CultureNOW - Broad Canal: Peter Vanderwarker

Broad Canal

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Description

ABOUT THE HISTORICAL PHOTOGRAPHS
"Thousands of people drive within a few yards of the Broad Canal every day, yet few know it exists. It slices into Cambridge from the Charles River a half block north of Main Street. In both photos, we’re looking east, toward the Charles. The Broad was built in 1807, 80 feet wide and lined with granite. Originally it extended deeper into East Cambridge, past the site of today’s Kendall Square Cinema, ending in a triangular basin bounded by three streets now known as Bristol, Webster, and Cardinal Medeiros. It was used for deliveries of lumber and coal.

In 1871, the Cambridge Gas Light Co. built a plant for manufacturing gas from coal on the north bank. The company – now Southern Energy – is still here today, visible in both photos. In the old one, we see a company-owned coal schooner, the Henry Endicott, anchored in front of a coal wharf. Cranes lifted coal from boats or barges onto the wharf. In the new photo, the company owns both the oil tank in the foreground and, beyond it, the step-shaped power plant with three stacks.

By 1950 or so, the Broad Canal was no longer being used for navigation. In the 1960s, the city filled most of it in. What remained was forgotten for 30 years.

But now the canal is about to enter into a new kind of life. A private developer is creating a mixed-use neighborhood to the north and west of the canal. He regards the canal as an amenity and plans to create a ‘Canal Square’ overlooking the water, paved in granite, with an outdoor cafe, a grove of plane trees, and a dock for canoes and kayaks. At the same time, the Southern Energy power plant is being enlarged, and, as part of that effort, the company will create a pedestrian walk along the canal’s northern edge.

There’s already a handsome walk along the southern edge, thanks to the vision of Cambridge planners who, 20 years ago, required it of the developers of the office building we see on the right of the new photograph. Nobody ever strolls on that south walk today. But within a few years, Broad Canal, so long ignored, should emerge as a waterfront pleasure for Cambridge. The Monster.com blimp, high in the sky above the canal, is a reminder that times are changing."

-Robert Campbell and Peter Vanderwarker, "CITYSCAPES - Broad Canal," Boston Globe, 2000

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Location

Broad Canal Way & Broad Canal Walk
Cambridge, MA 02142
United States

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