Massive Upper Broadway Reconstruction Project Started

Work on all aspects of Upper Broadway began on Monday starting with the water and sewer piping on the corridor that runs from City Hall to the Revere City line, and the final checkmark on the project’s list won’t be clicked until 2025.

Public Works Director Fidel Maltez announced this week that the $16 million infrastructure and roadway improvement project started on Monday and will continue for several years. The project has been long in the making and planning started under former City Manager Jay Ash in conjunction with the state Department of Transportation (MassDOT).

The massive Upper Broadway infrastructure and roadway project began on Monday at
City Hall. Aqualine contractors will work the next two years to replace water and sewer
pipes from City Hall to the Revere line. After that, the City will reconstruct the roadway,
sidewalks and drainage. The project is expected to wrap up in 2025.

“The Upper Broadway project has been in the works a long time,” said Maltez. “What started on Monday is the full replacement of all water and sewer infrastructure on Broadway. We started at City Hall. We are going to replace all water pipes and all sewer pipes to the Revere line. If we encounter lead pipes, we’ll replace them. If we encounter damaged infrastructure, we’ll replace it. This part of the project is going to take two years.”

That work is being farmed out to Aqualine, a water and sewer work company that has done work on Essex and Webster Streets recently.

Maltez said the work will continue through the winter and wrap up in the fall of 2021.

That part of the project was always the obstacle to working on the roadway, as no City officials wanted to embark on roadway work without digging up the ancient and aging water and sewer pipes.

The breakthrough was getting $10 million in federal funding for the project and $4 million in MWRA Loans and grants. The MWRA portion will include $3 million in grants, and only $1 million in loans. That funding brought the project much more into focus and will end up costing the City very little for such a major project.

The second part of the project will be more visible and will incorporate the federal funds from MassDOT. That will focus on the sidewalks, drainage and paving of Broadway.

“At that point, there’s going to be a separate project that will replace all of the sidewalks, install all new drainage and repave the street – all of it from City Hall to the Revere line,” he said. “Once that happens, we’re also going to have a dedicated bike lane in both directions from City Hall to Revere.”

That roadway work will start in 2023, and will likely wrap up in 2025.

“These are both big projects and will take a long time, but they’ll really change our city I believe,” said Maltez.

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