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Developer hopes to break ground this fall on complete re-do of Orient Heights housing project

Orient Heights architectural rendering

Architect's rendering.

Trinity Financial this week filed its formal plans with the BRA to replace the 1950s-era, 331-unit Orient Heights housing project with 373 new public-housing units and 42-market rate apartments.

The current apartments would be torn down in phases - the entire project would not be complete until 2024 - starting with a two-year makeover along Waldemar Avenue, and would mix townhouses with some five-story apartment buildings.

Current tenants will be moved to other BHA projects and given first crack at the new units.

Also:

A revised roadway network has been designed to connect Vallar Road at the center of the Project Site to Waldemar Avenue along its northern edge. This new connection will allow pedestrians, bicyclists, and vehicles to circulate freely through the Project Site, forging a connection between the upper and lower areas of the development that is currently missing. Additionally, Faywood Avenue, along the Project Site’s southern edge, will be widened to allow two-way traffic to provide a better connected street grid. The enhanced network of renovated and new streets will provide improved access to and from the new homes and improved circulation for the greater Orient Heights community.

At the heart of the Project, a new public park, tentatively called "Gateway Park," will be programmed for active and passive recreation with multigenerational uses for all residents and the greater neighborhood. The park will include playground equipment for a range of ages. Comfortable seating and gathering spaces will be incorporated to balance active uses while providing a landscaped garden to buffer the park from the adjacent roadways.

From the Trinity filing:

Site map
Orient Heights proposal
Orient Heights proposal
Orient Heights proposal

Orient Heights project notification form (107M PDF).

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Comments

Good luck to those 42 market rate renters.

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There's precedent for this, and it seems to work.

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They appear to look high end, does a unit come with a complimentary BMW.

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After all those years in suspended animation and all, which might explain why you don't realize that pretty much all low-slung apartment buildings look like that these days. It's amazing what you can do with prefab panels.

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You kidding me, the Yuppies scrounging to buy property in Eastie would love pay six figures for an Orient Heights project unit!
Just think they will pay $400k for a 2bedroom Orient heights project unit and renovate the shit out of it and add granite ,hardwood flooring stainless steel , they will throw in a flatscreen, and add a rooftop deck.

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That the city is actually doing something to help poor people.

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when the city started redoing public housing, they started redesigning them with tenant input. There was a whole Globe article about the factors they took into consideration, but one was to reduce the amount of "isolated" internal areas where crime took place: hallways, stairwells, deserted exterior yards. So now projects don't look like sad prisons.

Additionally, other cities are starting to redesign their public housing to look more market-rate. I think it makes it more palatable to the neighborhood when it doesn't stand out as public housing.

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They look satellite free to me which is a start .

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A dropped Civic with a rusted hood comes standard.

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