music vendors on every corner, and lots of funky and unique stores. It's pretty "corporate" these days. However, it's still a nice place for a stroll on a beautiful evening.
 
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The transformation of University Park in Cambridge is something. That whole area is unrecognizable now to my teenage self wandering it in the 90s.

The transformation of the Necco factory into Novartis made me a little sad. However, it was fun to watch them grind the sugar out of the structure.

The residential tower at Landsdowne and Pacific made it through two cycles before getting built. It went from residential to dotcom office and back again, as I recall.
 
Came in 2010 for college (Lesley), moved around a lot between Cambridge, Brighton, and Allston before settling into Quincy hopefully permanently near the end of 2017. The city has transformed dramatically in my adult life. Biking is worlds easier (though still a long way to go). I used to cross the Everett St bridge every day, and that area is unrecognizable now and continuing to improve.

I too miss what Harvard Square was when I moved here, but I love the direction things are moving in Quincy.
 
41 years, after college in Virginia. 1983 was within the decade after the busing crisis began (and a mere decade after the completion of the local highway system), and it was a meteor whose impact was still being felt in many ways, by presence and absence.
 
Java King said:
Totally agree about Assembly. I remember the indoor mall in the late 80's. It was pretty sad, even back then. LOL
I lived in both Somerville and Medford in my late 20's. It has wonderful memories for me, and has only gotten better in my opinion.
I certainly agree that Harvard Square isn't what it used to be. It was so fun to hang out there on a weekend night with large crowds, street music vendors on every corner, and lots of funky and unique stores. It's pretty "corporate" these days. However, it's still a nice place for a stroll on a beautiful evening.
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I arrived in Boston in 2017, so definitely missed the old days of Harvard Square, but FWIW I think it is still a decent place for a nice afternoon or evening out. Recently we grabbed hot chocolate at L.A. Burdick's, saw a movie at the Brattle, and then got ramen at Hokkaido and dessert at Tatte afterwards. All within a 5 min walk! It was a nice evening.
 
#bancars said:
I arrived in Boston in 2017, so definitely missed the old days of Harvard Square, but FWIW I think it is still a decent place for a nice afternoon or evening out. Recently we grabbed hot chocolate at L.A. Burdick's, saw a movie at the Brattle, and then got ramen at Hokkaido and dessert at Tatte afterwards. All within a 5 min walk! It was a nice evening.
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It’s normal for folks who’ve been in a place for a while to bemoan how everything was better/cooler/more fun “back in the day.” Stick around long enough and in 2045 you’ll be telling younger people how cool Harvard Square used to be in 2024.
 
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I grew up here. Initially, it was out in the burbs and visiting the city, before moving in.

I’m old enough to remember Faces standing sentry on the Route 2 approach to Alewife, but young enough to not have attended. I’m old enough to have attended the original Manray, but young enough that Hell had yielded to Xmortis. I’m old enough to have seen Knick Knack at the Computer Museum when SIGGRAPH was in town, but I’m young enough that the Auto Museum was a Brookline institution.
 
I was born down on A St. Well, actually O and 8th
Raised up on B St. Off East 8th, actually
Southie is my home town!

Though I've been living in Grafton since I got married almost a decade ago.

Things I like: How open the city feels with the Artery gone, how nice the Esplanade is, how much more diverse some of the neighborhoods are.
Things I miss: Building 19, the Big Dig exhibit at the Museum of Science, Gate of Heaven School, Jack, Liz, Bruce, Bob and Joyce on WBZ.
 
Java King said:
After reading the press release that The Association for Public Transit was merging with Transit Matters, I had to dig up my Car Free in Boston book. It's the 4th Edition of Car Free in Boston from 1984. I moved here from Nebraska in 1987. So, that's 37 years watching the Boston area transform and become more urban and transit rich.
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I came here a year after you did, fall of '88, and I'm pretty sure my copy of Car Free in Boston is also the 4th edition. That book was incredibly helpful and I used it to understand how to go to so many places, even using transit to get to the Blue Hills hiking trails. It has been fun watching aspects of the city change, and even though I miss certain things, like the Kenmore of the 80s and early 90s, I also love what has happened generally in the Fenway/Kenmore area. I've lived in Kenmore, Allston, Brookline, and finally settled in Roslindale, which gave me a hugely stronger appreciation for the neighborhoods. For a long time, I didn't know well the parts of the city on the other side of the river and harbor (I'll include places like Somerville as part of a larger concept of "the city"). But as I've moved around to different jobs, and as biking infrastructure became much better over the past 15 years, I've really enjoyed learning my way around everywhere else. Definitely a great city, always has been, and I was very happy to raise a family here.

Arenacale said:
Jack, Liz, Bruce, Bob and Joyce on WBZ.
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💯
 
Came here for my undergrad in 2009 and never left. I was a long-time lurker here either due to being a genuine lurker or later by necessity when Briv was in absentia. I've lived in Cambridge, JP, Quincy, and Somerville before settling where I am now in South Medford. Given that I know that a good handful of the users here live in either Medford or Somerville along the GLX, I often wonder if I've spotted one of you taking pictures when I've been out and about. It's very possible that you've spotted me and my two toddlers watching the trains go by.
 
13 years...

The Good:
  • RKG is amazing in the late Spring/Summer/Early Fall... it's pretty meh in the winter though.
  • Seaport is amazing. I used to come into the city before I moved here and I remember just the courthouse and Anthony's plus the construction of the first office tower... it was a pretty barren area. I used to live in an area where I could frequently run around The Seaport and it's amazing to see all the changes.
  • Weather has gotten better over the last decade...
The Bad:
  • There's some closures of bars that I really liked (RIP Remington's, Stoddards, Barracuda, IT, Sweetwater). Definitely a few others that have left my memory now...
  • The Murder of the Boylston Place alley by Emerson (fuck Emerson, worst college in the city). At least they finally fixed the facade on their main building.
  • The decline of the T into a pile of almost useless garbage.
  • Worsening night life.
  • Affordability has tanked.
 
RandomWalk said:
I grew up here. Initially, it was out in the burbs and visiting the city, before moving in.

I’m old enough to remember Faces standing sentry on the Route 2 approach to Alewife, but young enough to not have attended. I’m old enough to have attended the original Manray, but young enough that Hell had yielded to Xmortis. I’m old enough to have seen Knick Knack at the Computer Museum when SIGGRAPH was in town, but I’m young enough that the Auto Museum was a Brookline institution.
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Now that you mention it, I really do miss the Computer Museum. It was a cool space with a walk-through PC that was 2 floors! I went to Faces a couple of times in the late 80's, but it certainly wasn't my scene. It seemed to more aligned with big hair girls from the North Shore. LOL Manray was definitely more my vibe. Speaking of urban context, the Alewife area of Cambridge and Route 2 has certainly changed quite a bit in 30 years.
 
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