Craigie Bridge closure on November 6 will spill over into Somerville
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Signs in Somerville warn commuters of the impending Craigie Drawbridge closure. - Photo by Elizabeth Sheeran

By Elizabeth Sheeran

Commuters headed down McGrath Highway toward Boston next week will only be able to go so far on Route 28.

The Craigie Drawbridge over the Charles River, which connects Boston and Cambridge by the Museum of Science, will be partially closed for construction as of this weekend. Beginning on Saturday, November 6, Boston-bound drivers not headed to the museum itself will have to turn left or right before they get to the river.

Detours will direct them either left over the Gilmore Bridge, onto Austin Street into Charlestown, or right onto Edwin H. Land Boulevard connecting to Memorial Drive in Cambridge. And with the detour point only 2700 feet from the Somerville city line, local police are gearing up for traffic backups around the bridge to spill over into Somerville.

“Our concern all along has been that people will lose patience and start seeking alternate routes through Somerville that will take them on to neighborhood streets,” said Somerville Deputy Police Chief Paul Upton.

He said a half dozen major commuter arteries pass through Cambridge and Somerville headed to the five street-level bridges that cross the Charles into downtown Boston. The state transportation department (MassDOT) estimates more than 42,000 cars a day travel down McGrath Highway alone, and local police say the actual number is probably higher.

Upton said it doesn’t take a traffic engineer to figure out that taking one of those bridges out of commission for repairs will have a cascading effect into Somerville. “If you take all the traffic that’s coming down McGrath Highway in the morning toward Boston, and try to funnel it through fewer options, it’s going to cause congestion here,” said Upton.

And the challenge won’t exactly be short-lived. According to Mass DOT, the first phase of the Craigie Bridge reconstruction will last at least four weeks, when traffic headed into Boston (but not outbound traffic) will be blocked.

That will be followed by a period from December to February when limited traffic will flow in each direction. During the final phase, for two to three months next winter and spring, there will again be no Boston-bound traffic on the bridge. Work on the bridge will proceed seven days a week for 24 hours a day, apart from 10 hours on Thanksgiving and 10 hours on Christmas Day.

Police are hoping that commuters will look for alternatives that reduce the volume of traffic, like public transportation or carpooling, and they are encouraging employers to provide flexible work hours or telecommuting options for their workers. But Upton said they’re planning for the worst.

The Somerville Police Department is coordinating its response with Boston, Cambridge, State and Transit police. MassDOT will fund extra police details throughout Somerville while the bridge is closed, including a full-time detail at Broadway and Mt. Vernon, near the Sullivan Square exit ramp off I-93, and at five other sites during the morning rush hour.

Upton said it will take at least the first week for Somerville police to fully assess how the bridge shutdown is impacting the city. But their goal for now is clear. “Our priority is to prevent gridlock in Somerville and keep the commuters on the commuter routes,” said Upton.