On Saturday, March 26th at 10 am, riders will meet at Tenean Beach in Dorchester and ride south along the Greenway to Readville in Hyde Park and back again, a distance of less than 18 miles. Three detours to points of interest are included in that distance. Helmets are required and heavy rain will postpone the ride.

On March 14th, EPA officially listed the Lower Neponset River from Mother Brook in Hyde Park to the Baker Dam in Dorchester as a Superfund site. This announcement will allow the Lower Neponset to receive large scale funding to remove contamination in the bottom of the river.

EPA press release on the Superfund Designation
Boston Globe on designation, celebration, and what it means for river users.

Join the Neponset River Watershed Association for their annual Spring Cleanup on Saturday, April 23rd, from 9-12 pm. 

DCR reached out to us in February asking where we would like to see trail repairs. They have marked up areas to be patched around Pope John Paul II Park and are looking into repairs other areas as well. Contractors are bidding on the project now. We will pass along any news about upcoming trail work as soon as we have details.

The Neponset Trail travels through Milton and connects to other roads and trails. The Town of Milton wants to hear from you about how they can better link together bike and pedestrian routes across town.

The Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC) Boston to Blue Hills project, in partnership with the Neponset River Watershed Association, is setting up community meetings to discuss the creation of green transportation links between Boston and the Blue Hills Reservation. As this connection is what the Neponset Trail has aimed to do since its inception, the Neponset River Greenway Council is working with them to connect more parts of the city to our trail so that Boston residents can get to the Blue Hills, as well as to the harbor.

After a meeting with lots of neighborhood feedback, the DCR is re-doing their 25% design of a trail along the west side of the Neponset River in the Edgewater neighborhood of Mattapan. The community has been advocating for this trail along the river for many years, and is making sure their preferences for how the trail should be built are taken into consideration during the design phase.

On Wednesday, March 9, the Milton Select Board voted down a proposal for two digital billboards across the Neponset River from Neponset Park in Dorchester at 2 Granite Avenue in Milton. Billboards that close to parkland are theoretically illegal, but they keep getting proposed anyway. Their bright and changing lights would have been a major distraction both to drivers on the Southeast Expressway, people seeking nature on the Neponset Trail, and Dorchester residents near the river, as well as users of the park.

Watch for these events later this spring:

Sunday, May 15: Lunar eclipse walk, possibly in Pope John Paul II Park from the Hallet St. entrance where there is lots of sky. Totality is centered around 12:11 Monday morning, but the eclipse will start at 10:28 pm Sunday night. Bring a flashlight, and binoculars or a telescope to look at the moon.

Saturday, May 7: The Edgewater Food Forest in Mattapan is opening