By William Tauro
Somerville’s decision to strip away hundreds of on-street parking spaces for new bus lanes has hit local businesses hard and fast. Shops and restaurants along Broadway, Highland Avenue, and McGrath Highway rely on those curbside spots for the quick customer turnover that keeps registers ringing. When parking vanishes, regulars stop coming; owners watch lunch rushes shrink and evening take-out orders plummet as people drive instead to Medford or Everett where parking is still free and easy. These are not corporate chains—these are family-owned bakeries, pizza places, and hardware stores that now face real survival threats from a policy sold as “visionary.”

Seniors are suffering most of all. Many older residents in Teele Square, Ball Square, and East Somerville gave up long commutes years ago but still need their cars for doctor visits, grocery runs, and pharmacy trips.
Losing the spot in front of the store can mean a painful quarter-mile walk with a cane or walker, especially in winter. The city’s alternative—waiting for an overdue Ride van or transferring twice on a bus—is simply not realistic for someone with mobility issues. What planners call “improved transit access” often feels like reduced independence for the people who have lived here longest.
These sweeping changes are largely driven by a younger wave of progressive activists and councilors who arrived in Somerville over the last decade and now hold outsized influence. Their priorities—faster buses, bike lanes, and aggressive climate goals—are clear, but the process rarely includes genuine give-and-take with older homeowners, working-class families, or moderate voters who want balanced solutions.
Meetings are packed with twenty- and thirty-somethings while seniors and shift workers are underrepresented, and anyone who asks for slower implementation or replacement parking is quickly labeled anti-progress.
People don’t realize when you lose a local business, you lose that tax base that the businesses have been paying for a long time and now once they close they no longer are contributing their share of taxes and the shortfall lands on the laps of the resident to pay which eventually trickles down to the tenant to pay.
Somerville doesn’t have to choose between better buses and livable neighborhoods. Thoughtful compromises—shared parking with churches, timed loading zones, or small municipal lots on the fringes—could soften the blow while still speeding up transit.
Most residents, young and old, liberal and conservative, actually want the same things: a city that works for everyone. When decisions are made only by one vocal, ideologically similar group instead of through real collaboration across ages and viewpoints, the result is resentment, empty storefronts, and seniors stuck at home.