By Adam Swift
Opening up access to the waterfront in Chelsea has been a major goal of city officials and local environmental groups for decades.
Last Wednesday, May 21, saw another major milestone in creating public access to the waterfront with the groundbreaking of the Chelsea Creek Waterfront project at the southern portion of the Pre-Flight, LLC parking property along Eastern Avenue and the Chelsea Creek. The total area of the Pre-Flight property is just over 22.5 acres, with approximately 19 acres of land and 3.5 acres of water.
The project will create a walkway composed of crushed seashells, surrounded by newly planted grasses and native plantings, that will extend from Eastern Avenue. The walkway will also feature a nautical-themed rope and post barrier that will lead visitors to a view of Chelsea Creek. This observation area will feature a historic anchor point to honor the site’s maritime heritage.
“The past three city managers have had a hand in this,” said Chelsea City Manager Fidel Maltez said, praising the efforts former city managers Jay Ash and Tom Ambrosino played in making the open space on Chelsea Creek a reality.
The project will align with Chelsea’s long-term resiliency efforts to protect against future flooding and could also lay the groundwork for potential commercial development, which could include structured parking, industrial development, or a hotel, as allowed by the Chapter 91 permit (the Massachusetts Public Waterfront Act).
“This project has been a long time in the making, and today marks a significant step forward for our community,” said Maltez. “It will create access to a beautiful waterfront viewing area complete with landscaped areas and seating where our residents can gather, reflect, and enjoy the connection to the water that has been missing for a long, long time.”
The Chelsea Creek Waterfront Project, along with the planned Lewis Latimer Park across the street from the waterfront park, will finally open up the waterfront to residents, Maltez said.
Work between the city, the state, and environmental agencies with Pre-Flight has laid the groundwork necessary to allow Pre-Flight to eventually redevelop the site as a whole, Maltez added.
“At DEP Waterways, we work hard every day to make the shoreline accessible to folks,” said Daniel Padien, the Waterways program chief for the Massachusetts DEP.
Padien said projects like the one on Chelsea Creek are only made possible by hard work and persistence by the state, city, and the developer to provide access points along the shore.
John Walkey, the director of climate justice and waterfront initiatives for GreenRoots, echoed the sentiments about the project being a longtime in the making, noting that when he first came aboard at GreenRoots years ago, opening up access to the waterfront did not seem like an achievable goal.
“When GreenRoots first started, waterfront wasn’t even on our radar, we were called the greenspace and recreation committee and we were just trying to get more park space,” said Walkey. “Someone reached out to us and said, what about your waterfront, and we said, what waterfront? And that is what started this 30 year odyssey of saying, look at the Esplanade, look at what’s happening above the Amelia Earhart Dam at the Mystic River, look at what’s happening at Boston Harbor in terms of the clean up … why is Chelsea left out of this, why should Chelsea just be stuck with the industrial end of things?”
Jim Mueller, the CEO of InterPark/Pre-Flight also noted the 20 year journey it took to create public space on the company’s private property.
“Even though we are the long-term owner of these properties, the idea is that eventually they will all pass on to somebody else,” said Mueller. “We owe a debt to those people to pass them on better than we found them. So this idea of ownership in a responsible way has been a core part of what we do.”
The project is expected to be completed and open to the public by the middle of the summer.