West Roxbury, Massachusetts

West Roxbury is a neighborhood in Boston bordered by Roslindale to the northeast, the Town of Dedham to the west and south, the town of Brookline to the north and the city of Newton to the west. West Roxbury is often mistakenly confused with Roxbury, although the two are not related. West Roxbury, often referred to as a suburb within the city, is separated from Roxbury by Jamaica Plain and Roslindale.

West Roxbury’s main thoroughfare is Centre Street, which is lined with local restaurants and commercial establishments. Life in the neighborhood centers on civic activism, local politics, parishes and youth athletic leagues. West Roxbury is home to District E-5 of the Boston Police Department and two Boston fire stations, Ladder 25 & Engine 30 on Centre Street and Engine 55 on Washington Street. The Needham Branch of the MBTA Commuter Rail network has three stations in West Roxbury (Bellevue, Highland and West Roxbury). Several MBTA bus lines run through and/or terminate in West Roxbury.

A large Veterans Affairs hospital is located opposite the Charles River on the VFW Parkway near the Dedham line. This hospital has undergone several expansions during the last couple of decades. The neighborhood was home to an experimental transcendentalist utopia community called Brook Farm, which attracted notable figures such as Margaret Fuller and Nathaniel Hawthorne, whose 1852 novel (The Blithedale Romance) is based on his stay there.