HINGHAM — September 15, 2026 — The Select Board voted 3-0 to authorize an $86,500 design amendment, not to exceed $198,700, that will carry the Main, Middle and Short street roundabout to bid this winter. Construction is set to start in April and run four to six months, putting the July 4 parade and the start of the school year inside the work window.
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Work on the roundabout began around 2022, after a fatality at the intersection of Main, Middle and Short streets led the town and the police department into a MassDOT road safety audit. That audit’s consultant laid out several fixes. Signalization would have put mast arms on Article 97 land and could have forced a taking of private property. The roundabout required no taking, changed no Article 97 land, needed no special legislation, and rated as both the safest option and the most efficient.
The amendment approved Tuesday pays the town’s traffic engineering consultant to finish design, prepare the project for bidding and provide construction quality assurance. It also widens the design scope to roadways picked up by water main work, including an extension of Main Street and part of Levitt Street, with lighter work on Short Street and School Street. The money comes from Chapter 90, roughly half in fiscal 2027 and the balance rolling into fiscal 2028.
Construction is funded separately. The town submitted a design that was about 95% complete to MassDOT’s Complete Streets program and won a $1 million construction award, and that award expires December 31, 2027. The money has to be spent before that date for the town to be reimbursed, which sets the rest of the calendar: design finished by mid- to late November, bidding in late December or early January, a contract in place in February, and ground broken in April.
Four to six months of construction starting in April covers the July 4 parade and reaches the start of the school year at Hingham High. Chair Liz Klein asked whether the work could be scheduled around the school year, was told it could not.
Member Bill Ramsey asked that the contract obligate the contractor to keep the parade route passable and safe for bystanders, and Town Engineer JR Frey said the requirement would go into the bid solicitation. Frey said the water portion could conceivably begin earlier, though he would not commit to it.
Select Board member Julie Strehle pressed on the funding year and on the water main work, which has to be finished before the roundabout surface goes in. Both will be bid as a single contract, with the water crews breaking ground in April and the road construction following behind.
I just love to hear that when there’s going to be a road construction project that you’re teeing it up, lining it up with Weir River water system, that’s living into the promise of owning our own water system and having control over that. — Select Board Member Julie Strehle
Frey said the fire department’s quint (pumper) and ambulances can get through the roundabout, with signage set so the overhanging bucket clears, and that no part of the Town Common will fall within the roadway or the curb line.
