Roll over bars to see underlying info. Data from 2019-2023 U.S. Census American Community Survey estimates by Census tract.
One of the frustrating things about the MBTA Communities Law is that it doesn’t take into account which communities have done more than the regional average to build housing. Instead, every city and town with a train station was told to creating zoning for the same flat percentage increase. What’s missing? If you start with a small amount of housing, a 15% increase is a tiny number. But if you already have high housing density that’s straining infrastructure, 15% of that large number is a much bigger number!
I decided to take a look at population density in Middlesex County, after attending a rather fun 3-hour mapping workshop last week. The map above is the result.
It does seem that Framingham has already done more than its MetroWest neighbors to build dense housing near a commuter rail station.
(And don’t get me started on how the law impacts a town like Sherborn, which is as close to commuter rail as much of Framingham. But because the rail station isn’t technically within Sherborn’s borders, they have much lower zoning requirements.)
Map data is from aggregated U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey estimates from 2019-2023. It should be a bit more up to date than the 2020 ten-year Census, but still won’t have all the new apartments that came online recently (and of course can’t include construction like in Nobscot that is still underway.)
Sign up for the District 2 email-list.