Your Neighbors Speaking Up -- on Camera

Today is Tuesday, March 29. Here are five things you need to know today.

1. You’ve seen it on TV news a million times. A reporter walking around a busy parking lot or striding along a bustling Main Street, looking for a willing passerby to weigh in with a “person on the street” perspective.“How are you dealing with this snow storm?” “What is your wish for the New Year?” “Who’d you just vote for?” May I direct you to , a new feature on Patch inspired by that age-old journalism trope, but updated with a Charlestown-centric spin. Each week our reporter Kasey Hariman will pose a new question to folks in the neighborhood – something relevant to the neighborhood -- and each day we’ll post a new response. You can take a look at where neighbors are sharing their thoughts on a City Council proposal to ban smoking in public parks. And please -- if you have any suggestions for questions, let us know. 

2. Anyone hoping to get on the Orange Line yesterday afternoon had their plans derailed when a fire near Chinatown station broke out. The blaze was so serious, in fact, that more than 200 people were evacuated from an Orange Line train. Nobody was inured, but it seems like it was a pretty scary scene, according to this Globe story.

3. Put this in your calendar if you haven’t already: Street sweeping starts Friday. If you’ve already forgotten the schedule, you can get a full listing on the city’s web site. You can also sign up for phone and email reminders, or update your account with the city’s alert system.

4. Let’s just go ahead and file this one under Holy Crap: Radioactive rainwater was found in Massachusetts this weekend. Yup, from the nuclear disaster in Japan. Routine rain samples taken in Massachusetts, as well as California, Pennsylvania and Washington state, all showed the same elevated levels of radioiodine-131. Health officials are saying that there’s no threat here: the levels are too low to cause any alarm. But um… I’m alarmed. How about you? Also: health officials declined to say which towns the samples of rainwater were taken from. Read the full story in the Herald.

5. The forecast: Mostly sunny today with a high near 44. A bit windy this afternoon, with gusts as high as 24 mph.

For more info on what's happening around the neighborhood, check out our events calendar.