Social media has spoken and there are a lot of passionate people on both sides as to whether the Reformatory Trail should or shouldn’t be paved.
A vote will be taken at the Special Town Meeting that will decide whether the project moves forward or not.
Lost in all the passion is a real sense of what most people believe. There are lots of good arguments on both sides.
As with all of our polls, this is not scientific by any means. We’re just trying to gauge what our readers think about the project.
So what’s Bedford thinking? Should the Reformatory Trail be Paved?
Ready to be counted? Vote in the poll until noon next Saturday, You’ll find the poll on The Citizen’s main page, or by scrolling on your phone or tablet.
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The question isn’t, “Should a trail be paved?” The question is, “Should we reject millions of dollars in improvements to infrastructure which provide safety for road users, upgraded drainage and road conditions?” If surfacing and changes to the bikeway extension could be separated from the rest of the project, fine, change the scope of the work. I have reservations about parts of the extension design myself. BUT, I am determined that the improvements to decades-old drainage problems and the addition of the multi-use bikeway and sidewalks on Railroad Avenue are worth the changes to part of that project. If paving the extension is rejected the entire project is rejected. Would those residents against paving be willing to pay from taxes levied only on them for the rest of the improvements we all will lose? The question is not just paving or no paving.
The air we breathe depends on trees. Some of us like to go fast on asphalt roads, but all of us breathe. And I cannot find anyone, even one person who will ditch their car to ride to work on this proposed Highway to Nowhere.
You can’t justify a bridge by counting the number of people swimming across the river. If the extension enables just ONE driver to go car-free, then it will more than offset the lost carbon sequestration potential of the 4.34 acres of trees impacted. Pre-pandemic, I personally biked to Boston daily on the Minuteman while my car rusted in my driveway. It helped me feel like part of the solution, and not part of the problem. I’m privileged to have relatively easy access to the Minuteman because I live on the East side of town. I want more people in our town to have that same opportunity. Learn more about the benefits at https://www.minuteman-extension.org/
Not to mention that asphalt in the sun is 50 degrees plus hotter than asphalt in the shade. I have loved summer walks with my foster dogs, but no longer if it’s paved and shadeless and 132 degrees.