neighborhood info?

[intuition-ist.livejournal.com]

I'm looking for people with first-hand (preferably recent) knowledge of the neighborhoods in the area enclosed if you draw a line on a map from the corner of Central & Broadway, down Central, across to Lowell on Vernon St., up Lowell back towards Broadway, and down Broadway to close the rectangle. What I'm looking for: general attitudes of the people you had as neighbors, perceived frequency of property crimes (car/house break-ins), frequency of large/loud parties, any suspicion you might have had regarding criminal activities among people in your neighborhood, any efforts by your neighbors to support civic-type projects (block party, neighborhood cleanup, gardens, etc.). Feel free to send a message if you don't want to respond publicly to this post.

EDITED to more specifically describe the area I'm talking about. Thanks to everyone who wrote in so far. :)

Comments

[myselftheliar.livejournal.com]

I lived in that area for five years before moving a few blocks over last year (has the same feel though). Very rarely had any issues. I had my bicycle stolen but feel that could have happened anywhere as I was foolish and used a poor lock. Sometimes there were loud moments during major sporting events (World Cup, World Series, Superbowl etc) lots of honking and shouting, but generally weekends were mundane. I never once felt unsafe walking home from bus stops, even late, and only once witnessed an altercation of any kind (and it was during the Trum Field 4th of July celebrations). Unsure about civic projects in general.

Between Powderhouse & traintracks, near St C

[tealegirle.livejournal.com]

I've lived here for two years; it's generally a quiet neighborhood (mostly old-school Medfordians, very few students on my block). Our house got broken into once--but that was likewise our fault, as we left the sliding-door-blocker-thing down. Not much neighborhood spirit--other than the people next to us on both sides, we don't know the neighbors; they're mostly people who grew up and old on this street. St C the school is not a good neighbor: their bells go off VERY often (and often bizarrely late, like 9 pm), their kids leave trash in our yard and sit on the cars parked on the street, their pickup is poorly organized and floods our street to the point of impassibility. I've never felt unsafe in this neighborhood, at any hour.

[curiositykt.livejournal.com]

I lived on Bristol Road for about 4 years. It was very quiet and nice. I strongly recommend the Medford side of this neighborhood as you don't have to worry about the parking enforcement and trash pickup is much less stressful (though both sides are probably fine now that single stream has come to both).

Very little crime. There was one night many years ago that a couple of kids came down and bashed off side mirrors on SUVs (Conveniently I didn't drive a SUV) But that was a very isolated event. Generally the old people on the street sitting out on the porches all afternoon keep good watch on the street. It really felt like a neighborhood.

St. C's school is very loud. The kids playing in their playground during recess and such sound like they are being murdered. The few times I stayed home sick I was awakened by their screaming and it continued most of the day (Which is probably the case anywhere that has lots of kids playing an outside space, I'm all for kids playing, but it should be known going in)

The street did flood a bit when it rained. It seems like the drains clog up instantaneously. And having a road that spills out on to broadway is annoying when they inevitably close it for yet another roadrace. Also the powderhouse rotary took years off of my life.

[ron_newman]

I'm confused by this response (and the one above it) because Bristol Road isn't anywhere near the neighborhood that the OP is asking about.

[curiositykt.livejournal.com]

I looked that the comment above mine and thought, oh, hey I lived in that area, so my response is due to their response.

whoops! sorry

[tealegirle.livejournal.com]

Saw "between Broadway & traintracks" & didn't look up Lowell & Central. Should have. Sorry!

[avjudge]

I've lived on the lower half of Glenwood for 5 years, and really only can speak for my block. It's a pretty quiet neighborhood (parties? What are those?). We have several single-family homes (due in large part to a tract development of cute little Mansards in the early 1870s) so there are a bunch of homes with kids in the newborn to 8-year-old range. Up until a month ago you did hear playing toddlers in the early evening - a sound I quite like.

We have the usual petty crime - someone's bike was stolen from their front porch by breaking a baluster, I lost a potted plant from my front porch - but I feel really safe here. It was a big deal a couple of years ago when a guy came down the street at 3am, drunk, kicked out of On the Hill Tavern, and tried every car door to snag all the change he could find (leaving everything else). I was amazed to find out how many people left their car doors unlocked!

There have been a few houses with drug activity but not so blatant that I notice it (one gone and one still here) - my neighbor with experience clues me in. Also, I hate to admit this is from our street: http://www.wickedlocal.com/somerville/news/x834504789/Police-Somerville-man-steals-gold-chain-caught-with-pants-down
But at least he doesn't seem to get into that sort of nonsense around here (maybe because, I'm told, he lives with his parents).

As for general attitudes, a few months ago I would have recommended that you stroll around after work and talk to people. But most people are inside now. There are a lot of people who I never see - I'm afraid there's all too much of that everywhere - I think mostly in the multi-family rentals where the people are "passing through" - and I must admit, 25 years ago when I lived up on Winter Hill & was a grad student I was one of those. But there are a lot of people who own their homes and are committed to the neighborhood, if not obviously outgoing. (This is, after all, New England.) You do tend to see the people with kids more than most others.

We do have an annual block party (3 years so far). Also lots of trick-or-treaters! Though I understand it's really Bartlett St and its cotton candy machine that draw them to our neighborhood so we get them when they do a loop though the surrounding blocks.

[contradictacat.livejournal.com]

Wait, what? A cotton candy machine? on MY street? (It's more likely than you think!) That's pretty awesome and I want to make friends with them now.

[avjudge]

I heard last Halloween (a year ago) that the house had been sold and a requirement in the sales agreement was that the cotton candy continue to be given out to trick-or-treaters! I don't know if it's true, but it's a great story, so I'm going to believe it. :-)

I went out with my nieces this year (who came down for the 2nd year from rural NH because they found that the trick-or-treating here is so awesome) and saw this fabled house. It really exists! It's on the corner of - darn - Robinson or Ames, can't remember which one, with the door actually not on Bartlett but on the other street (whichever it is). The northeast corner of the intersection, which narrows it down to 2 houses. Based on my memory of the house & Google satellite view, I think it's Ames, the house with the tower.

Go start making friends :-)

[stefan62.livejournal.com]

That story is true. We've lived a few doors from the cotton candy house since 1998 - it's a great, quiet neighborhood.

[turil.livejournal.com]

SCUL for a while lived on Bartlett Street. And Skunk still lives there (the official SCUL fort is at Artisan's Asylum now). They are very civic minded, but mostly late on Saturday nights. :-)

I've walked around the area many, many times, especially passing through on my way to Christmas Tree shop, and it's definitely a healthy mix of folks. And I know the school that had a fire over near Broadway and Central (I think) that is just reopening is a favorite of many Somerville kids and parents.

[avjudge]

The only school I know that had a fire is the East Cambridge school, on the other side of McGrath. The Winter Hill school is on Medford St and should have a fire, it's so ugly! (Just kidding about the fire, but it really does look like a bunker.)

[turil.livejournal.com]

Oh, it turns out that it's further down past Foss Park off of Broadway. It's the East Somerville Community School at Edgerly. (is that what you meant?)

Sorry about that! I had thought I'd passed it before on the way to Ten Hills area, from Lowell Street. But I guess not!

[ron_newman]

the East Somerville Community School is not on Broadway either, it's at Cross and Pearl streets (and far away from the neighborhood the OP is asking about)

[ron_newman]

there's no school at Broadway and Central -- just Vida Real church and Temple B'nai Brith (my synagogue)

[freckles42.livejournal.com]

I generally like our neighborhood. (I'm on Bartlett.)

We personally have one set of neighbors in the house next to ours that drive me nuts - lots of loud parties and loud TV-watching (with the windows open) and I don't think they realize that their open windows point five feet across the alley to my bedroom. Fortunately, they generally settle down after 11 PM. For comparison, I have never had to call the cops on them, while at my old place in a "good" part of JP, I called the cops 4-5 times per week because of a house that played music so loud I could hear it over earplugs AND A/C.

I (cisgendered, female-presenting, queer, white) have always felt safe walking around the neighborhood, even late at night. I feel safer on the cross streets as opposed to, say, Broadway, but that's only by a tiny amount.

I haven't had a break-in (house or car). My car was broken into in my neighborhood in JP.

As for the civic projects, I've only lived there a few months, so I can't really speak to that. I have met a few of my neighbors - sometimes I have to be bold, but generally people recognize each other.

Generally, I like where I am. It's a good area.

[greyling.livejournal.com]

I lived on Belmont St for a couple years, moved away about 1 1/2 years ago now.

I could have felt unsafe-er, and could have felt safer. I wasn't thrilled about crossing the train tracks at the Shaws underpass and walking home from there, especially in the winter. There was one incident in which I felt distinctly unsafe - walking home around 11, at Belmont & Summer, I looked up to see a large male sprinting directly at me, diagonally across the street crossing. I think he was hoping to catch me unawares, but I saw him & became defensive as he was crossing the street, and I think that threw him off - as soon as I looked up, he abruptly changed courses and ran away...

I am 5'7 and female.

I didn't know my neighbors at all, on Belmont. There were large multi-families; the house across the street had tenants in two units that very much did not get along, leading to loud yelling fights and the police being called more than once.

Living on the hill was interesting in the winter. People would often forget to park on only one side of the street come winter, which lead to the snow plows honking interminably and then leaving when nobody came out to move their cars, which occasionally lead to un-shoveled streets. I'm told the street parking situation was somewhat dire on that hill, and people could count on getting the sides of their cars dinged up.

Loud parties weren't a problem. I may have noticed a few during my stay, but the noise levels were just fine.

I didn't feel much block spirit, no block parties that I knew of - there may very well have been something, but I doubt the people on the block counted on befriending a large house of mid-twenties kids.

[turil.livejournal.com]

Belmont isn't on the Broadway side of the train tracks, though.

[turil.livejournal.com]

Oh! There are two sets of train tracks! I think Intuition_ist was talking about the one's over near Broadway, but now that you mention it, maybe she was talking about the ones by Beacon/Somerville Ave...

[greyling.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I see what you mean. I suspect you're right - the ones by beacon/somerville would trace out a rather long & skinny "neighborhood" to be asking about, and thus I think I was on the "wrong side of the tracks", so to speak.

[intuition-ist.livejournal.com]

see rewritten description of the area I'm talking about...

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

maybe this will be useful:

http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/ma/somerville/crime/

#

[intuition-ist.livejournal.com]

Somewhat, though I was confronted by numerous "Subscribe to get the data you thought was here in the first place, nyah" messages.

[avjudge]

So the neighborhood in question is divided between being (a part of) the lowest-crime section of the city and (part of) the 5th lowest. Obviously an arbitrary division, as I can't believe there's a lot more crime across my street (Glenwood, the dividing line) than on my side of it.

[mamajoan.livejournal.com]

I live on Lowell between the bridge and Medford Street. I feel pretty safe there. In 7.5 years I've had one thing stolen off my front porch (a boom box and it was stupid of me to have left it there) and my car tires slashed once -- several other cars also had slashed tires the same day so it seems to have been one random hoodlum passing through. Other than that, not much. I have several times accidentally left my car overnight with the windows open or the doors unlocked, and nothing has been stolen from it (not that there's anything worth stealing from it, but still).

Lowell Street is a fairly busy street and I wouldn't say there's a huge sense of "community" although, to be sure, when I take my kids around the side streets in our area on Halloween, everyone is SUPER friendly. People hang out on their porches and wait for us to come by.

Generally speaking, the neighborhood when I moved in was about 50-50 between elderly Brazilian/Portuguese folks and grad students. Over the years, the elderly folks have been dying off and their 2- and 3-bedroom houses are being converted to condos one by one (this describes my house). There are several such buildings in my area that have gone through a number of occupants -- grad students who stay for a year or two and then leave. There are also a few families with young kids - more of those now than when we moved in, also.

There is the occasional loud party, or loud drunks staggering down the street from the bars up on Medford/Broadway, but that's city life for ya.