Happy New Year! We have received the final project report from the MIT student team that worked on planning for the future of Brickbottom and the McGrath Highway corridor during the Fall 2014 semester. The full document is available at this link.

The student team conducted lots of stakeholder interviews, and hosted two community meetings during the semester. We’d like to say a big “thank you” to all the Somerville residents, business owners, commercial landlords and community activists who took the time to participate.

Folks in the neighborhood and around the city emphasized the need to preserve what’s great about Brickbottom today, at the same time as we harness the energy of new investment to help achieve our shared goals. This vision is consistent with the consultant-generated district plan for Inner Belt and Brickbottom that can be found at this link.

To stay plugged in regarding next steps, keep an eye on citywide zoning reform at this link. Progressive new legislation will be debated this month (including at important public meetings January 20th and January 29th), and it includes regulations to support continued fabrication, light industrial and arts-related uses in Brickbottom and throughout Somerville.