Boston Releases Draft Update for the 2030 Climate Action Plan
October 23, 2025
In April 2025, Boston began community engagement for the update to Boston’s Climate Action Plan for 2030, which will identify priorities between now and 2030 to meet goals across climate mitigation, climate resilience, and climate justice. This 2030 update is the first version to incorporate climate justice, alongside climate mitigation and resilience goals. In summer 2025, Boston released the first draft of the 2030 Climate Action Plan, with the following 8 overarching goals: making our buildings healthier, more resilient, and fully decarbonized; making transportation more sustainable, accessible, and equitable; powering Boston with clean, renewable energy; combatting the risks posed by extreme weather events; reducing waste and promoting sustainable consumption; protecting and expanding our green space; building a green workforce; and prioritizing public health for a healthier, stronger city.
The draft Boston Climate Action Plan offers 36 strategies across 11 categories: buildings, transportation, energy, recovery and materials, open space, combating heat, combating stormwater and inland flooding, combating coastal flooding, combating cross-hazard climate risks, workforce development, and funding and financing. Through a series of community stakeholder sessions and written comments on the initial draft Climate Action Plan for 2030, Boston hopes to prioritize the strategies to focus on for the next 5 years, as well as to identify relevant metrics for tracking success and implementation progress, and relevant “delivery partners” that can help the City to implement various strategies.
A Better City submitted extensive comments on the draft Climate Action Plan and encouraged the City to consider financial and technical feasibility of . . .
Zoning Commission Approves Downtown Skyline Districts
October 22, 2025
Earlier today, the City of Boston Zoning Commission voted unanimously to approve zoning amendments to create new Skyline Districts that implement zoning recommendations from PLAN: Downtown to modernize land uses, incentivize preservation and adaptive reuse, and enable more growth, housing, and businesses Downtown. Mayor Wu is expected to sign the zoning into law in the coming weeks.
Tom Nally, Senior Advisor at A Better City, offered the following testimony:
Good morning. My name is Thomas Nally and I am a planner and architect by training and a Senior Advisor at A Better City. A Better City represents a multi-sector group of nearly 130 business leaders united around a common vision: to create a more vibrant, competitive, sustainable, and equitable city and region for all. Our mission is to engage the Greater Boston business community and civic institutions in developing solutions and influencing policy through . . .
Event Recap: E-Bike Battery Safety Webinar
October 17, 2025
On Wednesday, October 15th, A Better City convened a presentation on micromobility and lithium-ion battery fires. We are confident in the transformative potential of micromobility, helping to reduce congestion and pollution in our densest areas. Here in Greater Boston, the use of e-scooters, bikes and e-bikes—whether personally owned or shared through Bluebikes—continues to grow. Yet, we know that micromobility parking and charging policies vary widely among members of our Transportation Management Associations. We’ve sought for a long time to develop clear guidance for developing campus micromobility policy that is driven by facts and science, not the news cycle. Lithium-ion battery fires are high-profile and scary and can lead to a distorted perception of how common they are which can blunt the adoption of this type of mobility. We are hopeful that the potential severity of these fires motivates our membership to seriously consider their micromobility policies and invest in mobility in a way that makes their communities safer, and more mobile.
In this session, we were grateful to have the expertise of Electric Avenue, a New York City-based micromobility consulting group, and Laura Kavanagh, former Commissioner of the New York Fire Department, who helped guide us through:
- The root causes of lithium-ion battery fires and the scale of the issue
- Ways that large organizations and properties can mitigate their risk without stifling micromobility
- Emerging standards in third party certification
- A brief overview of new technologies and services that are available in this space
We were excited by the interest and attendance of nearly 60 members from a broad swath of industries which demonstrated the timeliness and relevance of the topic. You can view a recording of the session by clicking on the image above. Total running time is ~70min which includes the main presentation . . .
A Better City Statement on Recent Changes at MassDOT
October 16, 2025
Earlier today, Governor Healey MORE
Better Bike Lanes: Year One of Quantitative Evaluation
September 30, 2025
In July of this year, the City of Boston published the Better Bike Lanes Year One Quantitative Evaluation report, which assesses the safety and traffic impacts of seven recent bike infrastructure projects on City streets. The City of Boston launched the Better Bike Lanes initiative in 2022 with a goal of adding 9.4 miles to Boston’s bike network along with speed calming treatments in some areas. In 2023, seven key corridors received upgrades, including separated lanes, contraflow access, and speed humps to calm motor vehicle speeds. This evaluation describes the positive impacts for cycling and road safety, with negligible effects on car traffic.
A word about methodology:
This report compares baseline data collected in September 2022 with post-install data collected in September, 2024. In addition, the report contains control location data from 15 Boston streets of various size and type that have similar characteristics to the project streets but did not receive any bike infrastructure improvements during the study period. Note that control streets compare volume data only, as speed data was not available. Key takeaways from the report are summarized below:
Bicycling Volumes Increased Dramatically
- Biking rose by 44% on average across project corridors after improvements, while control streets (those without changes) saw a slight 3% decrease
- Streets with new contraflow bike lanes saw the highest gains, averaging 482%
- Six of the seven upgraded corridors saw an increase in daily cyclists, with some locations experiencing as much as a 194% jump. In the one corridor that saw a dip, the decline was just ten percent.
Road Safety Improved
- Speeding significantly decreased: six out of seven projects saw major drops in the fastest . . .
Event Recap: Built to Lead: Lessons in Building Decarbonization in Existing Buildings
September 25, 2025
On Wednesday, September 24th, A Better City convened an informative and inspiring event to kick off the new "Built to Lead: Lessons in Building Decarbonization and Resilience" series, showcasing the climate leadership of A Better City member companies and institutions in advancing innovative and replicable strategies.
This first event in our series focused on decarbonizing existing buildings, we explored an array of strategies—from temperature control, to new window technology, to equipment optimization, to waste heat recovery, to innovative retrofit phasing. Slides from the event can be found here, thank you to our panelists for sharing their time and expertise:
• Torey Lee Brooks, Pembroke
• Saagar Patel PE, LEED AP BDC, WELL AP, CCP, Equity Residential
• Al Scaramelli, Beacon Capital Partners
• Neetu Singh Siddarth, BXP, Inc.
•
I-90 Allston Multimodal Project Update
September 23, 2025
A Better City remains committed to advancing the I-90 Allston Multimodal Project, which is a once-in-a-generation chance to replace a structurally deficient elevated highway with safer transportation connections and expanded access to the Charles River for Allston residents. The project also includes a new multimodal transportation hub at West Station that will improve transit connections for commuters throughout the region and support future development in nearby Beacon Park Yard.
The enactment of the so-called "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" in July eliminated billions of dollars in unobligated funding for the federal Reconnecting Communities grant program—including all but $8 million of a $335 million grant for the I-90 Allston Multimodal Project. The rescinded federal grant represented approximately 17% of the total project cost, but there is still overwhelming support to deliver this project, including a commitment from Governor Healy to “
Updates to BERDO Regulations and Policies and Procedures
September 18, 2025
At the September 17 meeting of the Air Pollution Control Commission, updates to BERDO regulations and policies and procedures were passed unanimously. The process for these updates kicked off in May, 2025, and covered topics that relate to the flexibility measures application processes, third-party verification, and clarification of language to already existing BERDO procedures. Throughout this process, thanks to member engagement, A Better City submitted two sets of comments: July 14, 2025, and August 28, 2025.
In a nutshell, the approved changes included:
- Streamlining requirements for third-party verification for Buildings’ first emissions compliance year (Regulations, Section VII).
- Modifying application deadlines for all flexibility measures (Regulations, Section XI-XIII).
- Enabling building owners to request to extend the BERDO Review Board’s voting timelines for all flexibility measures (Regulations, Section XI-XIII).
- Removing the requirement to record decisions related to flexibility measures in the Registry of Deeds for flexibility measures (Regulations, Section XI-XIII).
- Enabling the Review Board to grant exemptions on BERDO solar requirements without a Hardship Compliance Plan (Regulations, Section X).
- Clarifying roles between the APCC, the BERDO Review Board, and the City of Boston Environment Department (Regulations, throughout; Policies and Procedures, throughout).
- Update of projected grid emissions . . .
Boston City Council Passes Heat Safety Ordinance for City Workers & Contractors
September 18, 2025
On August 27th, 2025, Boston City Council unanimously passed Docket #0135, An Ordinance to Protect Workers from Heat-Related Illness and Injuries in the City of Boston. Since an initial hearing on heat and worker protections in June 2024, Councilor Benjamin Weber’s office and other co-sponsors have been working with the City’s Office of Worker Empowerment, Office of Climate Resilience, and Office of Emergency Management, to draft and revise ordinance language that would protect city workers and contractors from the impacts of extreme heat. With initial ordinance language filed in January 2025, the intent was to finalize and pass the ordinance in summer 2025, with sufficient time for worker heat safety planning and implementation by summer 2026. The ordinance was written to go into effect 6 months after the day of passage, which will be February 27, 2026, giving relevant employers and contractors several months to design and implement heat illness prevention plans for summer 2026.
Some high-level takeaways from Boston’s heat safety ordinance for workers include:
- As of now, the heat safety ordinance only applies to city employees, contractors, and workers associated with city leases/sub-contracts. It is intended to encourage private employers to protect their workers in extreme heat as well but they are not yet mandated to do so.
- The threshold for protections is lower than emergency declaration protocol thresholds. The worker safety ordinance threshold kicks in at periods of extreme heat qualified as 80 degrees F or higher.
- Although some may say that this encourages misalignment with Boston’s heat emergency declaration protocols (with Boston’s heat advisories . . .
Built to Lead: Lessons in Building Decarbonization and Resilience
September 11, 2025
On September 24, A Better City is hosting the first in a series of five in-person panel events to showcase the climate leadership of A Better City member companies and institutions, Built to Lead: Lessons in Building Decarbonization and Resilience. Over the last three and a half years, A Better City members have been focused on helping to shape new and updated climate policies that relate to large buildings. This panel series will move from policy to implementation by showcasing how climate leaders are both decarbonizing and fortifying their building stock. The series aims to provide inspiring and replicable strategies for all large building owners.
The series includes:
- Built to Lead: Lessons in Building Decarbonization in Existing Buildings, Wednesday, September 24, 2025 @ 9-10:30 AM at 290 Congress St, Fort Point Room, Boston, MA 02210
- Torey Brooks, Pembroke—relaxing temperature settings in back-of-house pilot
- Saagar Patel, Equity Residential—new window technology pilot
- Al Scaramelli, Beacon Capital—building equipment optimization pilot
- Neetu Siddarth, BXP—waste heat recovery project
- Kailash Viswanathan, Consigli—retrofit phasing pilot in . . .
