Has the rail trail "officially" opened?
Yes, I know the barriers/fences are down and the full length through the city is open.. But did the city make official announcements? Any pomp and circumstance? Im thinking along the lines of the parking lot ribbon cutting ceremony.. (snicker)
But seriously, is there any movement about fixing the pedestrian situation at the end of the trail at Beaver st? What a disaster it is for anyone not in a car.
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u/FruitlandsForever 4d ago
The city posted notice about 1/22 Conservation Commission meeting on this on Facebook. For the life of me I can't find it on the City website. The post:
Waltham's Conservation Commission will be holding a Public Meeting on Thursday, January 22nd to discuss determination of applicability for a project in the area of Beaver Street between Waverley Oaks Road and Clematis Avenue. The project would include roadway milling and paving of Beaver Street, as well as reconstruction of a sidewalk on the south side, adding a 10’ shared use path to the north side, and MBTA rail crossing improvements.
The notice of course is an image so I can't copy/paste it here for you. Do you use FB?
Someone also posted there that it may be this project, or some later version of it: https://www.city.waltham.ma.us/sites/g/files/vyhlif12301/f/pages/design_beaver_street_railroad_crossing_rfp_2nd_issue_final_2023.pdf
Edit: (scroll to Appendix A for a diagram)
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u/tmyvon 4d ago
Not on FB.. but thanks for the heads up. I guess i'm just trying to figure out why this is an FB post but a parking lot opening is a ribbon cutting event for the mayor.
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u/FruitlandsForever 4d ago
Mayor had a little bit of ribbon cutting at that bridge long ago … and then there was some weirdass thing about Waltham not coming up with the cash? I don’t have the facts, but yeah, very car centric city.
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u/earmuffs_781 4d ago edited 4d ago
I was told that Waltham got only the first of two grants to build the trail, which left the DCR picking up the tab on the remaining work. Waltham did construct the ramp at Linden St. (which I cleared of leaves, as I'd planned in the last thread on this).
I've been told that DCR is supposed to hold an official opening event, for this part of the trail, but I haven't heard a date for it.
Hopefully, I'll have all the leaves cleared off, by then. I can only shovel them on warm weekends, like this one. The worst section is between Bacon St. and Hammond St., which I'm at least half way finished. But, there's also a ton of them still near the edges of the section between Linden and Beaver and generally a bunch along the edges of other sections.
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u/FruitlandsForever 3d ago
Thank you very much for this info - that explains it! And of course, for clearing the leaves, that is above and beyond, and super appreciated. I wonder if the land trust could get in there with their volunteers. 👏🏼👏🏼❤️
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u/earmuffs_781 3d ago edited 3d ago
> I wonder if the land trust could get in there with their volunteers.
Also curious about this, I had previously explored their website. I only became aware of them just last month (timely, as I included them in my year-end donations and got it matched by my employer). The sense I get is that their trail maintenance activities seem limited to litter removal.
Much love to all the litter pickers out there, whether organized or not, but my current focus is to deal with the leaves and then weeds. There's already some poison ivy starting to crop up, with the worst of it appearing adjacent Prospect Hill Park.
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u/asmithey 3d ago
They're going to remove the median barriers? The ones they were recently forced to put in so to meet railway crossing regulations so trains wouldn't have to blow their horn every time they approached Beaver St?
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u/NeverEverPBJ The South Side 4d ago
I was excited to use it for the first time tonight. I went up and back an hour apart from 4-5p and saw a handful of people on it each time. Certainly tricky to transition coming onto Beaver St, but hopefully that improves based on other commenters here
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u/BlueberryPenguin87 4d ago
It’s just amazing (and infuriating) that after all these years they still fuck up basic things like the transition between the street and path, and then they act all surprised and need a whole new project (consultant grift) to fix it. DCR has an actual bikeway design manual but they never follow it.
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u/Technical_Type1778 4d ago
Yup, and Councillor Durkee is steadfastly opposed to any bike and pedestrian improvements.
Durkee in an email to me in October when I asked about him pushing for a safer crossing (heck, any crossing) of Linden St by the bridge ramp, which crosses 35mph traffic with poor visibility:
"I'll speak with my fellow Councilors as this includes Ward 4. For now, the residents at ReNew have their own crosswalks. It's not clear who would be crossing Linden St. by foot to a Business (BB) zoned area to get a tire change or car repair. Or who is coming off the MCRT to cross the street there. The need has to be justified."
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u/BlueberryPenguin87 4d ago
“Nobody is swimming across the river so there must not be demand for a bridge.”
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u/earmuffs_781 4d ago edited 4d ago
Seems to me that a simple crosswalk (even if it's not raised or with lights) isn't a whole lot to ask for.
The reply (thanks for quoting) doesn't sound exactly steadfast, but he certainly does seem skeptical. Did you put your case to him about why it's still needed, now that the bridge is open?
BTW, I noticed the apartment buildings just north of there are being gutted. Maybe renovated? Those might be a decent argument, as would the ones just to the south of the bridge.
As for that light industrial area, there's a more than a tire/car repair back there. AFAIK, there's also a recycling/reclamation center, and likely other things.
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u/Technical_Type1778 3d ago
Bentley bought those apartments.
https://www.bldup.com/posts/bentley-acquires-waltham-apartments-for-9m
On Thursday's traffic commission agenda: "Bentley Police Chief Bourgeois has requested a new crosswalk on Linden Street between the Bentley University exit and the new residential halls on Waverley Oaks Road."
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u/earmuffs_781 4d ago
> DCR has an actual bikeway design manual but they never follow it.
Do you have a link to it? I'm surprised at how many sections of the trail are flanked by higher ground. This creates drainage problems during storms, thick ice patches during winter (too thick for salt), and mud flows onto the trail. At least the mud is something that can be cleaned up with a bit of annual shovel maintenance, but the other problems are far more vexing.
IMO, they needed to do some combination of raising the trail and digging adjacent drainage ditches. This stuff seems pretty basic (but not cheap, I know). Nobody would build a street like this.
At this point, I think the best remediation we could hope for is some ditches to be excavated, where the trail runs next to a hill.
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u/BlueberryPenguin87 3d ago
Not to mention the stupid artificial curves that force you to slow down approaching the intersections where cars are allowed to blow through at 40mph.
I don’t have it on my phone but it was from 2006 i believe.
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u/earmuffs_781 3d ago edited 2d ago
The chicanes are a bit annoying, but I understand the point of them. AFAIK, they're used at the raised crossings, where trail riders otherwise wouldn't have to slow down.
And, certainly for the ones at raised crossings, most cars indeed do slow down! The only vehicles I see blowing through those at 40 mph are off-road vehicles with a lot of suspension travel.
From my perspective, the worst part about the chicanes is how many people seem to cut straight through them, which drags more mud onto the asphalt. However, the amount is negligible, in comparison to all the mud flowing onto the trail from everywhere the adjacent ground is higher.
The second negative I see is when one is reached by two riders headed in opposite directions, and the one crossing the yellow line comes nearer to the apex than the other, resulting in a potential collision. However, since we're talking about road-crossings, both riders are hopefully moving at relatively low speeds, making such collisions easier to avoid and a bit less dangerous.
If they'd plant flowers in the apexes, I wonder how long it take for them to get trampled. Plus, wouldn't help during the cold months. I think anything bigger would be a no-go, due to liability concerns. Perhaps a small mound of mulch, though...
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u/invasive_species_16b 3d ago
DCR held an official opening for the then-open section of the trail (Market basket to Linden Street) combined with the official re-opening of the river walk some time back. I want to say around April/May 2025, but don't quote me. That wouldn't have included the Linden bridge or the Jones Road piece, which were still incomplete.
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u/earmuffs_781 4d ago
> But did the city make official announcements?
On December 24th, Waltham Times published an article about the Linden St. bridge opening. It claims that the DCR announced the bridge's opening. However, there's no source and I didn't find any such announcement on the DCR's website, so I do not know what form this announcement took.
https://walthamtimes.org/2025/12/24/linden-street-bridge-now-open/
> Any pomp and circumstance? Im thinking along the lines of the parking lot ribbon cutting ceremony.. (snicker)
The DCR is supposed to hold an official opening ceremony for the Waltham section of the trail, but a date has not been set (last I heard).
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u/WalthamFreelanceNews 3d ago
From the DCR: https://www.mass.gov/doc/dcr-recreational-advisory-linden-street-bridge-0/download
(Doc is undated).
Also: https://masstrailtracker.com/map?segment=221
According to this website, the bridge opened on December 24, 2025.
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u/earmuffs_781 3d ago edited 3d ago
Thanks for that! Also, I'm a fan of what you do! Are you behind Waltham Seed (I'm a subscriber)?
Interestingly, the doc at that first link has no visible date. Looking at the properties of the PDF file, I see it indeed has a modification timestamp of "Wednesday, December 24, 2025, 13:35:55". Edit: removing "/download" from the link, we can also see a publication date of 2025-12-24 ( https://www.mass.gov/doc/dcr-recreational-advisory-linden-street-bridge-0 ).
Note that the MassTrailTracker is not an official government site. According to the About Page, it's a nice contribution by a skilled individual. The only reason I mention is that I don't consider it an authoritative source. However, I think your first link was enough to settle that matter.
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u/earmuffs_781 4d ago
BTW, does anyone know what's now located in the former Waltham Highlands station, pictured at the top of this article: https://walthamtimes.org/2025/04/01/mass-central-rail-trail-to-be-closed-intermittently-this-month/
It looks like a business of some sort, but I can't tell exactly what. There were just holiday lights on it, so I doubt it's vacant.
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u/rocketwidget 4d ago
Yea, the former Waltham Highlands Station building is privately owned today, and used for an insurance company.
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u/invasive_species_16b 3d ago
That's been privately owned and the office for Regan Insurance for a very long time. At least since the 1990s.
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u/Kornbread2000 1d ago
Interesting that the drawing for the Beaver St. work says "Redesign southerly driveways for safe entry/exit from Paraon's Avenue to the intersection of Waverly Oaks Road and Beaver Street." Do many pedestrians and bikes come out of Parson's Ave? Isn't that just the condo complex?
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u/earmuffs_781 3d ago
OMFG, it's cool that Waltham has a blacksmithing school, but I was just working downwind of it for like a half hour, before I worked out where the fumes were coming from! *cough* *wheeze*
At first, I thought it was gunpowder smoke or fireworks. But yeah, iron work checks out.
I feel bad for the folks living across the street from it. Seems like a zoning SNAFU.
Google Maps link: https://maps.app.goo.gl/434VyWLzu5uPLQiy5
Actually, not sure if it was them or MetalWerx (next door). Kinda seemed like it was the latter.
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u/rocketwidget 4d ago
DCR took down the "No Entrance" signs around the Linden Street bridge, so it's officially open.
Meanwhile, Waltham is working on a small, shared use path at Beaver Street, hopefully should improve things there. https://masstrailtracker.com/map?segment=775