David Halperin

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Support N Mass Ave & Cambridge St Zoning Reforms

Following years of community process and planning, North Mass Ave and Cambridge Street zoning petitions to allow more housing are before the Ordinance Committee on Thursday, October 30, 2025 at 5:30 p.m.  (There will be a continuation on Thursday, November 13, 2025 at 5:30 p.m. with
no public comment.) The meeting will be hybrid: in person at the Sullivan Chamber at City Hall and remotely via ZOOM at https://cambridgema.zoom.us/s/97895847144

At its October 21 meeting, the Planning Board unanimously recommended these zoning changes, which will allow more housing by right along these two corridors.  The Ordinance Committee, which consists of the entire City Council, will vote on November 13 whether to recommend that the City Council adopt the reforms.  The Community Development Department's recommendations come after years of community process, including numerous public meetings, open houses, and charrettes, as well as many months of meetings of a working group consisting of local community leaders for North Mass Ave and PorterSquare.

Please email City Council to voice your support for sending these recommendations on to the full Council! Many housing opponents emailed and spoke at the Planning Board meeting, often misinformed of the details of these proposals by local groups that oppose housing. 

Here are some key points for emails/public testimony:

  • North Mass Ave zoning came out of the Mass Ave Planning Study. Aworking group that included many stakeholders and local leaders met over the course of a year. The proposals which informed the zoning petition had broad support from the working group. Cambridge St zoning proposals similarly resulted from a long community process that supported more height to add housing along this corridor.
  • It has been a common refrain during other rezoning processes thatwe should be zoning our corridors and squares for more housing.Projections for housing growth during the multifamily process stillexpected most growth to be on corridors and in squares. If this isgoing to be our strategy as a city, we need to move forward on these opportunities.
  • Despite housing affordability being by far the most important issue identified by residents in the City’s annual scientific survey, we are behind on our housing production goals on any rezoning scenariothe city has proposed. Upzoning our corridors and squares will helpput us on a better track for both total housing production as well asincreased affordable housing via Inclusionary Zoning.
  • Northern Mass Ave has a lot of one-story retail—very poor land usegiven our housing crisis.
  • People who live on our transit corridors and near T stops will drive less. This helps us allow for housing growth without congesting our streets.
  • It reduces CO2 emissions by allowing residents of these buildings to drive less than they would if transit-oriented development buildings were not built and they had to live elsewhere. Additionally, like all new multifamily in Cambridge over 12,000 sqft, it will be subject to the stretch energy code and built to a very high standard of efficiency.
  • Having more customers in the immediate area will help sustain morelocal small businesses and keep these corridors vibrant.