Davis Square @ Elm & Grove Street
Davis Square needs homes.
This block could have 502 of them.
The site today
Walk along Elm Street, from The Burren to Dragon Pizza, and you’ll see too many empty storefronts. Boarded-up windows aren’t neighborhood character we want, and conditions mean they’ll stay boarded up without significant investment. Leaving things as they are is a choice to let this block continue to deteriorate.
The homes we could have
We could have 502 homes here, and 126 of them (25%!) would be subsidized below-market. That means one-bedroom homes at about $1,829/mo. for people Somerville keeps pricing out through inaction, covered by market-rate rents of the remaining 376 homes.
At street level, this would be small storefronts sized for independent shops and cafés, with wider sidewalks and a corner cut-through that opens the block up to foot traffic instead of closing it off. And it’d be built by a 100% union construction workforce.
The neighbors who stay
The Burren wouldn’t lose its spot. Owner Tommy McCarthy signed a short-term extension at the current location, and a long-term lease to move back in once the building’s done. Dragon Pizza’s return has been confirmed too.
The businesses everyone worries about losing are already willing & able to stay here.
Why here, why now
SomerVision 2040 is Somerville’s long-range plan, adopted by the city after years of public input. It sorts the city into areas meant to stay as they are and areas meant to grow, and it marks Davis Square an “Enhance” area: meant to grow. That’s not us borrowing someone else’s authority. That’s our own plan saying growth belongs here.
The logic behind that is straighforward. Two-thirds of Somerville households rent, and rents climb fastest where the number of homes hasn’t kept up with the number of people who want to live here. Building more homes, especially subsidized below-market ones, is how a city keeps itself livable for the renters already here, while welcoming newcomers.
Transit is the other half of it. This site sits right on the Red Line, a short walk from bus lines that reach the rest of the city. Homes here mean more people within walking distance of the T, not more cars competing for street parking, exactly the kind of location SomerVision says should hold more people, not fewer.
That’s our plan working.
Make your voice heard
Opposition shows up to every meeting. Supporters need to too.
Want 502 homes — 126 of them subsidized below-market — instead of another decade of empty storefronts? Say so.
Sign up for project alerts ↗ Volunteer to help ↗ Join the Davis Square Neighborhood Council ↗For the City’s record of this proposal, see the City’s project page. Figures on units, affordability, and rents are from Copper Mill’s MassHousing filing and city records, both available from the City’s project page.
Reporting on tenant commitments, labor, and process status: WBUR, Boston.com, NBC Boston, The Harvard Crimson, and the Cambridge/Somerville Independent.
Compiled July 2026 — please reach out to info@vibrantdavis.org if any links are broken & let us know.