Boston · Downtown Boston

West End

TD Garden’s neighborhood, the Museum of Science, and the post-urban-renewal high-rise district between the North End and Beacon Hill.

The West End is the smallest of Boston's downtown neighborhoods and the one most reshaped by mid-20th-century urban renewal — the original West End was largely demolished in the late 1950s, replaced by the Charles River Park complex and the institutional buildings now dominating the area: Massachusetts General Hospital, TD Garden (where the Bruins and Celtics play), the Museum of Science straddling the river. Cambridge Street separates the modern West End from Beacon Hill's preservation district. For visiting adults 21+, the West End's value is less neighborhood-walking and more access: TD Garden events, Museum of Science visits, and the hospital district adjacency. Cannabis-licensed retail in the immediate West End is thin, but the short walk into Downtown Crossing or across the river to Cambridge opens the supply chain. The day shape leans event- or institution-anchored — a Garden game, a Science Museum afternoon, dinner at one of the West End restaurants, and a hotel base nearby.