US: House Redistricting Massachusetts

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Isn't Capuano going to run against Scott Brown anyway? No real reason to preserve his district if so.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

OK here's my take on a "fair" map ignoring current lines and incumbents:



MA-01: Not much to see here, super-safe D seat. Home of Ampere. Actually it's also home to Neal and Olver, I'd assume the older than dirt Olver would retire.
MA-02: This is what a proper Worcester-based seat looks like. No real chance of it flipping. McGovern wins here.
MA-03: Some relatively Republican areas here but at best it's a fool's gold type district, not visible very well on the map but it does include Framingham. That and Lowell will keep in the D area, though there could be an interesting primary fight on that basis. For now though Tsongas lives here and wouldn't be going anywhere.
MA-04: I removed the county borders because counties don't mean much in MA, but this runs almost concurrent with Essex County. Marginally more D than Tierney's current seat, and Tierney no doubt hangs on.
MA-05: This one I'm not too happy about, because it basically takes some leftover rural areas and shoves them into a Boston-based district, but best I could do for now. This district includes Somerville and Charlestown. It's quite different from Capuano's current seat, but he lives there and is definitely a safe seat. Markey lives here too, so an interesting primary battle could happen.
MA-06: Most of Boston plus Cambridge, Brookline, Belmont and Watertown. 57.3% White VAP. Partisan lean is obvious. Stephen Lynch lives here, but he won't be winning the primary. I never liked him anyway.
MA-07: Newton, Waltham, a sliver of Boston, Milton, Quiny and some rural areas. Both Frank and Keating live here, but wisdom seems to be Frank is retiring.
MA-08: The southeast shore to Attleboro. This is a legitimately winnable for the GOP open seat, though them blowing it is always possible, plus the existence of Brockton.
MA-09: New open seat that should be drawn from any community of interest standpoint. The cape plus the islands plus New Bedford and Fall River. Definitely a Dem seat, but could have an interesting primary fight.

It wasn't deliberate but worth noting that this map does screw over a particularly obnoxious demographic I'm known to not be too fond of.

The South Boston area Irish Catholics of course. Known for social conservatism, racism, anger at apostates and support for the IRA, they end up in a seat full of minorities and Brookline and Cambridge liberals, and their boy in Congress goes down.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

The issue is how the Worcester seat runs down the border like that. OK it might do that now but that doesn't make it a good or logical thing.

The only real logical district for Worcester is just one in the middle of the state, any other way you end up with some odd combination, the current set up which keeps Springfield separate from the Amherst area and rural western Mass is perhaps excusable with 10 districts but with 9 you've kind of crossed the threshold where it's not reasonable anymore. Not that I expect it to go away though since it appears like the 5th is the one being eyed for elimination.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I don't expect fair maps, persay, just ones that aren't hideously gerrymandered like Ohio this year or Maryland or Massachusetts last time around. I think we ought to be drawing Indiana/Wisconsin type maps that do favor the party who drew them but aren't ridiculous. As for Illinois, I'd like to have seen something a little more even-handed, but it wasn't truly awful.

As ugly as Massachusetts is, it's obviously not for partisan gain. You'd get the same result on a fair map.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Olver = should retire anyway for being so old.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Well with Olver retiring here's my proposal:

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I thought it was more important to keep the Springfield area and Worcester area in each respective district though.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

There's a "Save View JPG" button under "Area Views" at the top. Just upload it somewhere and then post it here.