Downtown Crossing

FilenesHole is your place for daily photo updates on construction work at the Filene's Memorial Hole.

Ed. note: I may have had something to do with setting up that account, but Dave Hunt will be taking most of the photos.

Ed Hatfield came upon this scene downtown.

Copyright Ed Hatfield. Posted in the Universal Hub pool on Flickr.

When workers on the Hole restoration project took down the Christo wrapping on the old Burnham building last week, they revealed this plaintive message, still up there after all these years.

Meanwhile, on the back side of the remains of the Burnham buidling, you can see the engineers working on the project to build a 50+ story building on the site have no shortage of fire extinguishers:

Taped off Downtown Crossing intersection. Photo by Stephanie Giunta.

Several streets downtown became a taped-off crime scene tonight after somebody was stabbed at Washington and Hayward streets around 7:30 p.m.

Holey moley.

Kelly photographed workers doing something at the Filene's Memorial Hole this morning.

Lori Magno photographed work this morning to remove the shroud covering the remains of the Filene's building, as part of site preparation to build the new skyscraper atop the Hole.

The Boston Business Journal reports Vornado Realty Trust has washed its hands of the Filene's project, with the help of $45 million from Millennium Partners, which bought its 50% share of the project. Under Millennium Partners' control, the project is actually back underway.

Transit Police report charging Jose Murillo, 27, of Cambridge on charges he stabbed two men at Downtown Crossing on April 10.

Police say Murillo turned himself in yesterday. He was arraigned today in Boston Municipal Court on charges of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon; Judge Annette Forde set bail at $25,000 and ordered Murillo to stay away from his two victims, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

The DA's office provided this account:

The heart of Downtown Crossing at 9:50 a.m. Photo by Gary Waldeck. Note plucky banana vendor in lower right.

Deserted Haymarket. Photo by David Schachner.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Via BPD.The MBTA is closed. Boston residents get emergency robo-calls from police warning them to stay inside. People in Watertown, Waltham, Newton, Belmont, Cambridge also told to "shelter in place." Courts in Cambridge, Brighton, Newton and Waltham are closed. Businesses are urged to not open. Amtrak stopped service to and from Boston.

Also shut this morning: The University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth: "UMass Dartmouth has learned that a person being sought in connection with the Boston Marathon bombing has been identified as a student registered at UMass Dartmouth."

Logan Airport, however, remains open. Also on the job: Cambridge garbage men. Also, their counterparts in Boston. Around 10 a.m., Boston Police let taxis resume service. Dunkin' Donuts, of course, remained open, even in Watertown, because we do have our limits.

The Globe reports that ad agency Arnold Worldwide will "occupy a large chunk" of the skyscraper expected to rise above The Hole.

Transit Police have released photos of the man they say ended an argument on a Red Line platform Wednesday night by stabbing two other men. Police say the stabber reached for his knife on the platform after accosting the victims and other passengers on a southbound Red Line train around 10 p.m.

Police say he's white or Hispanic, in his mid 20s, with a full beard and carrying a black back pack. His victims, one stabbed in the chest, one in the wrist, are expected to survive.

One in the chest, one in the hand, around 10:00 p.m. on the southbound Red Line platform, Mike Moura reports. Red Line trains continued to run, but weren't stopping at Downtown Crossing.

UPDATE: The MBTA reports both victims are expected to survive. The stabber got into an argument with them at the front end of the southbound platform and fled before police arrived.

Through the end of the year, the Globe reports.

The Boston Licensing Board votes tomorrow whether to let the impending Walgreens at School and Washington streets sell sushi and "locally sourced" bakery items, smoothies and coffee around the clock.

The ultra-luxe drug store is also seeking permission for a 42-seat patio overlooking the Irish Famine Memorial, but store attorney Joseph Hanley told the board this morning the chain would shut the patio at 11 p.m., in part to discourage early morning loitering. The chain's initial license request seemed to indicate a desire for a 24-hour patio.

Hanley added that Walgreens might also cut back on fresh overnight sushi if it turns out there's not much call for it.

Hanley said the food-serving license is the last major city approval the new Walgreens needs before it opens. The store will also feature a mezzanine liquor store open until 10 p.m. and a nail salon, in addition to more traditional drugstore fare in the former Borders/Boston Five Cent Savings Bank building.

City officials and the Downtown Boston Business Improvement District all voiced support for the license request.

A Cambridge man was ordered to stay off the T following an incident last week in which he allegedly ran his hands up the thigh of a female Red Line passenger when she closed her eyes, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

According to the DA's office, Transit Police nabbed Bashir Shaikh, 63, of Cambridge, on Monday - on the same afternoon train he had long shared with his alleged victim.

The woman told police she and Shaikh were familiar strangers - she recognized him as a frequent traveler on the train she'd take each afternoon out of Central Square. According to the DA's office, on the afternoon of March 13, she closed her eyes as the train on her trip:

Among the arrested in Boston yesterday: Patrick J. Kelly, 25, of Lowell, charged with assault and battery for an incident around 4:30 p.m. near the fare gates at the Downtown Crossing T station, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

Preliminary information suggests that Kelly was angry at the woman, whom he knew, because she didn't share his desire to drink at a bar after the St. Patrick’s Day parade.

Transit Police report:

Officers were alerted to a female victim who was lying on the ground near the fare gates holding her throat and crying. Officers immediately proceeded in her direction and assisted the victim to her feet. The victim pointed to a male. later identified as Patrick Kelley, 25 of Lowell, and stated to the officers Kelley had just kicked her in the throat. A witness present confirmed the victim's statement. Victim informed the officers she and Kelley had traveled to Boston with the same group and he assaulted her because she was too young to go drinking at a bar after the parade.

Arraignment scheduled for today in Boston Municipal Court. In addition to Kelly, roughly 30 people are scheduled for arraignment in South Boston District Court, mostly on disorderly-conduct charges for incidents along the parade route, the DA's office reports.

Innocent, etc.

Walgreens goes before the Boston Licensing Board on March 27 to serve food 24 hours a day at its impending upscale emporium on the site of the old Borders store at School and Washington streets.

According to its application, Walgreens, which plans sushi and juice bars to go with more traditional drugstore fare, is also seeking permission to operate an outdoor patio 24 hours a day, with 24 seats on its own property and 18 extending onto the city sidewalk in front of the Irish Famine Memorial.

Board hearings begin at 10 a.m. in its eighth-floor hearing room in City Hall.

Downtown Crossing store taped off. Photo by Kim Janey.

Large numbers of Boston cops , state troopers and Secret Service agents swarmed Time Products, 449 Washington St. this afternoon as they arrested the alleged mastermind of a ring dealing in stolen phones and fake cash, credit cards and identities.

The raid came after State Police arrested Shahab "David" Yousheei, 36, of Brighton, on the Common after he allegedly purchased counterfeit money from an undercover trooper, the state Attorney General's office reports:

Yes, he can do that: He's the mayor. The Herald reports Rosemary Sansone of the Downtown Boston Business Improvement District, which wanted to push the vendors out at the end of this month, found this "a great solution;" Herald does not indicate if she had a forced grin as she said this.

The original Boston Five Cent Savings Bank building, along School and Province streets in Downtown Crossing, is decorated with a riot of ancient symbols, from Babylonian winged lions and Roman bucrania to these kissing sea serpents.

Also see:
Municipal bucrania in Hyde Park.

On Washington Street this afternoon.

The Boston Business Journal reports Mayor Menino had nothing good to say today about a downtown business board's decision to boot pushcarts from Downtown Crossing at the end of this month.

"“These guys have been struggling, and now the good days are coming and the association wants to bring in other vendors from elsewhere?" the mayor asked.

The Downtown Boston Business Improvement District, a government-sanctioned group that levies fees on Downtown Crossing businesses for promotional efforts, said last week it was booting the pushcarts for being too declasse and that it was planning a new pushcart effort for next year. The move sparked a petition drive, a Facebook page (and another one) and a Twitter feed.

Steve Himmer suggested the city chose The Pushcart War for the next "one city one story" citywide reading program.

In the new ritzy apartment building under construction across from the Ritz, the Herald reports.

With downtown becoming the latest hot neighborhood, the quasi-public group that oversees Downtown Crossing has decided that the pushcarts that have long lined Washington and Summer streets are declasse and need to be removed immediately, the Globe reports.

The Downtown Boston Business Improvement District, which levies fees on Downtown Crossing merchants for promotional efforts and WalMart-style greeters, has told pushcart operators they have to vacate the area by the end of the month, the Globe says.

Petition to save the pushcarts.

It's a happy ending for the Hayden building, located on Washington Street, on the edge of Chinatown and Downtown Crossing.

The five-story office building, long run-down and in rough shape, has been renovated as four apartments, with retail at street level. Most-recently, the first floor was a bank. In the 1970s, it was an X-rated "peep show" cinema and gay bathhouse.

During its 135-plus year life, the building has been home to "tailors, jewelers, engravers, printers; a dental parlor advertising $6 false teeth and innovative cocaine-free dentistry “without the least particle of pain or danger’’; a uniform company and an employment service; a record shop; an Army-Navy store," according to the Boston Globe.

A re-dedication of the renovated building, built circa 1875 by H.H. Richardson (of Trinity Church fame), was held yesterday. According to the Boston Herald, the developer faces a unique challenge:

The Boston Licensing Board today rejected a request from the owners of the troubled Felt nightclub to restore its liquor license so they can sell it to the proposed operator of a supper club in the Washington Street location.