Biking the Boston 'Burbs (Trails, MDC, & Towns beyond Hubway area)

^^ Agree it's a great project, but the connection to biking / bike trails is fairly limited (the bridge as I understand would be a fairly short pedestrian/bike connection from the commercial, hotel and - soon - residential big-box buildings on Baker Avenue, to West Concord center / Concord Junction).

There are 3 amazing potential bike initiatives for Concord that I *do* really hope to see, fwiw:
1) Paving the Reformatory Branch to effectively extend to Concord the Minuteman Bike Path
2) Connecting the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail and the Assabet River Rail Trail (i.e., building a paved path along the Fitchburg MBTA line from West Concord to South Acton)
3) Adding meaningfully protected bike lanes across the many many Concord roads that are great for biking (Main Street/Route 62, Lowell Road, Monument Street, etc.).
 
Bedford rejecting the eminent domain to upgrade their portion of the Reformatory Branch was partially driven by Concord’s irrational fear of it dumping out on a dirt track just past Route 62. Short of the state mandating it (probably as a stone dust path), it will never happen.
 
itchy said:
^^ Agree it's a great project, but the connection to biking / bike trails is fairly limited (the bridge as I understand would be a fairly short pedestrian/bike connection from the commercial, hotel and - soon - residential big-box buildings on Baker Avenue, to West Concord center / Concord Junction).

There are 3 amazing potential bike initiatives for Concord that I *do* really hope to see, fwiw:
1) Paving the Reformatory Branch to effectively extend to Concord the Minuteman Bike Path
2) Connecting the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail and the Assabet River Rail Trail (i.e., building a paved path along the Fitchburg MBTA line from West Concord to South Acton)
3) Adding meaningfully protected bike lanes across the many many Concord roads that are great for biking (Main Street/Route 62, Lowell Road, Monument Street, etc.).
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Yeah I guess by great project I meant it’s a great project for the public, which a new bridge over a river that connects new developments to a bike path definitely is. But it’s more of a public amenities project than truly a biking project.
 
Progress on the Northern Strand Trail Extension in downtown Lynn: workers are placing new curbs in the westernmost lane of the Lynnway to create the new physically-protected bike path that will eventually extend all the way across the city from Western Ave. to the ocean:




Several other segments in the growing Border-to-Boston network are due to come online over the next few years:
mass.streetsblog.org

Travel Guide: Biking From the Border to Boston - Streetsblog Massachusetts

The Border to Boston trail is a proposed 70-mile route that will eventually connect Seabrook, New Hampshire to downtown Boston via Newburyport, Salem, and Lynn along abandoned railroad rights-of-way. Like many long-distance rail trails in Massachusetts, the Border to Boston trail is an ambitious...
mass.streetsblog.org mass.streetsblog.org
 
mass.streetsblog.org

New Trails We Can Look Forward To In 2025 - Streetsblog Massachusetts

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...
mass.streetsblog.org mass.streetsblog.org
 
FHWA announced the first round of Active Transportation Infrastructure Improvement Program funding today, the Merrimack Valley Planning Commission was awarded a $1,176,000 planning grant for "Reimagining the 110"

The Merrimack Valley Planning Commission will receive funding to develop a strategic planning and design process for a 24-mile spine in the upper portion of the Merrimack Valley that would connect Methuen, Lawrence, Haverhill, Merrimack, and Amesbury and provide safe and comfortable active transportation options that improve mobility, access, and connectivity. The project will focus on improving active transportation safety for many high crash areas, including five high crash pedestrian clusters, two high crash bike clusters, and 10 high crash intersections within the top 5 percent of their categories’ statewide. This project also envisions improvements for environmental justice populations by improving access to essential services and connecting environmental justice communities to train services (MBTA and Amtrak) that will help people to travel within and between communities.
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The full list of awardees can be found here:

 
Maybe beyond the scope of this forum but Western Mass developments deserve the spotlight: $17.3m awarded for planning, design and permitting of a 9-mile extension of the Ashuwillticook Trail up to North Adams and Williamstown. Great way to stitch the Berkshires and some lovely communities together. Hope one-day this can span from Connecticut up through Vermont. Would also be great if this tied into Downtown Pittsfield and the Amtrak station there to support regional mobility and recreation / tourism.
 
I'm a few months late posting this, as the article is from September. The town of Dover is considering moving forward with the very controversial rail trail project. I hope the bike trail ends up being built ASAP, but the NIMBYs in Dover are on another level. It's insane how anti-anything Dover is.
westwoodminute.town.news

Town of Dover Announces Planning Phases of a Dover Rail Trail Project | Westwood Minute

Dover projects construction of new rail trail
westwoodminute.town.news westwoodminute.town.news
Phase 1 – Planning and Design (October 2024-April 2025)

  • Plan and design of a trail beginning in October
  • Develop a preliminary trail layout design
  • Present a final design to the community for feedback, when a design is finished in April 2025
Phase 2 – Cost Estimation and Funding (Spring 2025)

  • Beginning in Spring 2025, develop a detailed cost estimate that includes construction, materials, labor and future maintenance costs
  • Identify funding sources, including government grants and public-private partnerships
  • Prepare a finalized budget
Phase 3: Final Planning and Approval (Fall 2025)

  • A working group to clearly outline complete construction project plans to be presented to Dover residents for approval at Town Meeting in fall 2025
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It would be amazing if the rest of the trail through Millis, Medway, and Bellingham gets built soon, regardless of what happens with the trail proposal in Dover.
 
Early interest in Rail-With-Trail along the Fitchburg line by representatives Weston, Lincoln, Concord, and Acton. Would be great for regional active mobility and improving first/last mile connections for stops along the Fitchburg line.
Screenshot 2025-02-26 at 4.57.00 PM.png
 
KCasiglio said:
Early interest in Rail-With-Trail along the Fitchburg line by representatives Weston, Lincoln, Concord, and Acton. Would be great for regional active mobility and improving first/last mile connections for stops along the Fitchburg line.
View attachment 60638
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Where are you hearing this? The South Acton to Concord connection would be a game changer in linking up rail trails and greatly improving pedestrian crossing of Route 2. By the way, the Reformatory branch should be included in your map.
 
chumbolly said:
Where are you hearing this? The South Acton to Concord connection would be a game changer in linking up rail trails and greatly improving pedestrian crossing of Route 2. By the way, the Reformatory branch should be included in your map.
Click to expand...
Not my map, was shared with the MPO by Lincoln, who reached out. Representatives from the four towns have been coordinating for the past several months and approached us about a feasibility study.
 
This would make so much sense ... that I can't believe it'd actually happen :)
 
themissinglink said:
I'm a few months late posting this, as the article is from September. The town of Dover is considering moving forward with the very controversial rail trail project. I hope the bike trail ends up being built ASAP, but the NIMBYs in Dover are on another level. It's insane how anti-anything Dover is.
westwoodminute.town.news

Town of Dover Announces Planning Phases of a Dover Rail Trail Project | Westwood Minute

Dover projects construction of new rail trail
westwoodminute.town.news westwoodminute.town.news


It would be amazing if the rest of the trail through Millis, Medway, and Bellingham gets built soon, regardless of what happens with the trail proposal in Dover.
Click to expand...

This is the most absurd thing for NIMBY's to rally against lol. Fine, I get the "undesirables" that a subway line will bring in, but a damn bike trail?? Lexington should be plenty of proof that having a greenway makes real estate values go up.
 
sneijder said:
This is the most absurd thing for NIMBY's to rally against lol. Fine, I get the "undesirables" that a subway line will bring in, but a damn bike trail?? Lexington should be plenty of proof that having a greenway makes real estate values go up.
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We're launching an automated bike/ped count program at the MPO, where we've invested in 10 automated counters. In setting up our roll out this spring we've got hundreds of locations we worked with municipalities to identify and prioritize. Only one municipality in the region said "thanks but no thanks" - Dover.
 
KCasiglio said:
We're launching an automated bike/ped count program at the MPO, where we've invested in 10 automated counters. In setting up our roll out this spring we've got hundreds of locations we worked with municipalities to identify and prioritize.
Click to expand...
Oh, this is exciting! Any way for us to get a preview of locations and schedule? I tend to enjoy riding past the sensors, just to help the data out.
 
HenryAlan said:
Oh, this is exciting! Any way for us to get a preview of locations and schedule? I tend to enjoy riding past the sensors, just to help the data out.
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I'll be happy to share once I have a concrete schedule, right now we are trying to arrange things so that we can be as efficient as possible with the transportation of the counters (i.e., scheduling Salem and Peabody back to back), but as we are reliant on municipal DPWs for the actual installation due to liability reasons we're still nailing that down. As of right now we have confirmed participation from Salem, Peabody, Woburn, Chelsea, Boston, Marlborough, and Sharon. We're expecting participation from Framingham, Holbrook, and Burlington as well but haven't formally gotten their signatures yet.

As a general overview, we're looking to do a series of counts for two weeks at a time per location all across the region from April-October. We're then planning on repeating the locations from October-April so we can get some seasonality impact data.
 
KCasiglio said:
Early interest in Rail-With-Trail along the Fitchburg line by representatives Weston, Lincoln, Concord, and Acton. Would be great for regional active mobility and improving first/last mile connections for stops along the Fitchburg line.
View attachment 60638
Click to expand...

Would love to see statewide or Greater Boston off-street bike path maps like this, showing all of them. It can be hard to even be aware of options in certain parts of the state.
 
#bancars said:
Would love to see statewide or Greater Boston off-street bike path maps like this, showing all of them. It can be hard to even be aware of options in certain parts of the state.
Click to expand...
You should check out the MassTrails Priority Trails Network (map), it shows bike infrastructure statewide (with proposed infrastructure, too).
 
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