Fenway (parkway)

Fenway

Map with the Fenway highlighted in red.
Maintained by	the Department of Conservation and Recreation
West end	Brookline Avenue
East end	Boylston Street
Construction
Inauguration	1876

Fenway, commonly referred to as The Fenway, is a mostly one-way, one- to three-lane parkway that runs along the southern and eastern edges of the Back Bay Fens in the Fenway–Kenmore neighborhood of Boston, in the east-central part of the U.S. state of Massachusetts. As part of the Emerald Necklace park system mainly designed by Frederick Law Olmsted in the late 19th century, the Fenway, along with the Back Bay Fens and Park Drive, connects the Commonwealth Avenue Mall to the Riverway. For its entire length, the parkway travels along the Muddy River and is part of the Metropolitan Park System of Greater Boston. Like others in the park system, it is maintained by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation.

The first parkway of the Emerald Necklace to be constructed, the Fenway's name was coined from an early description of the park that it runs alongside. It was first thought that it would promote a high-class neighborhood, but a majority of its early structures were for educational institutions. Current organizations on the parkway's route include the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts, and many colleges and universities.

The Fenway begins at the intersection of Brookline Avenue and the Riverway, heading southeast with three one-way lanes past Emmanuel College to an intersection with Avenue Louis Pasteur. From there, the left and right lanes become turn-only and the middle lane continues straight. Traffic in the left-turn-only lane changes direction and joins the paralleling Park Drive along with the oncoming traffic traveling northeast on the Fenway. After the turn-lane drops, the road becomes two-way with one lane in each direction past Simmons College and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. It then turns northeast at Louis Prang Street and becomes a one-way two-lane road which passes the Museum of Fine Arts and parts of Northeastern University. A short spur connects the parkway to Westland Avenue and from there it continues as a two-way road with two lanes in each direction past Berklee College of Music and the Boston Conservatory, ending at Boylston Street. At the Boylston Street intersection stands a monument of journalist, novelist and poet John Boyle O'Reilly which was constructed in 1897.