Category: Map

Lynn and Swampscott Walking Map

Lynn and Swampscott Walking Map

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North of Boston, the seacoast becomes increasingly rock and the surf, impressive and invigorating. A favorite walk here traces the expansive and accessible coastline along Lynn and Swampscott. On one side of the 2-mile promenade, the walkway forms a refuge from the tide while giving vistas of sandy beach and waves teasing the rocks and offshore islands. On the other side is a large disrict of 100-year-old homes of merchants and industrialists. Residents of this area came here because Lynn was once a powerhouse industrial center.

This walk leads you through the area’s industrial history from both sides: you’ll see both the remnants of the great, multistoried shoe factories where labor sweated, and he palatial seaside suburbs where management cavorted and unwound. On the way you’ll travel past the North Shore Community College, built on the site of other factories, and along the oceanfront–that great leveler and playground of all the people.


Click for “Lynn and Swampscott Interactive Walking map” on Google Maps

Watertown Walking Map

Watertown Walking Map

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Watertown has fantastic attributes that make it an ideal community for walking. Our long riverfront offers a choice of ideal walks. Our commercial areas are vibrant with ethnic diversities of food and cultural events. Many opportunities exist for Watertown Walks—create your own!

The Watertown Walking Map was developed and printed with funding from Tufts Health Plan. It was created through a collaboration of: WalkBoston, the Watertown Community Safe Routes to School, the Watertown Planning Department, the Watertown Health Department and the Watertown Bicycle-Pedestrian Committee.

Click for “Watertown Walking Map” PDF
Newton: Upper Falls Walking Map

Newton: Upper Falls Walking Map

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A hidden mill village on the Charles River, Newton Upper Falls is tucked into a busy corner of the metropolitan area. On this walk you will see a potpourri of 18th- and 19th-century architecture, many charming hilly and curving streets, and a major National Historic Landmark–Echo Bridge over the Charles River’s Hemlock Gorge.

Upper Falls was settled at the largest falls on the Charles River. Native Americans discovered the falls and established fish weirs here to harvest eels and other freshwater fish. In 1688 John Clark bought rights to build at the falls from Chief Nahatan for £12 sterling. By 1813, when a cotton mill was installed, industrial buildings lined the gorge from the falls area to the newly built Worcester Turnpike (now Rte 9). Within 40 years 1/4th of Newton’s population lived and worked in Upper Falls. Today a large portion of the village is protected as an historic district. Of the 150 buildings that existed 100 years ago in Upper Falls, 118 still stand.


Click for “WalkBoston Upper Falls Newton Walking Map” on Google Maps

Boston: Disasters, Dirty Deeds, and Debauchery-Walking Map

Boston: Disasters, Dirty Deeds, and Debauchery-Walking Map

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If you’ve been led to believe that Boston is steeped only in patriotism, Brahmin sensibilities, Ivory Towers, and the Kennedys–think again. All is not sugar and spice in one of America’s oldest cities; the dark side is never more than a few steps away! Boston’s less-than-illustrious past extends from the arrival of the Puritans to the present day, with a ghastly deed lurking around every corer. As you stroll down the quaint streets of Boston, discovering its sometimes sordid past, you may look at this old city in an entirely new light.

This walk traces the legendary happenings of the Great Molasses Flood, the Brinks Robbery, the former Combat Zone, the Common’s 17th century Hanging Tree, and the era of Mayor James Michael Curley. The book recalls the notoriety that resulted when thousands of windows crashed one by one to the streets below from the John Hancock Tower, then under construction.


Click for “WalkBoston’s Disasters, Dirty Deeds, and Debauchery Walking Map” on Google Maps

Boston: South Bay and the Shirley-Eustis House Walking Map

Boston: South Bay and the Shirley-Eustis House Walking Map

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If you look past the South Bay’s energy of modern commerce with some imagination, you can still visualize three-masted sailing ships, muscular steam locomotives, aristocratic estates, horse-drawn streetcars, and personalities of an earlier age who shaped and were shaped by the evolution of this area.

When the Puritans arrived in Boston, they found two large bays separated by a narrow isthmus roughly following today’s Washington Street. The southern bay—unsurprisingly named South Bay—was a large tidal marsh.

The bluffs overlooking South Bay, graced by the stately mansion of British royal governor William Shirley, were gradually lined with homes by the local gentry of the young republic. Influenced by the Industrial Revolution, over the 19th century these forces transformed the bay into a place devoted to industry and commerce.
Today only the Fort Point Channel remains as a remainder of South Bay’s watery history. Explore today’s South “Bay,” the neighborhood that landfill built.


Click for “WalkBoston’s South Bay and the Shirley-Eustis House Walking Map” on Google Maps