Kelley Square $16M overhaul underway
Photo | Grant Welker
Worcester's Kelley Square is undergoing a major overhaul meant to make the notorious intersection safer.
Worcester's Kelley Square can be an adventure to drive through normally, and now a major overhaul to make the intersection safer will temporarily make the square even a bit crazier.
The $16-million Kelley Square reconstruction project is now underway, as anyone who has passed through the notorious intersection knows. A groundbreaking ceremony scheduled for Thursday will make it official.
The event, to be held inside the soon-to-open Worcester Public Market, will include Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito and Massachusetts' top transportation official, Stephanie Pollack, the secretary and CEO of the Department of Transportation.
The project will direct traffic into a sort of two-ended roundabout with two travel lanes, which has been called a peanut design for its shape when viewed from the air. Other planned changes include reversing the direction of travel for two streets, making Millbury Street one-way southbound, and making Harding Street northbound for the stretch of the road south of Kelley Square.
Remaking Kelley Square — where a tangle of streets meet without the benefit of any traffic signals — is being undertaken while major projects are able to change much of the surrounding neighborhood.
The Worcester Public Market at the intersection of Green and Harding streets is slated to open this fall with a Wachusett Brewing Co. taproom, a second location of the gift store Worcester Wares, and a group of food sellers in an open European-style food hall. On the building's upper floors, 48 apartments opened this summer.
Site work is underway on the north side of Madison Street for the $101-million Polar Park, which is planned to start hosting baseball games for the Pawtucket Red Sox in the spring of 2021. On the south side of Madison Street, a $140-million mixed-use development with two hotels, apartments, offices and commercial space is slated to open for 2021.
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