Mayor Katjana Ballantyne and Fire Chief Charles Breen invite the Somerville community to the grand opening ceremony for the newly opened Assembly Square Fire Station on Saturday, October 18, at 10 a.m.

The event will feature a brief speaking program to include Mayor Ballantyne, Chief Breen, and Justin Crane from the CambridgeSeven architecture firm, followed by a hose uncoupling (the fire service’s form of a ribbon cutting). An open house-style walkthrough of the new station and touch-a-truck will follow until 12 p.m. Light refreshments will be provided.

The Assembly Square station is Somerville’s first newly constructed fire station in more than 50 years. The approximately 10,000-square-foot station houses Engine 2 and primarily serves the growing Assembly Square area and Ten Hills neighborhood. The full station is entirely fossil-fuel free and features a new state-of-the-art PURVIS Fire Station Alerting System. The station was built via a public-private partnership between BioMed Realty and the city.

Firefighter safety and well-being were central to the station’s design, with specialized equipment in a decontamination room for firefighters to clean protective gear and a dedicated heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system to keep contaminants out of the living areas.

Other features include a dayroom and kitchen, fitness room, and individual bunk rooms, as well as apparatus bays with exhaust systems and carbon monoxide monitors, a backup emergency generator system, internet connectivity and Wi-Fi, and ample storage space.

“When there’s a fire, every second counts, and this new station built under my administration is going to make the growing Assembly area and our whole city much safer,” said Mayor Ballantyne. “Our Capital Projects team, planning and development folks, the Fire Department, and our partner Biomed Realty all worked together to get this much-needed station built, and they’ve created something special that gives our firefighters the best safety equipment while also being completely fossil-fuel-free.”

“The new fire station will greatly improve response times and provide critical public safety services to the Assembly Square neighborhood,” said Chief Breen. “In addition, this state-of-the-art station is proof of the city’s commitment to improving the quality of life for our dedicated firefighters.”

The path to the first new fire station in more than 50 years

It took years of planning across two administrations to deliver Somerville its first new fire station in over 50 years. As the community planned for growth in Assembly Square back in the early 2010s, it became clear that a new fire station was needed. But the cost and challenges of traditional construction demanded a creative solution.

Rather than purchasing land and building from scratch, the former Curtatone administration issued a request for proposals for creative options for locating the station in public or private space. BioMed Realty responded with a proposal to incorporate a fire station into its 1.4 million square foot Assembly Square development. They proposed housing the station on the ground floor of a planned parking garage.

The location wasn’t ideal for retail, but made excellent sense for a fire station. The project would also avoid eminent domain complications, preserve tax revenue by keeping the land private, and accelerate the timeline. Through a negotiated development covenant, the city secured below-market lease rates, and in 2021, with Council approval, the City signed a 30-year lease. BioMed began Garage construction in 2022. The Ballantyne administration then designed and built out a state-of-the-art, completely fossil-fuel-free station with advanced safety features to protect firefighter health. Construction began in early 2024, and in September 2025, the new station opened its doors.

For more information about the new station, visit bit.ly/newfirestation.