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Twin towers, new entrance proposed for front of Boston Garden

By adamg on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 8:32am

WBUR reports on plans to finally hide that ugly blank front wall of the Garden with two mixed-use buildings featuring retail space, offices and, of course, 500 luxury apartments and a 200-room hotel.

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Downtown
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Development
North Station
Boston Garden


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Comments

By BostonUrbEx on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 8:47am.

Is the Stop & Shop that was allegedly going in on the ground floor or the floor immediately below ground.

Then again, it's also been said that Stop & Shop was going in at Greenway Center/One Canal, and the most recent news on that project leaves out S&S as well.

*shrug*

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By johnmcboston on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 10:03am.

Globe report said they were in discussions with S&S, but nothing signed yet - so why give S&S free advertising for a space they may walk away from. Then again I have no faith in S&S - weren't they supposed to go into the apartment building being built now on causeway? (never mind the fact that S&S is probably circling the drain anyway, so not sure they should be the grocer of choice to begin with)

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By anon on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 8:50am.

Luxury apartments??? Being built in Boston???

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By Jeff B on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 9:13am.

A good $1.8-2k for a single.

I really wish companies would make smaller, but still nice apartments with the amenities like a gym. There's such a disparity between the luxury apartments being built and the other micro apts. Not much of a middle ground.

Oh, how I would love a $1-1.3k single that isn't total piece of garbage or an hour to get into the city.

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By spin o rama on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 9:54am.

The space has been used as a parking lot since the new stadium opened in the mid-1990s.

Thanks Mr. Jacobs!

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By Stevil on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 9:58am.

Shoulda done something 10 years ago - now he has to go toe to toe with the 2-3 thousand units either under construction or breaking ground this year. Could be another 10-20 years before they really do build this.

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By Cliff on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 10:23am.

If 5k units broke ground this year, there would still be a housing shortage.

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By anon on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 12:45pm.

Why ugly faux precast brick panels instead of something Art Deco like the old Garden?

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By johnmcboston on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 1:00pm.

Hey, make it look like the original North Station, which was torn down to put the eyesore of a Garden there...

http://bit.ly/13t8vSS

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By aldos on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 5:14pm.

this kind of reminds me of the current Rowes Wharf

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By Obligatory link to Shorpy on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 6:30pm.

http://www.shorpy.com/node/6981?size=_original#cap...

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By BostonUrbEx on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 1:14pm.

Because value engineering, cutting corners, money, etc.

Johnmcboston is spot on though; if anything should come back, it is Union Station's glorious facade[s]!

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By anon-a-mouse on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 4:23pm.

building these things. These projects usually barely pencil out thanks to the cost of building with union labor. If you want more impressive architecture, ask our politicians why they insist on making building so unnecessarily expensive.

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By anon on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 6:47pm.

if it costs $x to build a shitty building, $x+y to build a building with nice architecture, and $x+y+z to build a building with nice architecture and well-paid labor, then, yeah, I can see why developers would go for only paying $x+z if they have to pay their workers well.

However, given the opportunity to reduce the costs of labor, why would any corporation choose to put that money into nicer architecture? I would assume they'd just pay $x and put the savings into their pockets.

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By anon-a-mouse on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 11:02pm.

However, they cant lose money on them. If the cost of labor were reduced, trust me...We would see better architecture. Many projects in Boston start out as grand plans and are slowly chipped away at until they work. Materials are cheapened, ornementation removed, etc.

That being said the interaction of many of the projects coming out these days at the street level is so vastly improved over previous decades that I can live with the crappy materials.

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By anon on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 11:40pm.

I'm not sure I agree, though- a lot of the grand buildings of the past were built generally for symbolic reasons... that grand arch of North Union Station was built by a company on the rise that wanted to show its dominance in the city.

This is an in-fill development on a vacant lot that the developer seemed totally fine to let sit vacant for years- the Garden next to it is the big show. It was never going to be a monument.

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By BostonUrbEx on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 10:11pm.

I never meant to imply anything to the contrary.

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By anon-a-mouse on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 11:05pm.

cutting corners, etc. just threw me off.

Its just not financially feasible to replicate the grand architecture of the past. Thats not due to VE or cutting corners, its just reality.

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