Newton mayor goes over the (painted) double line

Boston Globe

21-07-2025

And those are just the examples the crack research team at Globe Opinion could identify. (
In Rhode Island, Bristol's red-white-and-blue center line on two-way Main Street is such a cherished tradition that the town secured explicit permission for it from the federal government (
And is any of that really so terrible? The lines — and other nonstandard street markings, like the rainbow crosswalk in Northampton — seem inoffensive to me, small symbolic ways to honor an area's distinctive past or present. Check out
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Now, there is perhaps a reasonable counterargument that such markings could be viewed as exclusive — that an Italian flag painted in a public street sends an unwelcoming message to residents of the neighborhood who aren't Italian (or Mexican or Hungarian, if you want to get technical).
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But that's not how Newton's mayor, Ruthanne Fuller, has defended the decision to remove the center lines, which had been in place for decades before they disappeared in the middle of the night without warning on June 26.
Rather, the city says it was a required safety step. Removing them was 'mandatory, not optional,' Fuller wrote in a
The standards Fuller cited said two-way streets that are more than 20 feet wide and carry more than 6,000 vehicles daily 'shall' have center line markings that 'shall' be yellow. Adams Street is 33 feet wide and has an average daily vehicle count of 6,002, according to a
Citing crash data and other statistics, that same report also listed Adams Street as the highest priority spot for traffic calming in all of Newton — though it didn't specifically blame the Italian lines for the street's safety problems or recommend removing the lines as a way to solve them.
(If anything, I'd guess that unconventional lines make people slow down, not speed up, for the very reason that they're so unusual.)
Fuller offered a compromise, saying that the neighborhood could paint the Italian colors on the street in addition to the yellow lines in the center.
But that's not flying with residents, who are demanding the return of the Italian colors on the center lines, full stop. And Fuller's safety rationale hasn't convinced critics, some of whom have accused the mayor of acting out of anti-Italian animus. Some even tried to
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'The claim that these markings needed to be replaced with yellow lines for safety lacks merit,'
I'm not a lawyer — though many of Fuller's constituents are! — so I'm not going to attempt to parse the legal arguments. Suffice to say, though, that other cities in Massachusetts have apparently accepted whatever theoretical safety or legal risk nonstandard lines pose. (I emailed officials in Malden, Peabody, and Hingham, but none of them responded to my message; a spokesman for the city of Cambridge said the lines on one-way Warren Street were allowed because they do 'not interfere with any form of traffic control.')
But let's assume Fuller's legal interpretation is correct and yellow lines are indeed required on Adams Street. With some creativity, and creative readings of the rules, there are still ways the city could end the controversy:
The Newton City Council floated the idea of alternating between sections of double yellow lines and sections of Italian tricolor. The federal standards say the lines have to be yellow, but not that they have to be all yellow.
As mentioned, Bristol, R.I., has special permission to paint its center line red, white, and blue. The city could petition the Trump administration for a similar exemption. Given its commitment to celebrating diversity, there's little doubt the request would be approved.
More of a long shot, but an ideal solution would be to convince Italy to change its flag to a yellow-black-yellow pattern. It can't hurt to ask!
Newton could just convert the whole street to a one-way street or, even better, a giant bike lane, which could then be painted however the city pleases.
Secession.
The rules apply to paved roads. Maybe use cobblestones on Adams Street instead? (That would also slow down traffic!)
Secure pledges from three people in the neighborhood — maybe a few more as a cushion — to cut back on one trip on Adams Street a day, to get the daily vehicle count back below 6,000.
Ultimately, I don't understand why Fuller picked this fight, and picked it now. Adams Street may well have needed traffic calming measures — and according to Fuller's message, the city is going ahead with raised pedestrian crossing and radar feedback signs. Those measures seem much more likely to reduce accidents than removing the Italian lines, so why not try them first?
This is an excerpt from
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Alan Wirzbicki is Globe deputy editor for editorials. He can be reached at