After three consecutive months of increasingly bad news for Boston 2024, there appears to at last be a note of relief for the embattled Olympic bid. In a new poll released by WBUR (conducted by MassINC polling), support has increased for the first time since January. While the number is still far from where bid organizers want it to be (or, in fact, need it to be before a referendum), it marks a halt to the demoralizing slide of the past few months.

In the April edition of WBUR’s ongoing polling of support for Boston 2024, 40 percent of the “Boston area” now support the bid. This is an uptick from the appallingly low 36 percent measured in March. The slight rise in support could potentially be attributed to the end of Boston’s historic winter, which left much of the city feeling less than confident about the city’s infrastructure (and thus indignant at the proposal of hosting an international event).

Another possible explanation is the bid’s endorsement of a public vote to decide if Boston will continue to pursue a bid for the 2024 Summer Games. While organizers initially shunned the idea of a referendum, the dwindling support caused a complete change in March, as Boston 2024 reversed its approach.

Despite the increase, support still clearly remains well below anything close to a majority that will be necessary for a successful bid to go forward and potentially win IOC votes.

Of course, it’s worth noting that the poll’s margin of error is 4.9 percent, so it will be even more interesting to see if the upward trend continues in May, or if April’s results are merely an aberration.

Image via Boston 2024