Ahoy There Martin's Park

The Boston Park's Department releases updates on Martin's Park to inform the community what has been done in the last few weeks and what to expect in the coming weeks. October's report also includes schedule updates and the incorporation of climate resiliency strategies.

What has been done in the last few weeks:

- The wooden play ship has been installed on site!!  This is a huge visual change in the park, and is very exciting to see.

- All of the piles have been drilled along the sea wall.  This important work (which has been a lot of work, but doesn’t make a visual impact on the park) will allow for the next steps of pouring the walls along the Harborwalk.  These walls will then allow the earth shaping to progress.

- Work is continuing inside the covered parking.  Wall finishes and utilities are being installed.

Boat Foundation

Boat Installed

Completed Piles & Harborwalk wall forming

Park Maintenance Room

Here is what to look for in the next 2-3 weeks:

- Pouring of the north and south walls along the Harborwalk.

- Installing the mudmat that will be the base for the geofoam to be built on top of.

- Connecting water and drainage lines.

- Staking of geofoam to build up the higher elevations of the park.

- Continuing the foundations around the play ship, including setting one of the access areas and the cargo boxes.

Schedule update:

We wanted to update the community that the anticipated construction completion time frame has been pushed back to the spring.  Due to the resiliency work that was described in a recent update*, the time frame of the work has been extended.  Unfortunately, this extension of the work has pushed the schedule into winter months.  Cold weather is not conducive to installing several weather sensitive items in the park such as rubber surfacing and vegetation planting. 

The contractor and the City will continue to push to finish the park as efficiently and effectively as possible without sacrificing design or quality.  As we all know, weather can be unpredictable and we cannot foresee how far into the winter months work will be able to continue.  We will continue working as long as the weather allows and will re-assess park completion schedules and grand opening activities later in the year as we get a better sense of how long work can continue.

Site Resiliency:

A reminder about resiliency...

During the construction portion of this project, the Climate Ready Boston Report was released.  The information provided in this report raised the flood elevation.  The park was designed using previously released flood elevations.  Due to this, design and engineering work needed to be completed to make sure that the park took into consideration this information and planned for future resiliency.  This created the need to shift some of the focus of construction onto the design aspect of the work.  What was important to us was that the resiliency worked with the current design in order to still provide the park design promised to the community while making the Park more resilient.  The design work associated with this shift has been completed and the construction moving forward will incorporate these important resiliency strategies.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Lauren Bryant with Boston Parks & Recreation Department,