Map of Obscure Somerville-area stairways, ramps, paths, and shortcuts

[ron_newman]

Four years ago, I began making a Google Map of obscure stairways, ramps, paths, and shortcuts in and near Somerville. Since Google Map URLs are quite long, I gave this map a shorter one that's easy to remember:

http://TinyURL.com/ObscureSomerville

Please look at the map and let me know of anything you think should be added to, removed from, or changed on this map. You can comment here or send e-mail to the address on my LJ profile page.

I post this notice once or twice every year. Here are links to the earlier posts:
June 2013 | April 2012 | April 2011 | June 2010 | May 2010

Notable changes from last year:

• a new pedestrian/bike underpass below Route 28 between Ten Hills and Assembly Row
  
• the Gilman Street underpass is closed to both pedestrians and vehicles due to McGrath Highway bridge construction

(Even though I'm tagging this "bicycle", many of the places marked on the map are suitable only for pedestrian use.)

Comments

[misterthorn.livejournal.com]

Thanks very much for maintaining this valuable resource!

Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge)

[smammy]

Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge) is now paved.

Tyler Ct / Edmunds St / Cottage Park Dr gate to Linear…

[smammy]

Tyler Ct / Edmunds St / Cottage Park Dr gate to Linear Park (Cambridge). The area has been divided in half between Cottage Park Ave. and Edmunds St. due to ongoing demolition work. The end of Cottage Park Ave. has been fenced off. Linear Park is still accessible via Tyler Ct. and Edmunds St., although there is currently a chain across the end of Edmunds St. that must be stepped over or ducked under.

RE: Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge)

[ron_newman]

Thanks. I edited this description.

RE: Tyler Ct / Edmunds St / Cottage Park Dr gate to Linear…

[ron_newman]

Thanks. I'll take a walk around there to understand the area and then make an appropriate edit. (A friend of mine put this on the map, not me.)

Is there still a passageway from Brockford Street?

Three new pedestrian features

[smammy]

https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=zxHn4XhkrQOs.k6dMN7P1sPtM

RE: Tyler Ct / Edmunds St / Cottage Park Dr gate to Linear…

[smammy]

No, Brookford St has been impassible for years, in response to resident paranoia about "people coming over from the projects". (Not kidding.)

RE: Three new pedestrian features

[ron_newman]

The map legend has a blue pushpin labelled "All items", but I see no blue pushpins anywhere on the map.

RE: Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge)

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

Which parking lot does this path connect to -- the one on the eastern end of Whittemore, or the one south of the Grace buildings? And is there a bike/ped connection between those, that doesn't involve going all the way west around the buildings almost to Route 16?

RE: Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge)

[ron_newman]

The eastern one. I'm not sure if you can walk through to the other one. Tomorrow I'll take a walk around there and look.

Edited to add: No, you can't walk through the WR Grace complex at all; it's a long and impenetrable barrier in this part of North Cambridge.

Edited again, 10/8/14: Today at 6:15 I was able to walk through the complex from the western parking lot to the eastern one, exiting through a chain-link gate. Since this doesn't seem to be open all the time, and I don't know what hours it is open, I don't want to add it to the map.

RE: Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge)

[ron_newman]

It's still a very narrow unlit path between two high fences, with a 90-degree turn in the middle of it. When I walked through it at 7:30 tonight, my first thought was "this would be a great place to get mugged."

RE: Tyler Ct / Edmunds St / Cottage Park Dr gate to Linear…

[ron_newman]

I edited the description and the polygon appropriately, after walking there this evening. Maybe the Brockford and Cottage Park entrances will re-appear after all the excavation and construction is finished?

RE: Three new pedestrian features

[smammy]

RE: Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge)

[smammy]

Yeah, I've always thought it was a good place to accidentally run into another biker, since you can't see around the corner fer shit what with all those weedy maple trees sticking through the fence. At least it's not a mud pit any more though.

RE: Tyler Ct / Edmunds St / Cottage Park Dr gate to Linear…

[smammy]

Cottage Park Ave entrance will re-open, but Brookford St will remain closed. Apparently, my racist, classist, NIMBY neighbors went to court to get a judgement that Brookford St is, and has always been, a dead end street. And during the approval process for this latest project, Cottage Park Ave. and Wittenmore St. residents and Brookford St. residents circulated dueling petitions calling for (respectively) "Brookford St. to bear their fair share of increased traffic" and "recognize that Brookford St. has always been a dead end street and bla bla bla" ugh I can't even bear to finish this post I'm so incensed at the inanity of local development politics.

Here's the latest site plan: 33 Cottage Park Ave Civil Site Layout and Materials Plan.

RE: Whittemore Avenue path to Linear Park (Cambridge)

[ron_newman]

Maybe once all the construction next door is finished, we can get a wider, straighter, lit path here? That appears to be part of the plan you linked to in another comment.

RE: Three new pedestrian features

[ron_newman]

I will take a walk by these in the next few days and then add them to the map.

Another path

[elizabeth hyde stevens (from livejournal.com)]

Something you could add:

This is basically a regular sidewalk, but it goes right from Alewife to Trader Joe's, so for timid folks who wouldn't think to bike or walk along Rte 3, it seems useful:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=zbDPzsrahS6g.kF9q2R_upzBY

RE: Three new pedestrian features

[ron_newman]

I've added these to the map.

RE: Another path

[ron_newman]

Let me think about this. There is a lot I could put on the map around Fresh Pond and Alewife, but I'm not sure yet just how much detail I want to add beyond Somerville.

RE: Three new pedestrian features

[smammy]

Neat!