South End

Plans for an upscale steakhouse on Washington Street are back on track now that owner Brian Piccini has found another restaurant willing to sell him its liquor license.

Hollywood East Connection talks to Deborah Gregg, owner of the Polka Dog Bakery, about the newfound fame that comes from being featured in a national TV ad for Target.

Boston Police report a woman was attacked around 4:45 a.m. today at Columbus Avenue and Dartmouth Street.

Police say the woman managed to fend off her attacker, who ran down Columbus toward Clarendon.

Police described the man as slim with a muscular build and possibly in his 20s. He was dressed in a black hoodie with something covering his face and low-slung jeans with plaid boxer shorts. The woman was unable to see his race.

Police say they've stepped up patrols in the area.

An outraged citizen reports from 605 Mass. Ave.:

Street tree vandals have struck again and mostly destroyed a street elm. Needs to have attention and if possible saved or queued to be replaced.

The Mass. Ave. tree killer last struck in February.

BosGuy reports Yakitori Zai could open next week on Shawmut Avenue, serving up yakitori - charcoal-grilled meat on sticks.

MBTA Transit Police report arresting a homeless man on charges he punched and spit in the face of a Silver Line driver who asked him to pay his fare.

Sean Stuart, 43, was arrested shortly after 10 a.m. at Washington Street and Massachusetts Avenue - after being pulled off the driver by several Boston Police officers, Transit Police say.

According to an MBTA Transit Police report:

A fed-up South End resident complains:

Trash everywhere! Worcester Sq and rest of the South End are victims of trash pickers who tear open bags. The Mayor must do something to stop this. My building has been fined twice in the last month for trash violations that are a result of trash pickers. So I pay twice, taxes and fines. Start addressing the real problem. My guess is the trash pickers neither pay taxes, or more importantly, vote.

BosGuy reports Chestnut Hill's Urban Grape goes before the Boston Licensing Board this Wednesday seeking a license to start selling beer and wine in a store at the Bryant Residences, 303 Columbus Ave.

Boston Police report Steven Lovering took a cab to the 7-Eleven store at 55 Berkeley St. in the South End early this morning, then decided to hold the place up even though the cabbie refused to stick around for him.

Richard Beaubien captured a South End scene the other day.

Copyright Richard Beaubien. Tagged as universalhub on Flickr.

The Daily Free Press reports on a meeting last night about Boston University's South End biolab, which one day hopes to ramp up to play around with ebola and other nasty bugs.

Updated 6:10 a.m.

A woman who apparently committed suicide by ingesting sodium azide, a chemical used as an explosive in auto air bags and as a preservative in medical and biology labs, sparked a major incident on Mass. Ave. in the South End last night.

Four police officers and two emergency medical workers who responded to a first-floor apartment at 676 Massachusetts Ave. last night were taken to the nearby Boston Medical Center as a precaution, Brian D'Amico and the Boston Fire Department report. The Fire Department declared a Level 3 hazmat alert, its highest. Firefighters evacuated the apartment building after 11 p.m. as police shut down Mass. Ave. between Washington and Harrison.

The Fire Department reports residents were allowed back in their apartments around 1:45 a.m. after air checks showed the air was safe. The police officers and emergency medical workers turned out to be OK, the department adds.

Last year:
Emergency workers exposed to deadly chemical at Brighton suicide.

The Globe reports (registration required).

Firefighters responded to 33 Union Park around 4 p.m. for a roof fire, which they quickly knocked down, but not before it poured thick black smoke into the air. Fire investigators are now trying to determine the cause; the Boston Fire Department estimated damage at $200,000, said there were no injuries.

Union Park, of course, quickly filled with firetrucks. Photo by Marija Strazdas.

The Turnstile Theater Company's Blogoliloquy, at the Boston Center for the Arts next week, is a play that focuses on "life and people in Boston" as told through the posts on six actual local blogs.

John McLachlan reports this tree turkey whiles away the evenings in a neighbor's yard off Milford Street in the South End.

Copyright John McLachlan. Posted in the Universal Hub pool on Flickr.

The Boston Courant's Mich Cardin reported two weeks ago that developer David Goldman has signed an agreement to purchase the South End rowhouse located at 38 Upton Street, currently owned by the Pine Street Inn (PSI).

According to the Courant (no online edition):

Goldman, who began negotiations with PSI around December, bid on the property, eventually matching the appraisal price of more than $1 million.

38 Upton Street is one of three adjoining buildings originally purchased by Pine Street, back in 2008. The non-profit's plans to turn the properties into transitional housing unleashed the fury of some neighbors, who expressed concern that the development was too big for their bucolic, narrow, one-way street. Pine Street eventually bowed to the pressure and the three-building project was reduced to two, with PSI agreeing to sell the third on the private market.

Some of those same neighbors are still unhappy. According to the Courant, a 2009 written agreement signed by Pine Street and the Union Park Neighborhood Association set out specific deadlines for the sale of the third building; according to it, Pine Street was supposed to immediately begin efforts to sell the property.

The police tape from the murder scene must be all gone, because a concerned citizen only found one thing to complain about in the square - old Christmas wreathes:

I appreciate the wreaths in Blackstone Square for Christmas, but it's now 25 Feb and they are still up. Please remove. Look forward to fresh ones next Christmas.

Sullivan's at Castle Island re-opens this Saturday at 8:30 a.m.

read more at bluemassgroup

Updated Monday, 9 a.m.

Brian D'Amico reports a man was shot around 9:30 p.m. in Blackstone Square.

The man, 21, known to his friends as Humz and Hum Greazy, is Boston's third homicide victim this year and the second Villa Victoria resident to be gunned down since September, when Alex Sierra was murdered.

Tree being stripped.

A concerned citizen reports:

Multiple vandalized young trees along Mass Ave from Tremont St down to Washington St on the Even side. Someone is slowly killing and ripping the bark off of many of the recently planted trees along Mass Ave. some have bark being stripped away on trunks where others have whole branches ripped down. At 524 Mass Ave a strip of bark was ripped off the trunk of this tree last week. I pruned off the hanging strip last weekend but today another strip was ripped off on the same tree (shown in photo).

City officials today marked the case of the font-challenged Appleton Street sign "closed" after DPW workers replaced the sign that was driving one South End resident insane enough to keep filing complaints with the city over the way the initial letter was so much bigger than the rest and how the letters were all crooked.

But is this the last we've heard of the font kvetcher? The new sign is much larger than the Appleton Street sign on the other side of Dartmouth. Cause for concern?

The Boston Licensing Board yesterday deferred action on the proposed Boston Chops on Washington Street because it has no liquor licenses left to hand out.

At a hearing on Wednesday, the attorney for the latest venture by the group responsible for Deuxave in the Back Bay and dbar in Dorchester, said they would likely have to just keep hoping a license frees up, because expensive renovations and soundproofing needed for the space where Banq and Ginger Park failed means they could not also afford the $300,000 or so it would take to buy a liquor license on the open market.

State law limits the number of liquor licenses available in Boston.

The team behind Deuxave in the Back Bay is looking to transform the home of two failed South End restaurants into what their lawyer called "an urban, modern steakhouse concept."