Norfolk CountyMassachusetts
Needham, Massachusetts
1 high-hazard dam is rated in poor or unsatisfactory condition. Bedrock sits a median 15 ft down across 174 logs, shallower than the Massachusetts median of 24 ft.
- Live · as of Sep 11, 2026
- 9 public sources · method
- ← All towns
Median depth to bedrock
15 ft
middle half 10–26 ft · 174 logs
Bridges rated poor
2
of 14 inventoried
Poor high-hazard dams
1
National Inventory of Dams
Construction projects
26
median $536K · public bid results
01 · Dams & disasters
1 high-hazard dam needs work
FEMA Public Assistance is reported by county, so the figure below is Norfolk County-wide context, not a Needham number.
| Dam | Condition | Built |
|---|---|---|
| Sabrina Lake West DikeUnnamed tributary to Charles River | Unsatisfactory | 1870 |
High hazard potential means failure would probably cost lives — it rates the consequences, not the dam’s condition.
FEMA Public Assistance, Norfolk County
$90.4M
Federal share obligated across 939 projects in 11 declared disasters since 2010. The largest category is emergency protective measures (88%); roads & bridges took $2.6M.
02 · Ground
Rock turns up a median 15 ft down
From 174 depth-to-rock records inside Needham (MassGIS / MGS borings & well logs). Logs cluster where people drill wells and bore for roads, so treat this as the town’s pattern, not a site answer.
Half of Needham's logs reach rock between 10 and 26 ft
Depth to bedrock: 10th–90th percentile whisker, middle-half box, median tick; dashed line = Massachusetts median.
median 15 ftMA 24 ft
02040 ft
n = 174 logsSource: MassGIS / MGS borings & well logs
▸ Show the numbers▾ Hide the numbers
| Depth to rock (ft) | Logs |
|---|---|
| 0–5 | 15 |
| 5–10 | 26 |
| 10–20 | 70 |
| 20–50 | 44 |
| 50–100 | 13 |
| 100+ | 6 |
Rock within 10 ft
26%
of logs (23% across Massachusetts). Shallow rock means ledge in excavations, refusal for driven piles and rock anchors rather than soil nails; deep ground means taller shoring and more groundwater. 10% of logs here go past 50 ft.
03 · Bridges
2 of 14 bridges are rated poor — above the Massachusetts rate of 9%
Every highway bridge and large culvert in the 2025 National Bridge Inventory that stands inside Needham. Median age 88 years; 1 posted for weight.
43% good, 14% poor
FHWA good / fair / poor rating — the lowest of deck, superstructure, substructure or culvert.
- Good6 · 43%
- Fair6 · 43%
- Poor2 · 14%
n = 14 structuresSource: FHWA National Bridge Inventory 2025
▸ Show the numbers▾ Hide the numbers
| Built | Structures |
|---|---|
| pre-1910 | 5 |
| 1910s | 1 |
| 1920s | 1 |
| 1950s | 2 |
| 1970s | 1 |
| 2010s | 4 |
The poor-rated bridges
| Carries | Over | Built | Daily traffic |
|---|---|---|---|
| CHESTNUT ST | CHARLES RIVER | 1922 | 10,100 |
| HIGH ROCK ST | BCRR ABANDONED | 1916 | 6,600 |
04 · Money & permits
26 construction projects on file, median $536K — at or below the state's $1.5M
Public construction projects
26
Median estimated value $536K, middle half $235K–$2.1M, against $1.5M across Massachusetts. Capped total $54.5M (each project counted at no more than $100M). Public bid records compiled June 2026, heavy on 2021–22 — a sample, not an annual market.
05 · Next door
Needham and the 6 towns that border it
A dash means no data for that layer, not zero.
| Town | Poor bridges | Rock depth |
|---|---|---|
| Needham, MA | 2 / 14 | 15 ft |
| Boston, MA | 41 / 404 | 92 ft |
| Newton, MA | 10 / 49 | 30 ft |
| Dedham, MA | 2 / 23 | 14 ft |
| Wellesley, MA | 0 / 17 | 25 ft |
| Westwood, MA | 0 / 6 | 15 ft |
| Dover, MA | 0 / 5 | 21 ft |
Where these numbers come from
Method, sources & caveats
Needham is the Census county subdivision 2502144105 (Norfolk County). Every record is placed here by its coordinates, not by the place name the source uses. Construction-project figures come from Massachusetts public bid results, published as town-level counts, medians and capped totals (n ≥ 10).
- Towns are Census county subdivisions: cities, towns, plantations, and Maine/New Hampshire unorganized territories and townships. Every record is placed in a town by its coordinates (point-in-polygon), not by the source's own place label — so a bridge in Roxbury counts for Boston and a well in 'North Waltham' counts for Waltham.
- Bridges: FHWA NBI 2025, highway structures ≥ 20 ft including large culverts. 'Poor' is FHWA's good/fair/poor rating (lowest of deck, superstructure, substructure or culvert ≤ 4). Percent-poor is shown only for towns with at least 5 structures.
- Depth to bedrock is the median of driller- and boring-reported depths in the town, shown only where at least 10 logs exist. Water-well logs over-sample rural lots and hilltops; one town median never describes a particular site.
- Bedrock depths use the same state databases and filters as the Bedrock & soils module (bedrock wells and borings that reached rock, 0 < depth ≤ 400 ft, exact re-filings dropped), but every log is placed in a town by its coordinates rather than the driller's town field, so town counts can differ slightly between the two pages. Connecticut and Rhode Island have no statewide public well-log database with depths.
- Dams: only high-hazard-potential dams whose latest condition assessment is Poor or Unsatisfactory are counted (live NID). Connecticut and Rhode Island assessments may lag.
- FEMA Public Assistance dollars are federal share obligated for disasters declared since 2010, reported by county — they are county context, not a town figure.
- Grant awards are Massachusetts only (EEA Dam & Seawall program, MVP Action grants, CZM Coastal Resilience). Other states' programs are not yet included.
- Ground-related permit counts cover only the municipal portals the pipeline reads (Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, Worcester, Framingham, Providence, Portsmouth, Hartford and a few others) — an absent count means 'not covered', not zero.
- Data as of
- Sep 11, 2026
- Generated
- Sep 11, 2026
- Records
- 367,748
- Refresh
- Live pull · weekly
- U.S. Census Bureau cartographic boundary files — county subdivisions (2024, 1:500k)Public domain
- FHWA National Bridge Inventory (2025 delimited files)Public domain
- USACE National Inventory of DamsPublic domainHigh-hazard dams rated Poor or Unsatisfactory (live NID).
- USGS U.S. Landslide InventoryPublic domain
- MassGIS / Massachusetts Geological Survey — Bedrock Data PointsPublic recordBorings and well logs that reached rock (MassDEP well drillers, USGS, MWRA, MassDOT…); seismic/HVSR and map-derived shallow-bedrock/outcrop points excluded.
- NH DES Water Well Inventory, Maine Geological Survey Wells Database, Vermont DEC well recordsPublic recordBedrock wells only; driller-reported depth to bedrock / overburden thickness.
- OpenFEMA Public Assistance Funded Projects Details (v2)Public domain
- MA EEA / CZM grant awards — Dam & Seawall, MVP Action, CZM Coastal ResiliencePublic record
- Municipal open-data permit portals (Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, Providence, Portsmouth, others)Public recordOnly permits flagged as ground-related (retaining walls, excavation, foundations) are counted.
Published by Earth Support Corp as a public resource. Regional statistics for planning and curiosity. They are not an engineering report, a bid recommendation or a statement about any particular site, firm or project. Spot an error? Tell us and we will correct it. Full method: methodology.