The Beacon Hill Times reports the new North Washington Street Bridge, bedeviled by construction problems, will open to vehicle and pedestrian traffic on Dec. 9. Only one side of the bridge will be open to traffic in both directions - with final completion not expected until December, 2024, since contractors first have to take down the current temporary bridge to complete the inbound side of the permanent bridge.
Two at-wit's-end citizens file 311 complaints about conditions in the North End.
Let's start with the screaming veteran suicide guy and the firecracker guys on Hanover Street: Read more.
An outraged citizen filed a 311 complaint at 1:27 this morning about the situation at one apartment building on Fleet Street in the North End: Read more.
Gary noticed what low tide exposed at Christopher Columbus Park this afternoon.
A Suffolk Superior Court judge ruled today that Patrick Mendoza, 54, remains a potential threat to society, enough so that she ordered him held without bail until at least May 1. Read more.
Daniel Steiner comes up to Boston and talks to a couple of local experts on the way roads in olde Boston got laid out.
H/t Brendan.
Paul Revere forced to go "Whoa!" to avoid careering into the tree.
A disgruntled citizen files a 311 complaint about the Christmas tree now towering over the Prado and Hanover Street in the North End: Read more.
Photo by Adam Castiglioni; the party-platter sign is probably left over from J. Pace.
The head of the development company that wants to replace a block on Cross Street in the North End with a 134-room hotel is hoping to use the pre-demolition space to let Bostonians work off their aggression at what would be the city's first axe-throwing facility. Read more.
A Taunton man was arraigned last week on charges he robbed a man who thought he was going to be meeting with a prostitute but who instead proved to be two masked men with a knife waiting for him near a North End alley. Read more.
Drone video of the more damaged side, by First Church.
The leaders of First Church in Cambridge plan to take down the "golden cockerel" weathervane that has topped the church spire since 1873 for repairs. But in discussions set to begin this Sunday, parishioners will consider whether the church should then put the historic rooster back atop the spire - or sell it. Read more.
Eric Bender got a good view of the Thunder Bay, a Coast Guard ice breaker that was docked at the Coast Guard station off Commercial Street in the North End yesterday. It's normally berthed in Rockland, ME, where it goes out on the more frigid winter days to bust up the ice in the Penobscot River.
If nothing else, the clouds heralding Lee gave us an amazing sunset tonight, as Tim Babatz couldn't help but notice at Fan Pier on the harbor.
Up the harbor a bit, Adam Balsam got a good view in the North End: Read more.
The Massachusetts Veterans of Foreign Wars yesterday asked a judge to order Post 144, possibly no longer on Hanover Street in the North End, to immediately hand over its financial books for a deep audit of what's been going on with all the money the post has collected in recent years - with several hundred thousand dollars, including money meant to help veterans in need, unaccounted for. Read more.
The North End has many charms, but horseback riding is not normally one of them, so Jessica Dello Russo was a bit nonplussed when she spotted this guy hoofing it the wrong way down Salem Street this afternoon: Read more.
Boston Restaurant Talk reports on plans for a proposed Nite Life Cafe at 89 Charles St. on Beacon Hill - and reminds us that that's the same name as a Hanover Street joint where two men were murdered as they tried to rustle up bail money for Joe "The Animal" Barbosa in 1966.
Complaints to 311 about mattresses on Boston Move-In Day. Allston/Brighton and Mission Hill, of course, but a fair number of complaints from South Boston, too. Also see: Allston Christmas Bingo - North End edition.
While kids at South Bay and Downtown Crossing were getting all the police and media attention, kids over at the St. Anthony's Feast in the North End were busy brawling it up down by Langone Park on Commercial Street late Saturday. Read more.
Smoking manhole and its newly upside-down cover. Photo by Shamus Moynihan.
Shamus Moynihan reports that a manhole exploded at Atlantic Avenue and Commercial Wharf around 7:30 p.m., sending smoke 30 feet into the air and ejecting its heavy cover hard enough it flew up then came down and landed top down back on the hole. "Luckily, no one was hurt," he says.
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