Innovation District

The Globe reports the push comes after Monday's Carson Beach incident:

“They're perfectly suited to do a lot of important jobs in policing," [Commissioner Ed] Davis said of State Police. "They’re not as well suited to doing community policing in the neighborhoods in Boston."

However, Davis doesn't want authority over the Esplanade, also under state control. And the VFW and West Roxbury parkways weren't even mentioned in the article, even though they are lined with houses - and Davis cited domestic disputes along Day Boulevard that BPD gets called on but then can't do anything about as one reason to seek legislative approval for the shift.

The City Council today unanimously approved $12 million in tax breaks over seven years for construction of Vertex's planned $1-billion headquarters and lab space on Fan Pier.

City Councilor Bill Linehan, who represents South Boston and chairs the council's economic-development committee, said the new construction will mean $50 million in tax revenue over the period of the breaks.

Xconomy reports on the FDA giving the nod to Vertex's Incivek, designed to inhibit the liver-destroying virus. Approval means potentially big sales and a move to the South Boston waterfront.

The Boston Business Journal reports that Vertex Pharmaceuticals has signed a 15-year lease for 1.1 million square feet of space in the Innovation District.

Interesting job posting from NPR says it's just set up a "Digital Services team located in Boston's Innovation District" to further bring John Boehner's favorite public radio network into the digital age.

Specifically, the office will work with NPR affiliate stations to help them build in-depth online news sites of the sort WBUR is already running.

My Life List, which lets people post lists of things they want to accomplish, then mark them off, was named winner of the city's Innovation District: Welcome Home Challenge, the mayor's office reports.

The company, which now lists its headquarters in Marina del Rey, CA, but which has an office in Boston, gets to choose either $25,000 in cash or a $50,000 venture investment from VenCorps, which ran the competition. It was selected from among nine finalists, which were chosen in public voting by VenCorps, which will use a similar model for similar entrepreneurial efforts across the country.

The Boston Business Journal reports a five-company clean-technology "minicubator" will be moving from Cambridge to the South Boston waterfront.

The news is not necessarily bad for Cambridge, though: All of the five companies are "pre-revenue" and the reason they're being forced out of Boston's Left Bank is because their landlord is tearing down their building for a new biotech facility.

The Herald reports Cambridge is developing its own benefits package to try to keep Vertex in Cambridge, rather than letting it flee to South Boston - such as municipal "financing incentives."

"Cambridge is ready to go toe-to-toe," the Herald quotes Councilor Leland Cheung. Cheung, you may remember, was the guy who helped organize a Boston/Cambridge summit on ways to work together to develop the regional economy. Hmm, Cheung has youth on his side, but Menino has a few pounds on him, not to mention a lot more bare-knuckles experience.

The Boston Business Journal reports Vertex might just stay in Cambridge, either because the feds don't approve the drug on which its expansion hinges or because they accept a competing offer from Cambridge to move into new space on Binney Street.

The Fort Point Channel Blog details the proposed 184-unit building at 319 A St. Rear.

Karen Cord Taylor finds much to like about the SimCity-like development happening on the 1,000 acres between the Reserved and Fort Point channels, but worries about what isn't being defined in the plans:

So far no plans call for schools, a community health center, post offices, a Y, baseball fields, a soccer pitch, public tennis courts, a skating rink or libraries - public realms as important as green spaces where you sit and enjoy fountains. ...

I got particularly worried when Fan Pier's website touted Morton's Steakhouse and Starbucks Coffee as amenities. Don't we have higher aspirations for our city than eating and buying stuff?

Really? Really. The Boston Business Journal reports one Waterfront landlord had to turn to an expensive wireless service for its high-tech tenants. Verizon refused to wire the area, which is what you'd expect, given its never-ending feud with Innovation District backer Tom Menino. Comcast says it will get around to it one of these days.

BostInnovation reports on a city-sponsored session today that focused on how to build housing in the city's "Innovation District" on the South Boston waterfront that would attract researchers and scientists to live where they work:

... [I]t seems likely that the Innovation District will eventually include buildings designed with very small apartments created in innovative, non-traditional layouts. More than one architect suggested so-called "barbell" style apartments - fat at both ends, with skinny hallways in the middle. These could comfortably house adult roommates, and be laid out as tenants see fit. Many of the developers in the room seemed to like the idea of smaller apartments - provided housing regulations in the city could be relaxed - because densely populated apartment complexes can offset the high costs of developing new buildings.

Other suggestions for residential space layouts focused on shared communal spaces - though many of the designers in the room seemed to feel that shared bathrooms would be a bad idea. ...