LYNN — The MBTA, City of Lynn, and Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) hosted an open house focused on the Lynnway Multimodal Corridor Project to inform the public about future projects on Wednesday evening.
During the event, the community heard about the City’s vision for the Lynnway roadway, and attendees had an opportunity to ask questions, add input, and talk with the project team.
The three groups’ collective vision for the redesign of the Lynnway includes: Safety improvements for pedestrians, cyclists, transit riders, and drivers; infrastructure for faster, more reliable, and more comfortable bus connections to the Blue Line, Lynn ferry terminal, Lynn Commuter Rail station, and downtown Lynn; and safer and more convenient access to parks, businesses, and the waterfront.
Although DCR owns the Lynnway, the MBTA has the decision-making authority in this project. This is largely due to the $20 million in Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability & Equity grant funding for significant improvements to the Lynnway.
Director of Green Transportation for the DCR Daniel Driscoll said that the organization is “committed to working on all of our roads to try to make them safer for all users, and we’ve proven … that you can reduce road width, not severely impact traffic, but make them much safer for pedestrians and bikes, and we can hopefully get some trees planted too.”
Senior project manager for Transit Priority at the MBTA, Phillip Cherry, said the Lynnway project is in the beginning stages. He said this is the first time the organization has solicited public opinion.
“We have heard a lot of the good, bad, and ugly of the public comment,” Cherry said.
He said he hopes by the end of the calendar year, the MBTA will have a concept or concepts with some options for the public to review again.
“The Feedback people have about the Lynnway today and what they would like to see in the future is a key component of how we will develop that concept, or the potential multiple concepts,” Cherry said.
Cherry added that the MBTA has met with “some elected officials from both the state and local level, a few weeks ago and briefed them on this project,” if asked if the Multimodal Corridor Project is working with other communities aside from Lynn.
He added, “Our survey is open through mid-July, and we will continue to engage primarily in Lynn, but I think we will continue to push notice of this project and other local communities as well.”
Lynn’s city planner, Aaron Clausen, said the main concerns he has heard about the current state of the Lynnway are traffic congestion and pedestrian safety.
He said he wanted to know “what the main priorities” of the constituents were for this redesign.
“This is the first step in this design process. We’re looking to take these experiences back to inform the design, and there’ll be real opportunities to engage through surveys and open house meetings,” Clausen said.
An attendee of the open house, Hope Abramson, said she would like to see a more aesthetically pleasing scenery along the Lynnway. She believes more people would be poised to use a bike lane or a pedestrian walkway if there were more aesthetically pleasing areas lining the Lynnway.
Karyl Stoia, another attendee, said she came to the open house to see what kind of connections could be made to the Northern Strand bike trail and Harbor Park.
Karen Johnson said, “Obviously, there are a lot of things that need to change, like traffic control flow, rather than the fact that they’re putting in lanes for bicycles. Bicycles are really important to us.”
Historical Commission Secretary Pat Lee expressed a desire for Harbor Park to be easily accessible, suggesting a connection to the Lynnway project be implemented.
She added that although the project aims to make the Lynnway safer for pedestrians and bikers, safety must also be enforced by police officers on the Lynnway for it to succeed.
Attendee and co-chair of the Rider Oversight Committee for the MBTA, Stefan Wuensch, said he believes “this is a really good plan.”
“It’s going to increase safety. Having that extra lane is absolutely going to increase safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, people getting on and off the buses and for vehicles,” he said.
The Lynnway is a major roadway, part of Route 1A, and is owned and operated by DCR. It extends north from the General Edwards Bridge at the Revere city line to the Nahant Rotary. The Lynnway serves as a significant north-south connection to and within the city.
With more than 3,000 daily bus riders along the Lynnway and key connections to nearby routes serving over 8,500 riders daily, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority states that upgrades will improve travel time and reliability for over 70,000 riders each week.
The Lynnway’s bus routes link to broader systems that serve more than 8,500 riders each day. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority stated that planned enhancements will significantly cut travel times and improve schedule reliability, benefiting more than 70,000 weekly riders.
