Boston’s 10 most bikable neighborhoods, explained

Two Boston neighborhoods in particular are especially biker-friendly, according to Walk Score, a real estate listings service that measures bikability and walkability: Allston and Fenway-Kenmore.

They are the only Boston neighborhoods that earn a Bike Score of at least 90 out of 100.

Eight other neighborhoods in the city, though, are also reasonably bikable compared with their fellow enclaves. Let’s cycle through them, shall we?

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Allston

The millennial-heavy neighborhood is the most bikable in Boston, according to Walk Score. It earns a Bike Score of 95.

Allston has voluminous waterfront for cycling—with Cambridge just over the river—and a relatively safe biking artery in North Beacon Street/Brighton Avenue.

Fenway-Kenmore

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Nearby Fenway-Kenmore has a Bike Score of 91, according to Walk Score, which also lumps in the Longwood and Audubon areas in this combined neighborhood.

Fenway-Kenmore earns such high biking marks for much the same reason as Allston: It’s centrally located—Back Bay and the South End are right nearby—and the arterial roadways are biker-friendly.

Back Bay

Its grid-like layout and the Commonwealth Avenue Mall, never mind the fact that cycling through it places a biker in downtown Boston, help earn this tony neighborhood a Bike Score of 88.

Hyde Square (Jamaica Plain)

The Hyde Square area of Jamaica Plain punches in with a Bike Score of 88 as well.

The area skirts the biker-friendly Southwest Corridor Park; and its main drag, Centre Street, is generally easy to glide through (though watch for driveways and parking-lot exits).

Central Jamaica Plain

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The central area of JP, from the Arborway northward to Boylston and Green streets also earns a Bike Score of 88.

The area has that same SW Corridor Park as well as the eastern edge of the Arnold Arboretum. There’s also South Street as a north-south artery.

Lower Roxbury

The area from Malcolm X Boulevard over to Massachusetts Avenue and east of Tremont Street lands a Bike Score of 85.

Melnea Cass Boulevard and Tremont are major biking arteries; and downtown Boston as well as Dorchester abut the area.

Mission Hill

The neighborhood earns a Bike Score of 84. Hop on Huntington Avenue or Tremont Street, and head to downtown.

The West End

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A good thing that this neighborhood has a Bike Score of 84 as it’s a major commercial , center, not least because of North Station.

The South End

The neighborhood lands a Bike Score of 83, and it’s not difficult to see why: Centrally located and with plenty of arteries running into—and away from—downtown.

Jamaica Hills

Walk Score maps this as the JP area around the Arnold Arboretum and Jamaica Pond. So it’s not hard to see why it earned a Bike Score of 81—plenty of bucolic space.