• in 2001 the MBTA outlined a long-discussed project for a new transit corridor running through Boston and six other cities, called the Urban Ring

• in 2002 the Metropolitan District Commission (MDC)—now part of the state Dept. of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) —released its Charles River Master Plan

• between June, 2000 and April, 2003, Harvard spent over $460 million to acquire real estate along both sides of the river

Ambitious schemes are being hatched by Boston University, MIT, the biotech-biomedical industry, and institutions both public and private. These plans are hardly coordinated, and some will never make it past the computer screen. But if they are dreams, they are the dreams of rich and powerful people; and they converge in important ways.

Here we can only take a few jabs at a huge, complex subject. We will begin in a little meadow near the Cambridge end of the B.U. Bridge. Bob LaTrémouille has spent a lot of time on that patch of ground over the past seven years. When I first met him, twenty years ago, he was already spending more time being a community activist than practicing his specialty, zoning law. He is continually at war with the policies and practices of many of the politicians, bureaucrats, developers, and activists who contest the Cambridge arena, whom he describes as “sick… bizarre… reprehensible… evil… vile… reprehensible scum.” Apparently, they don’t much like Bob, either. Almost every week he stands before the glowering eyes of the city council to denounce the “destroyers of the river.” He says there is “a flat out pogrom” against white geese who spend their days honking and waddling around near the B.U. Bridge, blithely unconcerned with human notions of toilet training. A lot of people agree with LaTrémouille, admire the birds, and come to him with information and complaints about other things that are going on up and down the river. He connects all these things with the fate of the geese. At times, his discourse seems a bit incoherent. But the main point gets across.

A lot is going on in the so-called lower basin of the Charles River. And a lot converges at the place where the geese live. On a cold, blustery day a few months ago I came here with a friend to see the geese up close. You should come too. Stepping down into a miniature meadow, you find yourself in a world apart—surprisingly calm and warm, and even subtly numinous. There are quite a lot of white geese here. Startling if you’re not used to them, because they’re pretty big. It’s also a surprise to see the railroad track, even though you knew there’s supposed to be one there. Look up that track onto the railroad bridge, and you’ll see a second set of tracks that don’t lead anywhere. Nobody has to convince you this structure has been here for a hundred years.

Marilyn Wellons has often been here to visit and feed the geese. Four years ago she noticed “a pattern of escalating violence” directed at them. There were unfounded rumors that they carried the West Nile Virus. Someone left a threatening note on her car windshield. Finally, birds started turning up dead and mutilated. Wellons, LaTrémouille and other Friends of the White Geese are opposed to two other groups: • Friends of Magazine Beach, advocates of “upgrading” this sector of the riverbank; Cambridge city councilor Henrietta Davis is a founding member. • The Charles River Conservancy, founded in 1999 with corporate and institutional sponsorship, which recruits volunteers to help “revitalize the parklands” in cooperation with the MDC/DCR. Goose defenders are afraid that such volunteering may feed a vigilante mentality in some individuals. They think this is the connection between public agencies and guys creeping around at night to knife the birds and addle their eggs.

Humane dispositions When the Friends of Magazine Beach (yes, it really used to be a beach, folks, fifty years ago) could not get the cash-strapped MDC to make the improvements they wanted, they approached State Rep (now Senator) Jarrett Barrios, who negotiated a deal: the City of Cambridge agreed to pay the entire $1.5 million cost. Existing muddy banks and softball-soccer field are to be dug up, the soil replaced, graded and furnished with pathways. “The people who use the park, which are a lot of low- and moderate-income families,” said Barrios, are “not the squeaky wheels that the goose lovers are….” He thought the geese were a nuisance and should be “humanely disposed of.” He denied that this meant killing them. LaTrémouille then produced a flyer suggesting that Barrios himself should be “humanely disposed of.” Barrios expressed alarm—this was a death threat! [Heh, heh….]

Moreover for the goose defenders, this was not about improving playing fields. What the deal actually meant was that taxpayer money would be used to subsidize Boston University, and at the same time drive out the white geese. And indeed, for several years the MDC/DCR has let BU use the area for its graduation ceremonies; it even calls the neighboring goose meadow The BU Triangle. BU has had people come over to “its” Triangle to hack down a lot of vegetation, including bushes used as nesting areas by the white geese and a pair of hawks.

Enter, Lords of the Ring The Urban Ring is a plan for a mass transit corridor from Chelsea to South Boston, through Everett, Somerville, Cambridge, and Brookline. Today everyone has to travel into the center of Boston and out again to get to any other point on the rail system. The Ring would link the existing rail system at points a few miles out, freeing riders from the necessity of passing through the center. Phase two of the printed Urban Ring plan calls for a modification of the Grand Junction railroad bridge which runs under under the BU Bridge—remember, this is where the geese live—to accommodate two lanes of bus traffic. A dedicated bus route would run alongside the B&A tracks that run through the MIT area toward East Cambridge. Right now, in the words of one traffic engineer, all this is “just chalk on a map.” No money has been appropriated to do any of this work, only to study it. And the MBTA's Peter Calcaterra says his agency has abandoned the idea of building the Urban Ring over the railroad bridge. He doesn’t say, no Urban Ring. He doesn’t say that nobody else will find creative uses for the railroad bridge. The chalk on the map reminds old-timers of the planned route of the Inner Belt highway, defeated by neighborhood resistance in the 1960s. But the Belt was meant for through-traffic between downtown Boston and the suburbs. Today’s Urban Ring is meant to serve the intensive redevelopment of the very neighborhoods which were then slated for annihilation.

The universities and the riverfront Cambridge’s city manager Healy and then-State Representative Barrios strongly supported the Urban Ring in 2002. Barrios wrote that the route through Cambridgeport was so “essential” that planning agencies “should simply assume more money will be accessible.” Some people who don’t expect an Urban Ring to come down the pike very soon, are very concerned that Harvard University may try to get the present Mass. Turnpike exit diverted from its new holdings in Allston to the Grand Junction Railroad Bridge. That’s the one that runs under the BU bridge and touches ground in the goose meadow. Hmm. How bout a quick inventory of Harvard’s land purchases along the river:

• June 2000—Allston Landing— $151.7 million • Mar 2001— Watertown Arsenal— $180 million • Dec 2001— Polaroid site, Cambridgeport— $40 million • Aug 2002— CELCO plant,Western Ave— $14.6 million • April 2003— Mass Turnpike exit, Allston— $75 million After each of these purchases, Harvard representatives followed their honorable tradition of announcing that there were no plans to further develop the land before the next appearance of Halley’s Comet. “It will be years before there is any development by Harvard on the property.” (Paul Grogan, July 2000) “Harvard has no immediate or near-term plans for the property.” (Lauren Marshall, April 2003) Last spring Harvard initiated a meeting with residents of Allston’s Charlesbank low-income housing development near the Stadium, offering to buy the site and relocate them in new quarters, presumably well out of sight. (Low-income people, yuck!) And last fall Harvard secured a zoning truce with its perennially troublesome Riverside neighbors, in order to go forward with riverfront development there. Boston Globe reporter Richard Kindleberger wrote that a developer would have to rearrange the CSX rail yard and the MassPike ramp to make the best use of the land purchased in 2000. Mac Daniel noted in the Globe that the 2003 deed specifically allowed Harvard to move rail easements, roadway, and toll plaza. The MTA’s attitude was: “Whatever dollars we can get, we will take.” (Andrew Natsios, June 2000); and, well, Harvard would have to pay for any ramp relocation costs. (Matt Amorello, June 2003) Although Harvard recently ended the largest funds drive in U.S. college history — $2.6 billion—it is about to embark on a new effort to raise twice again as much. According to Stephen M. Marks in the March 3rd Harvard Crimson, “The lynchpin of the campaign will likely be the University’s new campus in Allston… as the center of the University is moved from the John Harvard statue to the Charles River.… [B]illions more will likely be required to prepare the land and begin construction of the first parts of the new campus, which could happen as soon as five years from now.” Only five years!

The Charles River Master Plan The year after the Urban Ring proposal it was the turn of the MDC/DCR’s Charles River Master Plan. It is difficult to do justice to the grandiosity of its vision. But then, grandiose plans do not always do justice to us. Like most plans, this one must adapt itself to the plans of others. But not in every instance. Across from Allston in Cambridge is Hell’s Half Acre. This is a small wetlands, located a couple of miles upriver from Magazine Beach. Here landscape de-signers can give play to their values without the complications introduced by new highway exits and science centers . One of the themes of the Master Plan is a return to the “original vision” of the gentlemen who planned the river’s park system, long, long ago. So there is a desire to get rid of “invasive species” —prolific life forms which produce boring ecosystems by crowding out the original inhabitants. To this way of thinking, our white geese might be regarded as invasive. Certain plant species are definitely included. Let me reassure you however, that we Americans of European ancestry have received a special exemption and will not be classified as invasive species. Fully half of Hell’s Half Acre has become a monoculture of the much-despised phragmites—a kind of reeds that shake their florets at you from a height of about twelve feet. These guys favor the banks of sluggishly-flowing rivers—rivers such as the lower Charles has been since the dam was built. So the plan is to get rid of phragmites. And who would care to defend such a homely vegetable? Well, wouldn’t you know, ten years ago, when the Boston Park Dept. was getting ready to attack the phrag thickets near the Fenway victory gardens, a crowd of local residents came out to physically block the cutting. The Master Plan calls for another assault on the Fenway phrags. This could be the end of them, since so many of the neighborhood’s activists were driven out after losing rent control. Interestingly, both at the Fenway and at Hell’s Half Acre, these reed forests have been a rendezvous for gay men for as long as anyone can remember. A fact left un-mentioned in the MDC/DCR Master Plan, otherwise so full of fascinating historical background. At Hell’s Half Acre, humans are also on queue to be uprooted. The Marsh Post American Legion is making inappropriate use of the river’s edge. It’s not a yacht club; so it doesn’t “need” to be there. The status of war veterans is not what it used to be. Now back downriver, just past the Geese and the BU Bridge.

The historic parkways initiative—sounds cool, doesn’t it? It means going back to the way things were when Esplanade meant the Cambridge side of the river. Now in those days, there were no cars, and there weren’t many trees. MIT wasn’t there either, but again there’s a special exemption. The MDC/DCR notified the Cambridge Conservation Commission June 30, 2003, that to help improve Memorial Drive it planned to uproot around 300 trees, mostly located in the wide strip that divides that road southeast of Mass. Avenue. The Commission asked the MDC/DCR to negotiate with the City Arborist. Director Jennifer Wright told me that about 65 trees, all on the “central reservation” are now proposed for removal. All but two are considered diseased or severely damaged. Two saplings must be planted for every adult tree removed. MDC/DCR’s Joe Orfant confirmed the numbers, and expects removal work to begin this summer.

Kathy Podgers has lived in Cambridge for forty years, for many of which she has driven up to the river and parked, in the only place on either side of the river where that could be done—off Memorial Drive across from MIT. Her windshield carries a card which entitles her to park in a handicap space. It’s hard for her to walk, and only a car gives her practical access to the river. Last year, just before the Fourth of July, that section Memorial Drive was fenced off—“for security reasons, just for the holiday,” she was told. But as the French say, nothing is more permanent than the temporary. The fences stayed up, and it emerged that all 300 riverfront-parking spaces were being eliminated. A big sign went up: “Historic Parkways Initiative —Demonstration Project.” This was Ms Podgers’ introduction to the Charles River Master Plan. She says she called the MDC/DCR and spoke with Joe Orfant. He told her that not all parking was being removed, that parking would still be available at the four yacht clubs, which included one handicap space per club. Were these spaces going to be available to the public? Well, no.

Ms. Podgers has a question for our elected and appointed officials. “Should public money be used to eliminate public parking… while continuing to provide parking to private yacht clubs, especially considering [that this] violates Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act?”

Sure, why not? Didn’t you know, citizen, that the riverfront where you loved to go for an hour of fresh air and a run for your dog, is known among planners as “boathouse row?” Don’t you realize that the whole Historic Parkways project is in front of MIT; that MIT is the only abutter; that the design work was funded by MIT and NSTAR? The field survey was conducted by volunteers from the Charles River Conservancy, whose membership overlaps with that of the boat houses. After finishing with the trees and parking spaces, the Historic Parkways project will have a second phase. Well, here we are back at the goose meadow.

A four-lane bridge Stash Horowitz is a pretty knowledgeable fellow, and he doesn’t live far from the B.U. Bridge. He tends to doubt that the MBTA is actually going to be doing anything with the Grand Junction Railroad Bridge any time soon. He thinks MIT would object to the new roadway that’s supposed to run from the bridge, up along the old B&A railroad tracks among MIT lab buildings, and on to Kendall Square.. Former city councilor Jonathan Myers however, told me that Bob Simha, MIT’s last planning director, seemed positive about that very idea when it was first being discussed in the mid 1990s. But neighbors are beginning to worry about Harvard trying to get the turnpike exit moved to the B.U. Bridge, and that it could very well succeed, and soon. They are worried about what will happen to the traffic after it leaves such a new bridge. Phase two of the Urban Ring, the MDC/DCR Charles River Master Plan, Phase two of the Historic Parkways Initiative, the BU Triangle, the $1.5 million Magazine Beach renovation, and the ambitions of Harvard to build a huge new science campus in Allston—everything seems to bring us back to where we started—the little meadow full of honking and waddling. When phase two of the Historic Parkways Initiative gets here, it is set to follow the plan laid down in the Master Plan: •“use the abandoned half of the Grand Junction Railroad Bridge to provide pedestrian and bicycle access.” That old bridge keeps getting wider: now it’s a bus route, a bike path, a train track, and a turnpike exit. Hey, why not do it all at once? Maybe we can get Harvard to pick up the tab. •“Regrade the bank and fill the hollow profile. Replant the turf.” And where are the geese going to go in the meantime? We’ve been in that hollow. It is their world. •“Discourage the growth of the flock of feral geese”— kind of redundant . •“Magazine Beach as a place of celebrations and special events”—BU is already seeing to that. The Urban Ring started as a concession made by the Big Dig to environmental groups who had sued on behalf of the transportation needs of lower income and minority people.

It’s about development, stupid. But since that time an awful lot of people have been priced out of the neighborhood. No surprise then, that the 2002 study’s real focus is on real estate development. “By enhancing transportation and connectivity within these urban neighborhoods, new redevelopment opportunities will occur without promoting sprawl….” A 46% population increase is projected for Cambridgeport over 20 years, the highest rate of increase in the Urban Ring zone. The planners reckon that “the region’s on-going growth in higher income populations” will be heavily concentrated in Cambridgeport, North Point, and Kendall Square. MIT has recently experienced a financial squeeze that has delayed construction projects and led to employee layoffs. But it couldn’t pass up buying the former Polaroid building at Main and Windsor for $15 million. It now controls virtually everything east of Lafayette Square—which is at the intersection of Mass. Avenue and Main Street—except Union Baptist and Tootsie Roll. Adjacent is its huge University Park. Lafayette Square is being reshaped, in the business interests of MIT/University Park, by the City of Cambridge and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. A new “park,” at a cost of $4 million, will cut off Main Street from Mass. Avenue. This was actually in the original MIT plan for University Park. The park plan blocks off the lowest-income Cam-bridge neighborhood—Area 4 —from Central Square and University Park. Travellers will thus not have to encounter Area 4 on trips between the science parks in Allston and Kendall Square. There’s no money to do an Urban Ring now. (Yes we know, it was only supposed to be for buses.) Why shouldn’t MIT pitch in and help? The City of Cambridge is already working on bypass roads in Cambridgeport. When will MIT move to develop its holdings east of Lafayette Square? When it does, very likely it will be the $300 million joint Harvard-MIT Genome Institute, announced last June, since it is to be administered by the Whitehead Institute, which is already in the neighborhood. MIT has become increasingly dependent on its real estate and other investments, and continues to be among the country’s largest defense contractors. Harvard and B.U. are now eager to follow it into the new brave world of bioterrorism and biotechnical research and development. The insiders’ buzzword is GeneTown: Beantown will become Genetown. Even the powerful Dept. of Homeland Security might have an interest in weaving the dense web of infrastructure around such patriotic efforts. Jarrett Barrios was probably right. With so much at stake, we should just assume that the money will be forthcoming.