Tag Archives: travel

Crowds flock to Charlie’s Kitchen sidewalk sale

6 Oct

Memorabilia and the hope of helping its owners re-open drew extensive support for the Harvard Square institution. There may be more to sell next weekend.

Part of the crowds that gathered outside of Charlie’s Kitchen for its farewell sale Oct. 3, 2026.

Hundreds of people came by Charlie’s Kitchen to buy memorabilia and support its co-owner, David Toraji Oshima. Charlie’s, a beloved dive bar in Harvard Square, closed earlier this year due to internal flooding from a dishwasher malfunction. Oshima started the “everything must go” sale to prepare for whatever happens next, which might include relaunching the restaurant and bar.

Re-opening, perhaps at a new location, depends on how a pending insurance claim plays out, since the damage and repair is estimated at near one million dollars. Oshima and partner Derek Luangrath own the bar and restaurant business, while the property is owned by Paul Overgaag, the previous proprietor of Charlie’s and the nearby Red House.

While Oshima hopes to restart, he said the sale was also meant to help to connect with the community and to preserve memories of the place. His sale was slated to start at 3 p.m. Saturday but there were dozens lined up at 1:30PM, which both warmed Oshima and overwhelmed him. “Today was way better than I thought,” Oshima said. “I told everybody 3 to 5, but I started setting up at 1, and by about 1:30, I had hundreds of people here supporting me.”

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Cambridge’s worst intersections getting safety makeovers

26 Sep

“High Crash Locations” are the target of a new effort by the Department of Transportation, starting with three between MIT and Central Square.

The intersection safety data map. Blue dots show safety projects that are or will be underway. Credit: City of Cambridge

After seven deaths in the last four years, the city’s taking new steps to fix its most dangerous intersections, starting with Mass Ave at Albany Street.

That intersection is at the top of Cambridge’s list of High Crash Locations (HCLs), as measured by the number and severity of crashes and whether those crashes involved people walking or biking. Although the Cambridge Department of Transportation (CDOT) has previously reviewed intersections for safety problems, this new program creates a formal process that will be updated every two years. At higher-ranked intersections, transportation staff will examine crash trends, travel patterns, conditions at the site and any recent or planned changes before determining what safety improvement measures to apply.

Jackie McLaughlin, a spokesperson for the Cambridge Department of Transportation (CDOT), said the impetus behind the program came from concerns by city council and others, “especially after some of the fatalities that unfortunately happened and we were trying to identify and formalize the process.”

The program is part of the city’s ongoing Vision Zero effort to eliminate fatal and serious-injury crashes. Somerville has achieved zero road deaths for four years running. Cambridge has had seven fatalities in that same timeframe.

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“Mighty Mary” and the all-woman team that cannonballed America’s Cup

11 Sep

A high seas adventure that broke the glass ceiling

A still from “Mighty Mary”

Most of the action in “Mighty Mary,” the new documentary about the first all-woman yachting team to vie for the America’s Cup in 1995, takes place in San Diego, where the women train and race. But the film also has plenty of Cambridge connections. Director and former Olympic rower Mary Mazzio lived in Cambridge in the early 1990s and trained at the Weld Boathouse on the Charles River. So did two of the Mighty Mary crew, 1992 Olympic teammates of Mazzio: Amy Baltzell and Marci Porter Lucier.

“There used to be a national-team training center run out of Weld Boathouse,” Mazzio said in an interview with Cambridge Day. “All of us came from that — birthed, if you will, by Cambridge. Love that dirty water.”

Mazzio, a filmmaker-in-residence at Babson College, was drawn to the story of the all-women’s crew as they trained for the competition to represent the U.S. in the race. “I remember following the story and thinking, ‘Oh my God, how are they going to achieve this?’” Mazzio said. “It seemed daunting, almost a fool’s errand. Then I thought, ‘I know these women. If anybody can do it, it’s them.’”

The story behind the story was that Bill Koch — who had won the 1992 America’s Cup with a nearly all-male crew — wanted to push boundaries with an all-woman crew. Koch believed that with advanced technology and tactical skills, winning the race was no longer just about sheer strength and endurance.

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So far, so fun for Cambridge’s version of Bourbon Street

28 Jun

Special open container zones and extended hours for alcohol service have drawn crowds for World Cup watch parties, but not complaints. Central Square’s happens Friday afternoon.

From the Tartan Army to the Tall Ships,  Cambridge is a prime beneficiary of the legislative mouthful called the Act Authorizing Municipalities to Opt-In to a Temporary Pilot to Extend the Hours of Liquor Licenses and to Allow for Public Consumption in Designated Districts in Summer 2026. Maybe we can just call it Bourbon Street comes to Boston.

Cambridge was first to sign up after Gov. Maura Healey signed the bill earlier this month, giving municipalities the opportunity to extend bar and restaurant last calls by one hour (but no later than 3 a.m.) and allow participating establishments to offer to-go alcohol that can be consumed on the street in designated social districts.

The city saw it as dovetailing with the Cambridge United initiative to host soccer watch parties throughout the city for each match held at Foxborough’s Gillette Stadium (Boston Stadium is its name for the duration of the World Cup).

The pilot period started June 12 and runs through the end of July, intentionally spanning the World Cup and the arrival of the Sail Boston Tall Ships.

Somerville, meanwhile, allowed the extended last call hour, but did not enact designated public drinking districts, saying the city was not laid out in a way that made sense from logistical point of view.

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Winding down with old friends at Tampopo

12 Jun

Since the announcement of the closure, people have been flocking by in droves for one last donburi bowl and to wish its owner, Yasumasa Ito, the best.

When 2025 became 2026, Yasumasa Ito decided 34 years was long enough and it was time to shut down Tampopo, the venerable Japanese noodle and donburi bowl bodega in the Lesley Building in Porter Square. Cambridge Day posted an appreciation piece highlighting our favorite dishes, and lauding Ito for maintaining high quality over the years. 

That story led to this story: around Memorial Day, the Day received an email from Kotaro Moria, who lives in Kanazawa — also known as “Little Kyoto” — in Japan’s Ishikawa Prefecture. Moria told us he appreciated our story, and it was a reason why he was coming to Boston to help Ito through the last 30 days of Tampopo’s existence.

Moria studied at Fisher College 16 years ago and worked for Ito while he was here. He now runs an IT and web design firm in Japan.

“I knew Tampopo was closing,” Morita said. “Another staff member asked me to make a website so customers could send messages to Ito-san. While I was working on it, I saw a recent photo of him. He looked thinner than I remembered, and I thought that this was hard on him, and I felt like I should go help. A few days later he took me up on it.”

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Amplifying cycling, community in Cambridge Crossing

14 May

The dual-concept space blends Casa Bikes, an e-bike rental and retail store, and AMPED! into a bustling community hub.

Rows of bikes at Casa Bikes @ AMPED!, with a community space in the background. 

When you walk into the 10,000 sq. ft. home of Casa Bikes @ AMPED!, you’re overtaken by its size — it’s probably the largest bike store in the area — and its paradoxical homeyness. Row after row of e-bikes and cargo bikes are sprinkled with oases of couches and chairs set around tables. There are rotating art displays on the walls and on the floor, some of which light up when you walk by.

The dual-concept space blends Casa Bikes, an e-bike rental and retail store, and AMPED!, which gives cyclists and community members —especially underrepresented voices — a place to interact. It’s the brainchild of co-owners Charles James and Daisy Chiu, who formerly ran Crimson Bikes, and Elder Gonzalez, and situated right at the end of the Community Bike Path that runs from the Alewife Linear Park path (currently closed for renovation) through Davis Square to the Lechmere T stop, then into Cambridge Crossing, the substantial development in East Cambridge just north of the Museum of Science.

“We didn’t just want to build a shop — we wanted to create a place where people can come, connect and actually experience something together,” said James during a tour of the space, which had its grand opening in September 2025, mere months after REI’s first small-format retail store closed. “We wanted to inspire childlike wonder,” he added.

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Unburied bricks in the Old Burying Ground

9 Apr

Harvard students from Hasty Pudding hold a different kind of social event, exposing a long-buried walkway.

Now that the snow has melted and spring is (tentatively) here, visitors can once again stroll the Old Burying Ground behind First Church, adjacent to Garden Street — on long-buried brick walkways that had been forgotten for decades.

The cemetery, one of the oldest in the country, is the resting place for an octet of Harvard presidents including the first, Henry Dunster, his successor Charles Chauncy, John Leverett and Edward Holyoke, as well as Neptune Frost, an enslaved man believed to have served in the Revolutionary War. But for years, there were no paths, only graves and open green space.

Last summer, Denise Jillson, the Harvard Square Business Association’s executive director, noticed what seemed to brick walkways, buried beneath sod. It turned out that the pathways were installed in the 1930s, with help from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), city officials said. Jillson, who has lived in Cambridge and Somerville most of her life, said she can’t remember ever seeing the brickwork.

Harvard University student volunteers worked to restore the path in the Old Burying Ground. Credit: Harvard Square Business Association

The paths were restored — improving accessibility for visitors — by Harvard students in the Hasty Pudding Club. They had asked Jillson about volunteer opportunities to fulfill community service requirements. Jillson said the students went “above and beyond” in their effort and commitment.

One lingering issue remains: ongoing maintenance of the pathways. Responsibility technically falls to the City of Cambridge, while Harvard oversees a small enclosed section. Jillson said she plans to work with the Department of Public Works (DPW) and use HSBA resources — including staff and interns — to maintain the paths.

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Harvard Square sees the light again

5 Dec

By Tom Meek

Friday, December 5, 2025

The restored lighting at the Christian Science Reading Room on Church Street in Cambridge’s Harvard Square.

A burst of brightness came to a gloomy stretch of Church Street last month as the Christian Science Reading Room restored soft white art deco lighting absent from the building’s facade for decades.
The lights returned to Church Street, across from the long-dormant AMC Loews Harvard Square, at a Nov. 7 unveiling. Pictures of the alluring illumination have become a slow-trending wave on local social media.

“Now when you see it, it catches your eye,” said Jason Fredette of Poyant Signs, the New Bedford company that restored the lighting over nine months. “The building looks totally different.”
The first structure at the site was a blacksmith shop in the late 1800s, later a veterinary practice. That became mixed retail at the turn of the century as Harvard Square became more thickly settled and the subway arrived in 1912, said Cambridge Historical Commission executive director Charles Sullivan. The 23 Church St. structure was razed in favor of the current one-story 1936 art deco design by architect William Laurence Galvin as a new, upscale home for Cambridge Gas and Electric Light Co.

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Danehy Park at 35: a dump that became a glowing urban emerald

15 Sep

Cambridge’s Danehy Park is a green destination born from a dump.

Hard to believe Danehy Park turns 35 on Monday.

This 50-acre North Cambridge destination for lounging and recreation, picnicking, sports and events big and small hosts the annual Family Day on Saturday; a jazz festival in July; and Shakespeare troupes and the Oldtime Baseball Game, with guests of Red Sox royalty such as Lou Merloni, Oil Can Boyd, Jonathan Papelbon and Pedro Martinez suiting up at St. Peter’s Field.

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Talk returns of bridge for bikes and pedestrians behind museum, a $302M proposal from 2023

1 Sep

A rendering of a proposed “Riverwalk” for bicyclist and pedestrians across the Charles River. The Museum of Science refused use of the image without the watermark labeling it “conceptual.”

A bike lane and footpath bridge across the Charles River past the Museum of Science is being discussed again by state Department of Transportation officials as being in early stages of planning.

The “Riverwalk” path along the back of the Museum of Science would connect Lechmere Canal Park and the CambridgeSide mall with the Teddy Ebersol Field section of Boston’s Esplanade without having to navigate the bustle of the McGrath-O’Brien Highway in Cambridge and Somerville or Leverett Circle across the river.

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