Somerville

Somerville is a suburb of Boston.

Understand

Somerville has managed to hold onto its blue-collar roots while at the same time gentrifying. It is still the most densely populated city in New England, so visitors will find lots of purely residential territory between the "fun" areas: Davis Square, Porter Square, and Powderhouse Square (the location of Tufts University). Other notable neighborhoods include Union Square and Winter Hill, erstwhile home of the "Winter Hill Gang", the organized crime group headed by Whitey Bulger in the 1960's and 1970's.

Get in

By plane

Fly in to Logan Airport. A taxi from Logan to Somerwille can cost anywhere between $20 and $35 depending on the route taken and time of day. You can also take the T subway line from Logan (Blue Line) to either the Orange Line (switch at State Street) or the Red Line. Alternately, you can take the Silver Line bus service to South Station, then transferring to the Red Line. The subway ride takes longer than a taxi and may involve some walking, which is something to consider when you have lots of luggage.

By train

Take the Red Line to either the Davis Square or Porter Square Stations. If you're coming from downtonw (e.g. South Station) you'll want to hop on an Alewife/Harvard bound train.

You can also take the Orange Line to Sullivan Square and then take one of the MBTA busses up Broadway through Winter Hill and beyond.

Should you be coming from northwest of Boston (e.g. Fitchburg) you can also hop on the Commuter Rail.

By car

From points North: You can get to Somerville in two ways:

# take Route 93 and get off at exits 29-31 # take Route 3 and park at the Alewife station on the Red Line. Take the inbound Red Line to Davis Square. This is advisable on the weekends, as parking can be hard to find near Davis Square.

By bus

The MTA bus system will take you from Sullivan Square (Orange Line) through Somerville on to Arlington center and Medford. You can also get to Somerville by bus from Lechmere Station (at the end of the Green Line in Cambridge, near the Cambridgeside Galleria and Boston Museum of Science).

Get around

By Bike

The Minuteman Commuter Bike Trail, the main branch of which runs from Bedford to Alewife (in Cambridge) extends through Davis square and a bit further parallel to Highland ave.

See

Check out crazy park benches in Union Square.

Prospect Hill, behind Union Square, has a tower you can climb for good views of Boston and was the location of the first American flag flown (January 1, 1776).

Do

Most tourists spend their time in Davis Square and Porter Square (both are within walking distance of each other). Residents sometimes avoid the crowds and hit their favorite spots in Union Square and the Winter Hill area, which are out of the range of the T (but are accessible by car and bus). The Somerville Theater in Davis Square is a nice, fairly cheap 2nd-run theater that sometimes has independent titles.

There is a bigger Loews' theater in the Assembly Square Mall.

Learn

Somerville is home to Tufts University, which is located in the Powderhouse Square area.

Buy

Eat

Drink

Sleep

Somerville is, as mentioned elsewhere, a heavily residential area; hence, there are few hotels. Look for accommodations in Cambridge; if you're splurging, go for something with a view of the Charles.

Budget

Mid-range

Splurge

Stay safe

The area around Sullivan Square and the Assembly Square Mall is a bit desolate after dark. You have to walk under the highway and there are several dive bars nearby. If you find yourself at Sullivan Square after dark, you might want to stick close to the bus stops where there are plenty of people around.

although somerville has changed its colors a bit some of the the rough edges still remains. Locals don't take kindly to outsiders so avoid conflict

Get out

This text of this article is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0. It has been slightly modified to fit the general design of this website. The authors of this document are Anonymous user(s) of Wikitravel, Evan Prodromou, John and the following WikiTravel users: Bletch, Ilkirk, Nickpest, Nzpcmad, Beland. The original version of this article can be seen at http://wikitravel.org/en/Somerville.