‘Lap in the Face’: Newton paints weeks before the annual festival on the Italian flag traffic stripes

For almost a century, half a mile on the road in Newton is not intensively due to a double yellow line, but instead a continuous tricolor line in honor of the Italian enclave.

Walking with Italian flags, the centerline of Adams Street in Newton’s Non -Antum neighborhood red, white and green since 1935, said the St. Mary of Carmen Society. But a few weeks before the annual festival of the Society, the city of Newton removed the iconic lines in favor of double yellow.

The society, which the Annually Italian-American festival In Pellegrini Park started to start on July 16, said that the again painting “without any public notification or outreach” came. The festival, which attracts a crowd of more than 10,000 people, also includes a procession in that part of Adams Street.

“This surprise removal of our holy religious public art installation was hastily and under the cover of darkness, only a few weeks before the 90th annual festival,” said the members of the Society in a statement. “This was a painful memory that our traditions can be deleted without warning or respect. It was more than a violation of trust: it was a slap in the face.”

Mayor of Newton, Ruthanne Fuller, who is not running for re -election this year, said in a statement that the “striping of Adams Street” after “big consideration in many months” came. She confirmed that the lines were dyed at night, which is standard practice.

Fuller said that she is “confident”, the street can have both the yellow safety lines and the iconic Italian tricolors, “moved with perhaps 12 to 18 (inches) should be moved.”

“We have taken the promotion carefully. Traditions are important. We communicated with Festa -volunteers for many months and absolutely want them this year again the Tricolors of Green, White and Red as they do every year on Adams Street,” Fuller said.

Adams Street is also dangerous, said Fuller, especially half the miles between the streets in Washington and Watertown with the painted tricolor. She quoted the city 2024 Traffic Calming Analysiswho arranged that piece as the top priority for ‘traffic calmly’.

“Having consistent line markings is important. Other busy streets in Non-Antum such as the rest of Adams Street, Chapel, Bridge, Crafts, Watertown, Pearl, Jackson and California are double-yellow streets,” Fuller said. “We look at data. We follow the federal standards.”

Newton city councilor John Oliver, one of the three councilors representing Nonantum, said The Boston Globe That he and his neighbors were not told about the repainting.

“Nobody in the community knew that this would come, no chosen officials were contacted”, “, told the SphereApparently in contrast to the mayor’s statement.

While the mayor says that the volunteers can repaint the colors, the St. Mary of Carmen Society called the city ‘to do the right one’. In their statement it asked the city to restore Tricolor -line painting, to acknowledge the damage caused to Non -Antum ‘because of unconscious cultural bias’ and ‘Hen to honor cultural and religious traditions’, their statement said.

A petition Van de Society has collected more than 2,000 signatures from Wednesday evening.

“This tradition is not new,” said society. “It has been in harmony with city traffic and public safety regulations for almost a century. In fact, the city of Newton has been permitted for decades – long before the current administration.”

Molly Farrar is a general allocation reporter for Boston.com, aimed at education, politics, crime and more.