A preliminary draft before Brookline's Bicycle Advisory Committee would eliminate dozens of on-street parking spaces along Harvard Street, removing customer parking on some blocks serving Coolidge Corner and Brookline Village businesses.

John VanScoyoc, who has served on the Select Board since 2020, flagged the proposal in a series of posts on X on Tuesday, Aug. 18, breaking down the losses block by block. The reductions he outlined are steep:

• A section of Harvard Street currently offering 15 spaces serving adjacent businesses would drop to zero.
• The northbound block between Babcock Street and the Florida Ruffin Ridley School, home to Jin's, Zaftig's and Healthworks, would fall from 11 spaces to 3.
• A stretch of restaurants and shops immediately south of Coolidge Corner would go from 17 spaces to 6.
• A northbound section of Harvard Street in Brookline Village would drop from 11 spaces to zero.

"The northbound block between Babcock and FRR School, containing Jin's, Zaftig's and Healthworks, would go from 11 spaces to 3," VanScoyoc wrote on X.

The proposal is described as a preliminary draft, not a final recommendation. VanScoyoc said the committee planned to discuss it during the week of Aug. 18, though the specific meeting date and time have not been publicly confirmed.

Echoes of Washington Street debate

The Harvard Street proposal arrives as Brookline continues to wrestle with the tension between bicycle infrastructure and business access. A separate $29 million reconstruction of Washington Street, proposed in late 2024, drew opposition from business owners over the planned elimination of 64 parking spaces to make room for separated bike lanes.

Bicycle Advisory Committee Vice Chair Toby Sillman wrote in a July 24 letter to the editor published in Brookline.News that "implementing measures such as parking-protected bike lanes would be far more helpful" for cyclist safety in Coolidge Corner, and noted the area is "rife with double-parking." That letter addressed parking enforcement and cyclist safety generally, not this specific Harvard Street proposal, but it reflects the committee's broader stance on parking-protected bike lanes.

No on-record comment from the Bicycle Advisory Committee, its chair, or any of the affected businesses was available as of Tuesday. The committee has not posted the draft document publicly or announced when public comment will be accepted.