By Linda Scott
Watertown Resident
We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us.
– Winston Churchill
This is a follow-up to “Where is your Neighborhood Going? (Parts One and Two)”
As I read the responses to the above letters in Watertown News, I decided that maybe an overview of recent housing development in Watertown was in order. So here goes.
Watertown’s Bona Fides
Watertown has proven again and again that we are a thoughtful, generous community. We have welcomed newcomers of all kinds and made room for their traditions. We have been a leader in supporting the learning disabled community and those with physical and emotional challenges as well, going back many more years than we will be reviewing here.
In 2019, Watertown was lauded in a Boston Globe article for being a leader in creating new housing (one of just four communities in Massachusetts). The title of the article: “NIMBY? Not in These Cities and Towns.”
For those of you who have not been following this issue, NIMBY stands for “Not In My Backyard,” a pejorative term for anyone who opposes any building for any reason. It’s simple but effective … publicly shame people into submission who don’t agree with you.
Apparently, from 2013 to 2017, fifteen cities and towns issued more than half of the building permits for the entire state. Of those 15 communities, Boston, Cambridge, Everett and Watertown permitted more than half of the multi-family housing. This report was issued by the Boston Foundation’s Greater Boston Housing Report Card.
In 2020, it was reported that Watertown reached Massachusetts Safe Harbor status, which means that Massachusetts deems us a community that has built enough affordable housing to meet this state goal:
General Land Area Minimum (1.5 percent Rule): A municipality can claim Safe Harbor if the land area occupied by affordable housing units comprises more than 1.5 percent of the total land area zoned for residential, commercial, or industrial use.
Watertown stood at 1.74% of the total land area.
Assistant Town Manager Steve Magoon said this:
“I think it [Safe Harbor status] is significant in a couple of ways. It is a result of a significant amount of hard work by staff — (senior planners) Gideon Schreiber and Laurel Schwab. Secondly, I think we are one of the only, if not the only, municipality in the state that meets that criteria.”
In other words, Watertown is one of the top Massachusetts communities committed to the permitting of new multi-family housing in the State. And possibly, Watertown is the only municipality that has committed a percentage of our very small land mass to affordable housing.
More recently, add to that our City’s decision for Watertown Square: zoning for 3,133 housing units instead of the 1,701 units mandated by the MBTA Law. In short, Watertown has the receipts.
All of that as Watertown housing prices continue to rise, new housing stock replaces older, more affordable stock, and with it, Watertown families are forced to leave their homes.
Recent Additions to Watertown’s “Skyline”
Now let’s take a look at a rough calculation of multi-unit housing built after 2019. I count a total of 663 housing units:
345 Pleasant Street (2020)
365 Pleasant Street (2020)
375 Pleasant Street (2020) = 64 units total
385 Pleasant Street (2020)
405 Pleasant Street (2022)
330-350 Pleasant Street (2020) = 99 units
166 Main Street (2022) = 35 units
101 N. Beacon Street (2021)) = 28 units
88 Arsenal Yards Blvd (2021) = 300 units
104 Main Street (soon to be completed (2026)): = 137 units
Total: 663 units
This is not an exhaustive list. For instance, it doesn’t include the many single family homes that were converted into multi-family homes. We’ve all seen them.
Due to be Built Soon:
Now let’s add the new buildings proposed and approved under the MBTA Law for 2026.
Again, this is not a complete list, just an “off the top of my head” enumeration and only reflects construction in what is defined as in “Watertown Square”:
75 Spring Street: 5 units
45-59 Mount Auburn Street: 153 units
33 Mt. Auburn Street: 40 units
108 Water Street: 52 unitsTotal: 250 units
Can you add more to this list?
Remember, we’re zoned to allow 3,133 units, just in the Watertown Square Area Plan alone. Just 2,883 more units to go! I might add, with no serious and immediate commitment for public transportation.
If all goes according to plan, all of the above projects should be simultaneously in construction mode in Watertown Square in 2026 or 2027.
Oh, add to that restructuring of the streets in Watertown Square without a cheap and removable trial run (Jersey barriers, etc.) before we commit millions of dollars to this project. I believe a street study is being conducted now.
All of this construction could have a chilling effect on our local businesses that are already reeling from Mt. Auburn Street construction.
And in the Near Future?
Let’s not forget a potential huge multi-story parking garage where the CVS lot is now located (a George Proakis pet project). See the red outlined area on map.
This would involve:
Cutting down as many as 20 plus trees in an area already described as a heat island
Demolishing a small historic commercial building
Subsidizing extra parking spots with taxpayer money to make up for the ones lost by meager parking mandates/developer incentives for new housing construction.
Making many women in this community feel less safe and uncomfortable to park in Watertown Square to patronize the businesses there.
As a matter of fact, I saw one study that estimated that 59 percent of women avoid parking garages: “Women prioritize safety, lighting and close proximity to exits when choosing parking spots, with 59 percent feeling least safe in garages compared to 47 percent of men according to LiveView Technologies (LVT).” See: https://www.lvt.com/press/one-third-of-us-women-avoid-in-person-shopping-due-to-parking-lot-safety-concerns
Here’s one of many sites on parking garage safety tips: https://premierbodyarmor.com/blogs/pba/staying-safe-in-a-parking-garage?srsltid=AfmBOooDLoRpapu3-jLYmJzMm5NrfjIY2mHwbKhwLhJ4-hdd9QP6BXwB
Perhaps substantial renovations to the MassPike and Newton Corner will be going on at the same time. Has anyone been following that?
Has the Newton Corner project been put on hold, or will that become a complicating factor?
And Additionally
Let’s not forget the East End. The Watertown Community Preservation Committee (CPC) has already recommended and the City Council has approved $6,000,000 for Willow Park and $1.675 million for 103 Nichols Ave. If/when additional funding becomes available, add the East End’s approved projects, Willow Park (138 units in total/78 new units) and 103 Nichols Ave. (5 units for special needs folks … none guaranteed to be from Watertown …) to our housing total.
Buildings in Limbo or on Hold
Now let’s look at proposed building projects (quite a few bio labs) that have been put on hold in Watertown for multiple years and multiple reasons and may be coming due soon:
99 Water Street
275 & 313 Pleasant Street, 84-86 Rosedale Rd, 60 Acton Street
560 Pleasant (Russos)
Also, listed as vacant properties:
705 Mt Auburn
64 Grove Street
Are you exhausted yet? I certainly am!
Some Recent Historical Context
At one Comprehensive Plan meeting in 2023, a (future) HAW (Housing for All Watertown) steering committee member rose to accuseWatertown of thinking that it’s Weston, because they didn’t rezone the Russell Avenue area for multifamily dwellings.
In response to this, a young Watertown resident and father from another part of Watertown rose to say, “We are not Weston. We are not Brighton either. We are Watertown,” which inspired a loud and lengthy applause from those residents in the room.
At the July 15, 2025 Watertown Affordable Trust meeting, that same HAW steering committee member presented and pushed for this same whole city rezoning agenda. See https://www.watertownmanews.com/2026/01/16/letter-part-2-do-you-know-where-your-neighborhood-is-going/
No one is saying “No” to building affordable housing. They’re just saying, “For God’s sake, let’s not lose us as a community while we’re doing it!”
An abundance of affordable housing? Great idea! Sadly, we just can’t count on HAW, a group with possible ties to big developers, to make it happen in a way that will save Watertown’s unique community. See: https://massterlist.com/2025/07/17/a-yimby-super-pac-enters-the-arena/
One Final Note
Please indulge me as I add one final quote:
“Architecture should speak of its time and place, but yearn for timelessness.” Architect Frank Gehry
Question: Are any of you seeing any examples of new Watertown housing architecture that you’d like to see historically preserved in fifty years?
Thus ends my most recent thoughts and observations on this matter … and yours?
You missed Elan on Arsenal St as well. The Elan has 262 units and was completed in 2020, and the River Park Lofts on Howard St with 65 units. Those bring existing units up to 990.
Hopefully the spaces directly behind CVS will all be signed as
HANDICAP when the enclosed parking garage goes live.
Planners misjudged the need for biotech laboratories and I
worry that a huge parking structure may be too much for
whatever the Watertown Square area finally becomes. Even
now we have trouble keeping existing restaurants open.
Why can we not encourage a top bakery and a U S Post Office?
Hi Robert,
I guess the “experts” were engaging in some wishful thinking when they kept insisting that we could never build enough bio labs. Planning with rose colored glasses on isn’t ideal and could put Watertown in a very vulnerable situation in the future.
For an article that explains how vulnerable Watertown is tax-wise right now, see: https://www.watertownmanews.com/2026/02/03/watertown-city-officials-join-state-reps-on-beacon-hill-to-ask-for-residential-tax-relief/
Currently, we seem to be doing a bit better than places like Cambridge, lab-wise, because our spaces are competitive in price. Another draw to Watertown vs. Cambridge labs …the abundant (and free?) parking spaces for workers that were built into the lab projects, according to the Boston Globe.
As the biotech market continues to shake out (larger labs gobbling up the smaller ones, with many of them located in other parts of the country) we’ll see.
The large parking garage is not a done deal. The details haven’t been revealed to the public yet. Keep a close eye out for them. Hint: I’m guessing that the diagram that I included in my letter won’t begin to do it justice. When these plans are revealed, be sure to give your feedback to your councilors. They’re not mind readers, and I’m sure they would appreciate your input.
Also, as far as the Post Office is concerned, I agree that this would be a very welcome re-addition to the Square. With the closing of Not Your Average Joe’s, Watertown Square is losing yet another important business. The reopening of the Post Office, a very popular service and big draw, would bring more people back to the Square.
Thanks Elaine,
I was sure I didn’t catch them all. That’s quite an addition!
Watertown as Weston? Tell me more. No, just kidding. We couldn’t be Weston if, we tried—and we don’t want to try. (HAW might want that person to keep his/her own counsel, rather than keep saying the quiet part out loud.) “Watertown is one of the top Massachusetts communities committed to the permitting of new multi-family housing in the State,” as you wrote above.
A little more open space, or greening what open space we do have, on the other hand, would be welcome. And a cheap fix. Spare us the “climate resiliency” claptrap if the first, second, and third step in redevelopment is to clearcut, then build. Reflective roofs and solar panels are good SECOND choices to a green canopy. Heat islands are a choice. Choose better. Besides, I thought the MBTA plan was to make residents more reliant on public transportation than private cars. What’s the multistory parking garage for, Blue Bikes and scooters (don’t get me started on scooters)? Good for you for pointing about people just don’t dig parking garages: sixty percent of women is a significant share, and half of men isn’t nothing either.
The original Watertown (1636) included modern day Watertown, Waltham, Weston, and part of Lincoln. http://www.westonhistory.org/data/uploads/weston-history/maps/1636-watertown-settlements.jpg
Yes, also parts of Cambridge and Concord. The original Watertown borders went from Fresh Pond to Walden Pond!
Thanks, Josh.
I thought that it was my turn to say the quiet part out loud. I hate to see people in this community emotionally beaten up and portrayed as something other or smaller than they are. Watertown is not perfect and doesn’t pretend to be, something that I’ve always liked about it here.
We can be proud that we try, and sometimes that effort is acknowledged, as in the recent excellent record we have for housing production.
We have a wide array of opinions on everything, and that makes life interesting. What we don’t need, in my opinion, is an approach that heavily relies on orthodoxy, with anyone who doesn’t agree 100% with what your group espouses being labelled a heretic.
As for trees…I’m a big fan!!
Advocating for mass parking over private parking seems to be what planers are doing.
I live near Watertown Sq. and this fall I had several drivers stop me as I was walking to ask if I know of any off street parking. Clearly planers have gotten that wrong in their parking estimating.
What will transportation look like in the future? What should we try to make it look like and how should we do that? Have we properly asked or answered these questions?
Beside the kinds of housing Watertown should be promoting, is that there are too competing types of transportation philosophy’s, getting though town quickly and not giving a water dam on how long it takes. (:-) Charlie).
It seems Watertown has settled on the later. I would like to see planning on the public transportation, bicycle, electric mobility and cars to be all brought together into an over all plan with no part of it being the priority (they are all valid priorities depending on what is right for you). I would love to hear from Zeke (transportation planer) on this idea.
I personally see all this new industrial housing without additional and equal open space as being very detrimental to the emotional well being of the future residences of this town.
If you look at some of the changes they do in other places in the world, Watertown is thinking really really small about what’s best and what’s possible.
Hi David,
You have some valid points here. I think that you’re right that we’re micro-planning, picking what’s popular at the moment without considering the whole picture. Lab overdevelopment is one recent example. Ironically, what seems to have put the brakes on that runaway train was the economy, not common sense.
As far as producing a half a parking space per new housing unit (yes, that’s really the ratio!), that’s called an “incentive” to the builder. Evidently, parking spaces are very expensive to build. It all comes down to economics.
Add to this the push by some residents with cars without a “home parking space” to advocate for year round street parking. That has the effect of making our streets more dangerous. On any given evening, when most people are home, try getting a fire truck up your street.
Here’s another building “incentive” that I know was making its way through the legislature, but I’ve lost track…building multi-family buildings without a second egress. Let’s ignore the fact that they save lives. It’s a monetary “incentive” for builders.
One of the major pieces to this puzzle is public transportation, but given this scary economy, I’m not sure we can rely on that in the immediate future.