Charles' 'Dirty Water': Industrial engine turns into hot property
The Charles River is no longer the
economic engine of Eastern Massachusetts.
But the once heavily polluted river, now cleaner, has taken
on a new life as a recreational resource, a backdrop for
housing and life sciences complexes and a historical focal
point for visitors.
Up until a decade ago, a fall into the
river meant a tetanus shot. The Standells’ “Dirty Water” was
the ode that summed up how many felt about the river that
flows from Hopkinton to Boston Harbor in a series of
mitten-shaped turns through 23 communities.
Now, more people are walking or running along the river,
sailing and canoeing on it, even swimming in it. And many
are looking to live along the Charles, as old factories are
being turned into condos and new residential complexes are
springing up all along the river.
“The Charles no longer drives the economy, but now it’s seen as more of a quality-of-life piece,” says Andrew Gottlieb, executive director of the state’s Office of Commonwealth Development. “It’s no coincidence that the revitalization of downtown Waltham into a restaurant and shopping mecca happened near the river. Communities that once turned their back on the river are now re-embracing it.”
On the Allston bank near Soldiers Field Road, an area once an open sewer for nearby stockyards, Harvard University is set to build a new campus with a life sciences and public health complex and student housing. And Boston University continues to construct its student residential village along the Charles.
Some of the old mill and factory buildings serve the region’s new economy, such as medical device maker Boston Scientific, with space along the Charles in Watertown. Biotech giant Genzyme built a factory along the river in Allston to produce enzymes.
“With the new life science complexes, housing, parks and walkways along the entire length of the river, the Charles is not only a more desirable amenity but more accessible,” says Larry Meehan, vice president with the Greater Boston Convention & Visitors Bureau.
Meehan says his group is beginning a marketing effort to entice more visitors to explore the river. “The Charles offers a 400-year history lesson and its stories are best told by navigating it on a boat or walking or biking along it,” says Meehan.
New parks like Northpoint in Cambridge
and the Nashua Street and Paul Revere parks in Boston have
transformed the once gritty mouth of the river - where it
meets the harbor - into oases of green with a planned
pedestrian bridge to connect them. The Charles River
Conservancy is raising funds to build a skate park under the
Zakim-Bunker Hill bridge, the landmark span that crowns the
mouth of the Charles.
From the beginning of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the
Charles River was the lifeblood of Eastern Massachusetts.
Starting in the early 1600s, water power was harnessed for
grist mills to grind corn, wheat, rye and other essential
foodstuffs from farms along the river.
Sawmills were set up to cut timber for houses and foundries made horseshoes and plows. Tanneries processed leather and paper mills were built in the Upper and Lower falls in Newton and Wellesley.
In Milford, the river runs through quarries of pink granite used to build many of Boston’s landmark buildings.
More than 30 dams were built along the river to harness water power. All along the banks are stone mills, waterwheels, bridges, rail crossings and other industrial ruins, some of which are finding new life as restaurants, housing complexes and cottage industries.
In the early 19th century, industry along the Charles took on national importance. In 1814, the first comprehensive factory in America was built along its banks in Waltham. The Boston Manufacturing Co., set up by Francis Cabot Lowell and his partners, was the first capitalized corporation in America and its textile manufacturing spawned industrial cities like Lowell and Lawrence. The Cabot mill also lays claim to being the first place in America where women were paid for work.
This was where America began its economic independence,” says Dan Yaeger, executive director of the Charles River Museum of Industry in Waltham. “Along the Charles was the birthplace of the American Industrial Revolution.”
Riverside clock and watch companies pioneered production using interchangeable parts and invented precision machinery. By the turn of the century, industries along the Charles made it the leading center of auto and auto-parts manufacturing (preceding Detroit) with some 250 companies - including a Ford Model T plant - along the river. Glassware, furniture and candy manufacturing plants along the East Cambridge banks of the river supplied much of the country.
But water was no longer a primary source of power for industry by 1920. And as industry moved inland, the Charles was left abandoned and polluted.
For much of the 20th century, the river’s water quality was horrendous. But the completion of the Deer Island treatment plant in the 1990s and closing of many illegal sewer hookups and storm water overflows has raised the Environmental Protection Agency’s water quality level on the Charles from a D in 1995 to a B+ today.
“We have made tremendous strides in the health of the river in the last 10 years,” says Anna Eleria, project manager for the Charles River Watershed Association, a nonprofit advocacy group that has been around since 1965. “We are encouraging developers who build along the river to ‘Think Blue’ to minimize adverse impacts on the river. It would be great if someone would write a new song about the Charles - we love that cleaner water.”