From train tracks to walking path: a history of the Holliston Rail Trail
HOLLISTON — Nearly every morning, Rod and Jennifer Burgett walk on the Holliston Rail Trail, a 6.7-mile path extending from the Sherborn line to the Milford line.
“It’s peaceful,” said Rod Burgett on a recent day after the first snowfall of the season. “Even though it goes through town, it’s set back enough so that it’s quiet. I’ve seen wildlife — deer, turkeys. It's relaxing.”
Jennifer Burgett said she loves how the trail travels the length of the town.
“It’s nice to have a place like this to go,” she said. “It’s long enough that if you stay in town, it’s a good place to exercise (or) ride a bike. ... People are out here in all weather.”
The Holliston trail is part of the Upper Charles Rail Trail, a 25-mile walking path — still not finished — that is built on a former rail bed connecting Ashland, Holliston, Sherborn, Milford and Hopkinton. In the making for decades, Milford and Holliston are the first two communities to have their portions completed, comprising about 13 miles.
The Upper Charles Rail Trail
The idea for the Upper Charles Rail Trail was started by Holliston resident John Thomas, president of the Upper Charles Conservation Inc. land trust in the early 1990s.
He was the “first to see the potential of converting the rail lines and he worked for several years gathering data and support and promoting the concept,” according to The Friends of the Milford Upper Charles Trail website.
A Holliston resident may have been the first to propose the trail's creation, but it was Milford that was the first community to have its portion of the trail completed.
The Holliston section was finished in 2018, with the completion of the 8 Arch Bridge and that area nearby.
For years, it seemed as if the Upper Charles Trail project would never get off the ground, according to Herb Brockert, lead contractor of the trail's Holliston trail section.
At the start, there was a lot of red tape, no money and no real opportunity to purchase the land that would become the trail, he said.
“I was saying, ‘How could this ever happen?’ But by hanging on and being persistent ... here we are," he said. "I never would have dreamed in the beginning that we would get here. It seemed impossible.”
Once was a railroad
The trail dates back to the 1800s, when the Boston and Worcester Railroad was built. The railroad was the main form of transportation connecting the two cities. Off the main line, there were various shorter spurs, according to local Holliston historian Joanne Hulbert.
“They came off like tentacles,” she said.
What is now the trail was once a segment of the track that went from Framingham to Milford. That portion was built in the 1830s.
“Once they started to build railroads in America, they burst onto the scene,” she said.
For a short time, Holliston was a well known town in the region. Mill buildings and shops were built along the rail line.
It cut the amount of time to get into Boston from days to merely hours, she said.
“It really opened up Holliston to the rest of the world,” she said.
But with the advent of the automobile, the railroad’s significance began to wane. The last passenger train was taken out of commission in 1959, Hulbert said, and the last freight train was taken off line in the late 1970s.
One of the big issues with use of the freight train was that the tunnel under Highland Street was too short for modern trains.
Let’s make a bike path
With the railbed unused, town officials started hatching a plan.
In the 1980s, the Holliston Conservation Commission discussed making a 2-mile bike trail on a former roadbed that started at Cross Street and ended toward the Milford line, according to Holliston Trails Committee Chair Robert Weidknect.
“It was an idea, that’s all it was,” he said.
It was kicked around until 1997, when Consolidated Rail Corp. came to an agreement with the town that it was going to give the land to the town for free, Weidknecht said.
But then it didn’t.
CSX Transportation bought Consolidated Rail and backed out of the deal, telling town officials they’d have to instead buy the land.
The town was able to secure a design phase grant from the federal government when it thought the deal with Conrail was on the table. But when the town found out it wasn't getting the land donated, funding for the project got pushed down the road for nearly 30 years.
“The Highway Department said, ‘You guys aren’t ready. Come back in 2024,’” Weidknecht said
It took the town 13 years before it could convince CSX to sell it the land. In the meantime, the town was able to secure other portions of land.
The first few of pieces of land for the Holliston trail were privately owned, and were either donated or purchased by the town. The first piece of the trail was completed in 2012.
When CSX gave the town the go-ahead to buy land for the trail, Holliston didn’t have all of the needed funding on hand, so it made purchases piece by piece, Weidknecht said. The town used primarily continuous grant funding from the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation, as well as other sources, including bond bills secured by its state representatives and senators.
Cesareo Contreras can be reached at 508-626-3957 or ccontreras@wickedlocal.com. Follow him on Twitter @cesareo_r.
This article originally appeared on MetroWest Daily News: The Holliston Rail Trail was built for hiking and biking
