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One bright spot over the past twelve months of COVID-19 has been the expansion of outdoor dining. It has made Davis Square a better place and kept some of our businesses alive. This success has shown that traffic does calm, and pedestrian safety is improved when outdoor space is prioritized for people.

We now have an opportunity to make some dramatic changes based on what we learned last year, and from the experiences of other cities and towns with pedestrian streets (Boston, Salem, and Newburyport for instance).

Diagrams by Chris Iwerks

Specifically, if we rearrange the traffic patterns in the square we can easily envision Elm being converted into a pedestrian street for two blocks between Day and Cutter. Closing Elm Street to through traffic has the knock-on effect of making the Davis Square intersection much simpler to resolve – providing a level of clarity that has eluded the last 10 years of neighborhood planning for the square.

These two moves – pedestrianizing Elm and a simpler intersection – have the ability to serve as a base plan for growing the square over time and informing future discussions about parking options, servicing approaches, building renovations and real estate developments.

Where such steps have been undertaken in other places the effects have been positive – businesses thrive, safety improves, and people are more attracted. This is something that can easily be done here. It can be set up in a test run using temporary barriers and, when the drainage/water/ sewer infrastructure work is completed under Elm, made permanent.

The past year has proven that Elm works as a pedestrian street and we should build on that success to create a more people-friendly future.

Alan Bingham
for DavisNOW.org