Home 'n' hearth
How Beacon Hill can cram as many people in as parts of Manhattan without skyscrapers
By adamg - 1/21/12 - 9:26 pmMike the Mad Biologist riffs on Bostonography's population density maps and ponders how much of Beacon Hill, the Back Bay and the North End approach Manhattan levels of density without anything approaching Manhattan-style building heights:
Boston has two things going for it that most other cities don't have: narrow streets and sidewalks. Not a lot of space is wasted in residential areas. Sidewalks at most are about nine to ten feet wide, and skinnier in other places (e.g., Beacon Hill). The streets typically are very narrow–about ten Mad Biologist paces (my pace length is about average)–if you factor in parked cars, add about four paces. Not only does this making walking around easier, but the real estate is used to house people, not air or cars. That allows much higher densities (although it makes drivers crazy at times) without skyscrapers.
Ed question: Would that also apply in Somerville, still one of the most densely packed cities in America?
The mouse who loved mustard
By adamg - 1/16/12 - 3:54 pmDan Miller reports stumbling onto the lair of the mouse in his house:
While cleaning the basement, we found a rolled-up carpet remnant with several little mustard packs inside, nibbled open and sucked dry.
Our little friend had to climb up on top of a condiment-supply table, carry the pack of mustard with his teeth and scurry to the other side of the basement.
Mega-landlord to smaller landlords: Don't be greedy pigs
By adamg - 1/13/12 - 7:30 amThe Boston Business Journal catches up with Harold Brown, who worries that if landlords take advantage of a tight rental market in Boston and jack rents up too much, they could see a serious effort to bring back rent control.
How early is too early for landlords to ask about lease renewal?
By adamg - 1/12/12 - 6:32 pmNikki Frankel asks on Jan. 12:
Hey, Boston, is anyone else being pressured to renew their September lease already? Seems wicked early to me.
He keeps a bottle of vodka under his bathroom sink
By adamg - 12/7/11 - 8:06 amJohn Ford lists uses for this wonder liquid, including:
11. To cure foot odour, wash your feet with vodka.
Different approaches to mouse control
By adamg - 11/21/11 - 7:55 amAt BU, students freak out and sleep in common areas.
A more mature Doug Haslam uses a different technique: a cat and a small piece of cheese:
We hear noises, and it sounds like a mouse, but I don't want it to be a mouse. I want it to be the fridge, even though that would be much more expensive. Actually, it sounds like a mouse that has gained the ability to use tiny tools, like a saw or nail gun.
People in Allston can never leave their apartments
By adamg - 10/17/11 - 6:19 pmThey like their houses green in JP
By adamg - 9/22/11 - 1:03 pmBuilding Green Boston reports Jamaica Plain is fast becoming a strong niche for green building:
We have 4 active projects in the area and have bid over 10 in the past 6 months.
With photos and details on one house's energy-efficiency retrofit.
They take out the trash - and leave it on bank president's front steps
By adamg - 9/22/11 - 11:15 amMalden Patch reports foreclosure protesters gathered up trash from a foreclosed Malden house they say Bank of America has let go to hell, then took it over to the Beacon Hill home of the president of the bank's Massachusetts division and dumped it there.
Court extends protection of law against stupid evictions to tenants getting evicted before law was passed
By adamg - 9/6/11 - 10:26 amThe Supreme Judicial Court ruled today that a 2010 law aimed at protecting tenants of foreclosed apartments against evictions "without just cause" also applies to tenants who were in the process of being evicted before the law went into effect, but who never left their units.
