Lost highway

A historic, overgrown win for Boston hikers

Of all the forces and objects that have taken a destructive toll on cities, it’s tough to beat highways. In U.S. cities, highways will often cleave through entire neighborhoods, subjecting residents to relentless air and noise pollution. Worse yet, the decision to route these highways through residential neighborhoods was often rooted in racism. During the post-war Urban Renewal era, the homes of Black families were seized by the government through eminent domain and razed, in order to clear space for the interstates. In Boston, hundreds of families were displaced from Roxbury, Jamaica Plain, and adjacent areas during the 1960s, as the federal government prepared to fund the construction of the Southwest Expressway—an extension of I-95 that would have run 8 miles from Canton to the South End. It would have dismembered Boston.

But it was never built. That’s because a large consortium of activists who would later become known as the People Before Highways movement successfully pressured Governor Francis W. Sargent to call the project off. It was a victory in the wake of a tremendous loss, as scores of homes and small businesses had already been razed to make room for the highway. And what the state ended up building instead of the interstate extension was the Southwest Corridor—a multi-use greenway path, flanked with shade trees, following the MBTA Orange Line tracks from Forest Hills station to Back Bay station. Today, the corridor is one of the great walkable gems of Boston. I’ve traversed the Southwest Corridor innumerable times, on dates, on training runs, on my way to the Reggie Lewis track center to get my first COVID-19 vaccine, you name it.

But the Southwest Corridor wasn’t the only green gift that took root in Boston after the highway upheaval. Remember, the I-95 extension was going to extend all the way from the heart of Boston to Canton, on the southern edge of the city. And hidden within the woods and wetlands near Boston’s southernmost limits today, a forgotten segment of the planned highway that actually made it to the paving stage is now overgrown with vines and shrubs, but still accessible by foot. It serves as an unlikely connection to one of the most ruggedly charming hiking destinations in Greater Boston—the Blue Hills Reservation trail network—and this weekend, I’m going to show you the way in.