"Along Eleanor Avenue in Bourne, a small, tight-knit neighborhood with deep roots is about to disappear. The state is taking 13 homes to make way for the new Sagamore Bridge and its network of access roads. Some of the families have called the street home for decades and have established connections with their neighbors - eating at each other's dinner tables, shoveling each other's driveways, and asking about children and grandchildren."
"According to the state, in 1904, financier August Belmont II and civil engineer William Barclay Parsons began construction of the Cape Cod Canal to help ships avoid the dangerous outer banks of Cape Cod. That construction came at a steep local cost. The company making the canal demolished around 25 homes and relocated about another 10, said Jerry Ellis, 91, a lifelong Bourne resident, former selectman, and superintendent of the Sagamore Cemetery."
Along Eleanor Avenue in Bourne, the state is acquiring 13 homes to build two new arch-style Sagamore Bridges and their access roads, with construction expected to begin in 2028 and continue into the late 2030s. Four properties have been acquired so far, forcing long-established families to relocate and scattering a closely connected community. Bourne has faced repeated land takings for more than a century, including Cape Cod Canal construction, the expansion of the Massachusetts Maritime Academy, and transportation projects that reshaped business districts. Early canal construction in 1904 demolished roughly 25 homes and relocated about 10, including property tied to the town’s namesake.
Read at Boston.com
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