The Community Path Through 20+ Years

By John Dieckmann

A detailed design of Belmont Community Path Phase 1, the segment from Brighton Street to Clark Street, including the pedestrian underpass, is currently underway. It has taken more than 20 years to get here. The following is a brief summary of the events that got this started and eventually, got us to this point.

First, by way of history, the right of way that is the basis for the Belmont Community Path and the overall Mass Central Rail Trail exists because beginning in 1870, a group of entrepreneurs built the Mass Central Railroad, later renamed the Central Mass Rail Road (CMRR). It was built in stages that eventually connected Boston to Northampton, a distance of 104 miles. From the start, the CMRR was unprofitable, but it still managed to operate in some fashion until 1980, when the last freight train ran. Passenger service ended for good in 1971.

The idea of creating the 26-mile Wayside Rail Trail, using the CMRR right of way from Belmont to Berlin, took shape during the 1990s, as did the larger idea of creating an 104-mile Mass Central Rail Trail using the entire CMRR right of way. Belmont appointed a bikeway planning committee in 1994. In 1997, the Central Transportation Planning Staff of the Boston Metropolitan Planning Organization concluded that the rail trail was possible in their “Rail Trail Feasibility Study.” Belmont also commissioned a study of the Belmont section at this time which concluded the route was feasible and identified similar route options.

By 1998, all seven of the Wayside Rail Trail towns had signed onto the project, and expectations for quick implementation were high, but trouble loomed. While five of the seven towns enthusiastically endorsed the rail trail, and have been on board ever since, in Weston shallow support switched to withdrawal from the rail trail, and strong abutter opposition quickly materialized in Belmont.

The death blow was delivered in 2001 by a change in funding. Initially the entire cost of the project was expected to be covered by state and federal highway funds. Partly due to the economic downturn, and partly to the reality that the state was on the hook for the huge cost of the “Big Dig,” the situation changed. Individual towns were now required by the state to absorb 10 percent of the project cost up front by funding the detailed design. No town had the budget to take on a new expensive project, so the Wayside Rail Trail languished.

For several years, not much happened. Then, the Wayside Rail Trail towns adopted the Community Preservation Act, providing a funding source at the town level for detailed design work. In Belmont, the Belmont Citizens Forum purchased the 3,560 foot long by 30 foot wide strip of land on the north side of the MBTA commuter rail property to serve as a buffer between a community path and the back yards of Channing Road properties.

A sequence of studies and committees revived the path:

A 2011-2012 Metropolitan Area Planning Council feasibility study, which led to

The 2012 appointment of Belmont’s Community Path Advisory Committee, which led to

An engineering feasibility study supervised by the Community Path Implementation Advisory Committee (CPIAC, 2014–18), which led to

The appointment of the current Community Path Project Committee and a detailed design contract (supported by Community Preservation Act funds).

We can expect the detailed design to be completed within two years and construction funding and construction work to begin within a year or two after the design has been completed. If you’d like to gain an in-depth understanding of the community path’s evolution, I’d encourage you to revisit past Belmont Citizens Forum Newsletter articles, available at bit.ly/BCFComPath.

John Dieckmann is a director of the Belmont Citizens Forum.