The northeastern corner of the intersection of Cambridge's Main Street and Massachusetts Avenue even looks confused. The areas farther from the traffic support small homes and seem to form a quiet community. However, the blocks on Main Street boast buildings of every shape and size, some closer to the sidewalks, some farther, and some angled as if they existed before the roads themselves. Among them are restaurants, a convenience store, offices, apartments, a bed and breakfast, at least three churches, scattered parking lots, and a deserted lot. Every few minutes the T's Red Line rumbles underneath. How did the area get to be such an amalgam? And when did this happen? The physical puzzle of such diversely shaped buildings on this site and the hints that it is not what it once was are part of its appeal.

 Part of the confusion must have begun with the intersection of the grids following Main Street and Massachusetts Avenue. Bishop Allen Drive, for example, obviously continues running parallel to Massachusetts Avenue as Main Street's School Street does to it. But when and how did these streets intersect? If someone orchestrated the event, why did he allow for the construction of acute angles at the corners of the blocks? This decision probably influenced the site more than he could have predicted.

 These roads certainly played a part in the buildings that are on the site today, but were there buildings before, ones without such sharp angles? What has happened to shape these buildings will probably tell most of the blocks' stories. For instance, what was there when the older brick buildings
that are not aligned with the streets first appeared? Was the short row of one story shops with attractive fronts longer at one point in time? Who decided to create parking lots and the empty lot on School Street? They could not have all been there from the beginning. And what happened to the buildings that were once there? Specifically, how does an apartment building stretching from the front of a block to the back, standing five stories high but only one room across and sticking up like a giant piece of bread among parking lots survive? Surly it was not the only one there, but what happened to its neighbors? Whatever happened, the change was not recent; the oatmeal advertisement on the side of the building where another could have been is now barely visible. On another note, when did triangular structures become necessary? If space was at such a premium, why were the parking lots not moved onto these corners? These buildings certainly add character to the site and its intersections, but that hardly seems like the reason for their creation.

 This site raises other questions that are difficult for me personally to overlook. I would like to know how long the bed and breakfast has existed. Its only sign is so small that no one would find the place unless he knew exactly where to look. If it has been in business for some time, how has it succeeded? The rumblings of the Red Line could not have helped the bed and breakfast or the site as a whole. So, how did the community change when the Red Line passed underneath it? And which was more influential, the Central Square stop or the noise? Finally, two of the more obvious questions and perhaps some of the more important to the site's development: Where was the school that named School Street, and why is it no longer there? The answers to these will also help with understanding the development of this intersection and its present condition.

 All of these factors -- the streets, the buildings, but especially obvious omissions -- led me to this section just off of the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Main Street. It is not precisely an attractive site, but the questions it poses are. What remains to be seen are as many equally suitable solutions.