City of Somerville Finalizes Design for Tufts Street Reconstruction
In December 2024, the City of Somerville finalized the design for the Tufts Street Reconstruction project. After a year and a half of community engagement, data collection, and design development, the City presents a vision for Tufts Street that includes:
- Two-way connections for vehicles and for bikes
- Street pinch points for traffic calming
- Landscaped areas
- Four multipurpose parking spaces
- Expanded tree wells for remaining mature/healthy trees to support the longevity and new trees to increase long-term shade coverage
- Wider sidewalks
- And new raised crossings across Tufts Street at Glen Street, Dell Street, and Cross Street
You can also find brochures describing this final design in English, Español, Português, Kreyòl Ayisyen, नेपाली, 繁體中文, 简体中文.
We gathered feedback about safety issues on Tufts Street in the summer of 2023, heard input on a proposed narrowed yield condition for Tufts Street in fall 2023, updated the design to focus on pinch points rather than a meandering street and released the new design in the summer of 2024. To learn more about how we engaged community members and what we heard during this final community engagement phase, please check out the Updated Design Community Engagement Report.
Following this round of feedback, the City of Somerville hosted a Tree Public Hearing on November 14, 2024, to discuss the trees being proposed to be removed as part of this work. The City’s Arborist and Tree Warden evaluated the condition of all of the trees being considered for removal. 22 trees were proposed to be removed in the project area. As a result of this hearing, one more tree was identified to remain rather than to be removed with a total of 21 trees identified to be removed and 9 to remain – five on Tufts Street and four on Glen Street and Knowlton Street within the limit of work. Of the 9 remaining, the new design includes larger planted areas to support tree longevity and widened sidewalks around the trees to provide an accessible path. The City will plant 39 new trees on Tufts Street as part of this project. The goal is to place the majority of new trees in larger and connected planted areas to promote healthy growth. New and remaining trees will create continuous tree coverage. We also aim to choose native species for new trees.
Lastly, our team will go to the City’s Traffic Commission on December 12 to ask for their approval of the four new parking spaces that will be loading zones during the day and resident permit parking overnight.
We are excited to publish the final design and move forward with preparing for construction between 2025 and 2026. Our team will be working over the next couple of months to put the design out for bid and secure a contractor. Once we have an anticipated construction schedule, we will provide an update on this webpage.
We want to note that prior to construction on Tufts Street, the MBTA plans to update the Route 90 bus to no longer use Tufts Street and instead use Washington Street. Please find more information regarding routing changes here.
The MBTA’s contractor is also completing work on Washington Street at the intersection of Tufts Street. They have installed two new floating bus stops and moved the crosswalk closer to the East Somerville Station. They are awaiting delivery of the new rectangular rapid flashing beacon (a push button actuated flashing crosswalk sign). They anticipate installing in early January. We will continue to provide updates on this webpage as we receive more information.
Thank you to all the community members who gave their time to attend our outreach events, write and send comments, and submit survey responses. We really appreciate you engaging in this effort. If you have any questions regarding the design, please reach out to our team at transportation@somervillema.gov.
To get updates about construction, we encourage community members who haven’t already done so, to sign up for City Alerts. If you have any questions during construction, please reach out to our team at construction@somervillema.gov.
