City Delays Plan To Revamp Streets

An effort by the City of Cambridge to improve Harvard Square’s streets and sidewalks—estimated to cost over $3 million—has been delayed because construction bids have exceeded the project budget and the engineer’s estimates by more than one million dollars.

“The city did fund the $3.5 million that would have allowed construction to begin this fall,” said John DiGiovanni, president of the Harvard Square Business Association and member of the Harvard Square Design Committee.

But the design committee who is spearheading the effort is now in the process of rebidding the project. In a letter to the committee members on December 9, 2005, Community Development Project Manager Katherine Watkins said that bids are due in January and that construction is anticipated to begin in the Spring of 2006.

“We’re certainly on track in terms that it’s moving forward, although our original intention was to begin this fall,” said Watkins.

She cites the high cost of lighting and the difficult working environment of the Square as reasons for the high construction bids in the letter. Watkins said, however, that the committee has recently “set up a contract so that an entire street segment could be eliminated from the project [in order to] move forward and get as many improvements done as possible within the budget.”

Thomas J. Lucey, Harvard’s director of community relations for Cambridge, said that the project is going to take much longer than initially expected and will “depend a little on the city’s capacity to fund its capital program, of which this is a part.”

Although many streets and sidewalks in the Square need improvement, Lucey said that he could not recall receiving complaints about the sidewalks. But concerns are sometimes raised about crosswalks (such as that across from Johnston gate) “when areas of pedestrian safety do come into play,” he said.

The $3 million project is Phase One of a larger three-phase project whose ultimate goal is “to make the public spaces as inviting and accessible as possible,” DiGiovanni said. Church Street, Winthrop Street, and Lampoon Plaza are among the areas scheduled to be renovated. Although DiGiovanni predicts that a “manageable goal” is to have Phase One begin and end in 2006, he could not predict when the whole project would be completed.

While sidewalks, bus stops, and pedestrian safety are major concerns of the committee, DiGiovanni said that much thought has been put into a detailed plan to “transform Palmer Street into the most photographed street in Harvard Square.”

Palmer Street, the cobblestone alley between either entrance of the Coop, is scheduled to be completed as part of Phase One of the project that will begin in the Spring.

The street will include special lighting and a screen that will drop from the bridge between the two Coop buildings; essentially, the street will become a pedestrian-friendly plaza. This art project was funded by a group of private property owners including himself, DiGiovanni said.

“The community has been terrific in the process,” said DiGiovanni. “We would all like this to go faster, but it takes longer than you think.”