After Delays, Harvard Square Finally Says Goodbye to The Pit

As part of ongoing renovations to the Harvard Square Plaza, yellow safety vests and work boots replaced black leather jackets and Doc Marten boots from the ’80s during the demolition of The Pit this past Tuesday.

Built in 1982, The Pit, a sunken brick-and-stone seating area, served as a place of “great acceptance” for individuals who were “grunge and punk,” according to Denise A. Jillson, the executive director of the Harvard Square Business Association.

“You could be different, you could be very different, but you would be accepted. And that was really the charm and the magic of the place,” Jillson said.

New construction plans were created to reimagine the aging Harvard Square Kiosk and Plaza to be “flexible, dynamic, and welcoming community assets,” per the Cambridge Department of Public Works website. Specifically, a permanent visitor information center will be built and the space would act as a hub for “community gatherings, including civic, artistic, and social activities.”

Another reason for the redevelopment was to improve the plaza’s accessibility to people with disabilities.

But until this past week — for almost three years — no ground was broken and The Pit remained fenced off to the public. The demolition delays were caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, the difficulties of building near a busy MBTA stop, and “setbacks” from Cambridge’s city government to make an appropriation for the project, according to Jillson.

The Cambridge Department of Public Works said on their website that they expect the project to be completed by summer 2026.

As the area remains under construction, Katie Labrie, the executive director of Cambridge Local First, spoke about how The Pit was not just a seating area — it was a place for anyone that felt they did not fit in.

A self-proclaimed “Pit rat” during her adolescent years, Labrie said the time she spent in The Pit during her adolescent years shaped her into the person and leader she is today.

The Pit allowed her teenager self to “find real, local community, as opposed to fabricated clubs or networks.”

“I always was drawn to living in neighborhoods that had that innate sense of sort of localism,” Labrie said. “If I hadn’t had that experience, I think so many of my life choices would have been different.”

Though Labrie said many of the people she met in The Pit were simply participating in a culture of teenage rebellion, the space had a deeper meaning for others.

“There were a lot of really, really great kids who were not just rebelling,” Labrie said. “They were escaping abusive homes, or they were voluntarily or involuntarily unhoused because their home conditions were intolerable.”

When The Pit was first announced to be remodeled in summer 2022, crowds gathered at Pit-a-Palooza, an event to celebrate “the notorious and revered Harvard Square ‘Pit’ and those who called it home,” according to its event website.

At Pit-a-Palooza, leather-clad attendees danced and moshed to New Wave and 90s punk hits, while second-hand smoke filled the air.

Though the bricks, stones, and the people who sit on them will change after reconstruction, Jillson said she hopes The Pit’s themes of acceptance will remain present.

The “expectation” for The Pit’s redevelopment is that it will be a “welcoming place” for “students and professors and unhoused people and foreigners and immigrants and people of every denomination and every way of identifying,” Jillson said.

After The Pit’s revitalization, Labrie said, “I would love to see music come back to the Square in a real serious way. There’s nothing like taking that escalator up right from the depths of the T and hearing music blasting.”

“It just makes you immediately know where you are and lifts your mood,” she added

—Staff writer Jaya N. Karamcheti can be reached at jaya.karamcheti@thecrimson.com.