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Good news for all!
This is great! BC can do some great work to its campus and this will start taking students out of the neighborhood and putting them in university control. We should all feel good about this!
Yeah, I've always wondered about that
I feel like many Brighton residents complain when students rent houses in the neighborhood, yet don't want BC to build any more dorms.
Good to see at least one person sees the ridiculousness of this stance.
-Cosmo
http://cosmocatalano.com
World's Toughest Writer
They might be wishing for option C
"None of the above"
Let's not forget 2000 Comm. Ave.
It's part of BC's plans for housing students and represents an expansion into the neighborhood. Sure, they'll all be contained in one High Rise of Fun, but still.
How does it represent an
How does it represent an "expansion into the neighborhood" for BC to continue developing "plans for housing students" that ensure they'll "all be contained"?
It's an oxymoron.
Because they're not being contained on the existing campus
Instead, BC essentially expanded its campus by buying an apartment building down by Cleveland Circle.
very valid point - i am
very valid point - i am certainly concerned what it will do to foot traffic along comm ave, particularly late at night after the students have been drinking - this could be disruptive to the neighborhood.
nonetheless, i like this better than the alternative. they will put the students in university controlled housing with RA's and patrolled by BC police. it will pull more students out of the neighborhood too.
my hope is that this doesnt represent more expansion, but rather a short term fix until they can get even more dorms on the brighton and main campuses.
also, i would argue the dorm is closer to BC than cleveland circle, but nonetheless, it is in the community
I smell BC propaganda rats
This is great? Really? Any chance some of you are working for Boston College?
NOBODY who lives in Brighton Center is happy about this. It's not just about the housing on Comm. Ave., it's the traffic impact too. Anyone want to guess the impact on parking for 1,000 extra students and a 1,000 seat baseball stadium in YOUR neighborhood? Brighton Center is at near-gridlock during rush hour -- it backs up to Oak Square and Market Street slows to a crawl. Now it will be total gridlock. Hey Menino -- kiss your lock on Brighton goodbye next election. Homeowners will crawl over broken glass to vote for anyone else.
Traffic for collegite baseball?
Really? Your big complaint is traffic for a collegiate baseball field that is now slightly closer to Brighton Center than it was before? College BASEBALL. I love baseball and all, but the BC dinning halls get more people for late night pizza than show up for campus baseball games. We're not talking about putting Fenway on the Archdiocese land.
Nice try
1. Where do the "1000 extra students" come from? Will all them own a car on campus?
2. BC baseball has trouble drawing a hundred fans, let alone a thousand.
I am a homeowner in Brighton Center
And your reasons for not liking this are not my concerns. I am selfishly sad to lose the peace and tranquility of St. John's seminary. Its already been ruined by asshole college students and faculty speeding through to get from Comm Ave to Foster Street.
I couldn't care less about Brighton Center traffic. I want to see MORE cars parked on Foster Street. All of that empty curbline leads to people driving WAY TOO FAST down Foster Street. If there were more (any) cars parked on Foster Street, it would be less of a racetrack and cars would go slower. Crossing Chestnut Hill Avenue is safer.
Anyhow, I am not totally against the plan. I hate the baseball field, would like to see more dorms.
Cleveland Circle is adjacent to the campus
To be fair, Cleveland Circle is adjacent to the back end of the campus. 2000 Commonwealth is right on the reservoir which directly borders the campus. I'd also note that once upon a time (so I'm told), BC owned a whole block of apartment buildings across the street from 2000 Common Ave for student housing. Most have been recoverted back to apartments, with the exception of Greycliff Hall. While admittedly much smaller than 2000, Greycliff was further off campus than 2000 will be before the acquisition of the Archdiocese land.
BU has LOTS of housing off campus
and from my experience they have very few problems because after one party, the BU police and BU can not only throw them out of housing, but penalize them schoolwise too.
And most of these kids will still not have cars.
Drunk BC kids won't live on campus duh
They live off campus so they can get smashed four nights a week.... they're not moving back on campus.
I find it interesting that
I find it interesting that the people near 2000 Comm ave think that BC's presence there should be "temporary" until new dorms can be built at Brighton campus. People near Brighton campus want sports fields, not dorms. Now someone in Brighton center doesn't want Fields because of traffic? And the people in Newton are another story all together. Everyone needs to realize that pushing the problem into other people's backyards solves nothing. I've been following this for a while and I think BC has been more than accommodating to the surrounding neighborhoods considering everything that's involved when looking at the facts:
- BC isn't going anywhere. It's part of the neighborhood. True they could curb expansion, but long term that helps no one.
- Local residents want students on BC property. BC did not have space for dorms on existing property so they bought more. Residents didn't want dorms on the new property. So BC went and bought an existing building nearby - a building that is separated by maybe a dozen houses, a cemetery, and a gas station from it's main campus and a building that would have a police presence and be monitored by the school (an improvement over the fact that students had previously lived there UNSUPERVISED).
- Very few students at BC have cars. Many students are from out of state (so that eliminates frequent parental visits). 1000 people at a baseball game (a long shot to begin with) does not equal 1000 cars and even then it's not a daily event.
-Many other schools in Boston have school owned housing integrated with the community - BU, Northeastern, MIT, Harvard, Wentworth, Emerson, Berklee, all the other schools around Fenway.
Given all that I really don't understand everyone's intense resentment to BC's plans. I guess it's a case of "not in my backyard" - the same type of mentality that prevents other big projects like high speed rail. Or maybe I'm missing something...
what you are missing
... is red Solo cups and broken beer bottles and drunken college kids closer to your bedroom window than you can imagine.
Yes, the building may be supervised, but the surrounding neighborhood is not.
You are right on one point, BC is not going anywhere.
Hey BC PR Hacks - You're not fooling anyone
My - what a large number of Pro-BC Expansion types just "randomly" showed up - when you can't find a single one who actually lives in Brighton. OK - I was mixing numbers - the actual number of students on Comm. Ave is closer to 560. And no, not all of them will mean an extra car. But poo-pooing the impact of traffic from a 1,000 seat stadium just shows you don't live in the neighborhood.
If BC only gets 100 people per game ... then why didn't they propose a 100 or 200 seat stadium? Oooops ... can't answer that can you? This is an extremely small neighborhood by any definition - I'll gladly match any traffic congestion study now with one after the stadium is built to prove my point.
Oh - and the argurment that many other universities have wiped out other neighborhoods by buying all the political support they need to do whatever they want isn't exactly compelling.
Wiped out their neighborhoods?
It does not appear to me that BC wants to tear down any buildings in your neighborhood. I don't think you're going to end up with vacant storefronts and an unfinished hole in the ground, like Allston has to deal with right now.
Yes, BC did tear down buildings in my neighborhood
Three houses, built in the 1870s and 1880s, torn down late last year. Addresses: 188-192-196 Foster Street.
An ugly mess of formerly historic houses.
Who knows if they (BC and/or the Jesuits) will be able to find the money in the current credit markets to build on the site.
So, yes, we already have a Filene's Basement / Columbus Center hole in our neighborhood. Courtesy of BC.
Yeah, right.
What these "Victorian" "formerly historic" houses looked like...
Google Street View of the 3 houses
Yeah, they were real classy places before BC tore them down. And the resulting lot is *just* like DTX. Get over it. I just drove down Foster a week ago. I didn't even notice that there was a spot without houses! That's how much of a horrific mess they've left our neighborhood...yeesh.
You know, you don't even have to go more than about 5 miles to see Harvard's hole in the ground in Allston as a comparison and you're going to whine about these 3 houses being leveled? Get real, man.
What the lots look like now from the same angle
If this is the "hole" to be compared with DTX, etc. then I think we're doing okay. (Pic links to full size version)
Thanks, I was unaware of this.
What is BC planning to build on the site of those houses?
Townhouses for grad students and seminarians
http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/2873/3710/160...
It's the horseshoe of buildings to the right of Foster St with the green courtyard in the center. Looks pretty nice to me.
1000 Seat Stadium
Seriously, you're still on the Stadium? Little league games in the neighborhood probably draw more people than BC games. If that is the lynch-pin of your opposition, you're out of your mind. The might have put up 1,000 seat bleachers because of ACC guidelines or just to be plan for the rare game or event that might need it. It doesn't mean there will constantly be 1,000 people on the roads of Oak Square.
Im not taking sides on this,
Im not taking sides on this, but people do not build 1,000 person stadiums unless they plan on filling it at least a few times a year. IF I were on a board oking the new building your damn sure I would want proof from the athletics dept that they were going to make every attempt to increase attendance at the games at the brand new stadium.
So Im not taking sides, but you cant discount someones concern over 1000 people going to an event at a yet to be built 1000 person stadium that is being proposed during a recession (everything is under scrutiny more now then ever.) I would assume it would have to meet close to capacity at least 4 times a year to justify the expense.
Chill Pill?
I'm not a "a pro-BC PR hack." that came out of the woodwork - I've been registered on this site for over a year. I'm a resident of Brighton. Admittedly I'm also an alumni so yes, I'm bias. But I live here with the rest of you, work a full time job, and pay my taxes (and I don't dump solo cups on your lawn). OK, I rent and don't own my place so I'm not concerned with property value. I'll give owners that much. I wonder, for everyone in the area who complains, how many people don't care or support the school's moves.
Also I fail to see how any of BC's plans is going to result in MORE noise, solo cups, and beer bottles? Kids already fill apartments in 2000 and all around south street. Moving them to one, supervised place can only help the situation. Kids will room hop instead of apartment hop up and down the street.
I also find the Brighton center traffic argument ridiculous. I drive through there every day and the traffic is bad in EVERY direction, not just relative to BC. Adding dorms and fields close to Brighton center isn't going to add any significant volume. Sure an event might cause temporary delays, so what? When there is a funeral at the church on Market street it causes delays. It's annoying and and adds 5 minutes to my commute but I'm not going to have the church shut down over it. You know why they want a 1000 seat stadium? So they gave have maybe half a dozen events there a year (maybe a church service, graduation, little league/high school playoffs, that kind of thing) No one is expecting 1000 people at regular baseball games. They can't even get that for many Men's basketball games in a 7000 seat stadium.
To everyone who is complaining I suggest two things.
1. On a Friday or Saturday night go stand outside one of the large dorms on lower campus like by comm ave, I bet there will be less noise, beer bottles and solo cup around than you imagine especially in the winter. (If they are still there, you might have to wait till fall).
2. Go to a BC baseball game (I think they are still playing) and count how many people are there. Discounting students and children, 1/3 of the people might have drove there.
Regarding a 1, 000-seated/person stadium.
One need only recall and look at the resistance that building a stadium met with down in South Boston when they tried to move the New England Patriot's Stadium down there from Foxboro some years back, to realize why there's opposition to the idea of a stadium nearby.
Regarding a couple orders of magnitude
The proposed facility is about the size of Dilboy Field in Somerville.
The Patriots wanted seating for about 60 times that many people in South Boston, and would have much greater financial pressure to keep the facility full on a regular basis.
Kinda different, dontcha think?
Not too different, really.
Stadiums, no matter what their size, still generate a great deal of noise and traffic, neither of which they need any more of.
actually a stadium might be better for residents
than some field that everyone can use 12 hours of the day, 365 days a year. Some small stadiums are only used for that specific sport. So a BC baseball stadium might only be used 3 months out of the year for probably 10-20 games at the most (including doubleheaders which would knock down the number of days.)
Look what they use the current baseball field for. Only baseball games, softball games (at the other side), football practice (1/2 the time) and parking during football games (which would not happen at the new field).
I just think there could be a way were a BC baseball stadium would be better for residents opposed to a multi-purpose facility or field (like Wentworth, NU and BU have) that are used all the time throuout the year.
Of course, if BC acutally does bring in 1000 people a game, then resident might have some sort of beef.
Also BC could agree not to lease it out for park league or high school games, which residents also dont want half the time. So its not always about "BC", its about anyone playing sports on sports field, including Brighton High School students.
get over yourself brighton
get over yourself brighton ctr guy. i have lived in brighton for 5 years and made the poor choice of moving into a neighborhood infested by students. i'm constantly kept up at night so i am excited that they can be put on campus in a controlled environment.
incidentally, i stumbled upon adam's wonderful blog 3 years ago and have posted numerous times.
tell me, as a brighton ctr guy, how affected are you? brighton ctr is a long way away from all the students i live with on foster street...
BC would be lucky
if they had 10 people at a baseball game. And Im serious about that one.
Here's your label
Anyone who hates this move is a self-interested crank who has no merits to their argument except that "I got mine...and you all can't come within 1 mile of it". They have either lived here all of their life and become engrained against BC and BU on their daily commutes on the B Line or they just bought here and nobody told them they were purchasing land within miles of two huge universities.
Anyone who loves this move by BC is a Jesuit homer and only interested in pushing BC further and further out until it consumes all of Brighton, a third of Allston, and half of Newton where it then abuts BU, Harvard, Brandeis, and Mount Ida and designates a Red Cup Zone surrounding all of its Athletic fields where you can't park unless you're drinking from a Red Cup and there's an event of some kind nearby.
As long as we know these ground rules, let's have at it while solving absolutely nothing.
Go.
Just wanted to add...
that in my experience probably more than 50% of loud parties that get broken up from foster st/Wash are out of college. I lived there for about 5 years after college and it was rowdy and we did cause a lot of trouble. But don't think the ordinary Brighton Townies are precious cupcakes either.
I dunno. Its not fair if people can't sleep at night, but Brighton used to be A LOT worse 15 years ago.
that is ridiculous kaz -
that is ridiculous kaz - only harvard is foolish enough to buy up allston
It's pretty unbelievable that the area's colleges/universities
It's pretty unbelievable and rather disgusting that this area's colleges and universities keep expanding into neighborhoods, building new dorms, baseball fields, etc, for their students when Boston Public School students, for the most part, get such a crappy education, run-down schools, and the fact that so many of them have to live in dangerous, crime-infested neighborhoods, and essentially get nothing.
It wouldn't hurt BC or any other college in this area to put a cap on their annual student enrollment and curb their expansion into neighborhoods.
"It wouldn't hurt"?
Doesn't more students generally mean more tuition income?
Please don't rant about stuff you don't know about
Such as the state of Boston public schools.
Awfully limiting condition
Don't you think?
I think that IM's statement
I think that IM's statement is connecting two things that have nothing to do with each other. If the universities stopped expanding, the Boston public schools would not benefit from that in any way so there is no correlation.
My one thought though is the comment on the state of the Boston Public schools. Now I don't live in Boston AND I do not have kids, nor do I know many people who currently have school aged children (get back to me in 5 years, half my friends are pregnant and live in Boston lol.) That being said I do know one thing about the Boston Public Schools, and that is everyone is obsessed about school placement and where their child will be going in September. I know people who take out deposits in private schools just in case the public school of their choice does not work out. Everyone does their homework to find out which is the best and which is the worst. That says to me there must be something wrong with the system that so many people are spending so much time trying to make sure their kids get into particular schools. If all the schools were in such good shape why would smart educated people all flock to the same ten schools or less?
The peculiar part
Is that it doesn't seem to be the same ten schools. Parents (in my observation as one of those people spending so much time...) is that the ranking varies quite widely. Some schools that are not on my list at all are at the top of the list for other parents. There are really more than ten schools that get this treatment. It seems to me that, at this point, it's a minority of schools that aren't at the top of somebody's list.
As far as all the parents doing their homework, you could see that as a good thing. If most of the parents of BPS kids are involved to that degree (and I don't believe they all are - just a subset of them), it will be reflected in their children's performance at school. In an ideal situation, all the schools would be full of kids whose parents spent time researching and trying to get their kids in there.
here's a question, though, ShadyMilkMan:
The rest of your post not withstanding, what's so wrong with saying that, over the years, the colleges and universities in this area, including BC, have really gone too far and expanded too deeply into many nearby neighborhoods, causing justified concern among lifetime and longtime residents in those neighborhoods? Nothing, as far as I'm concerned, because they have, and expansion into neighborhoods on the part of colleges and universities should/must be curtailed.
Im not saying that the
Im not saying that the argument that the universities may have expanded too far into local communities is wrong... Im saying that there is no correlation between that expansion and any negative effects on the Boston school system. BU building a new dorm does not cause the elementary school next door to lose funds or fail students. I felt the cause and effect were off kilter here.
You have yet to explain
what are the positive benefits that reduced expansion would have other than "I dont want it in my neighborhood"? What are the negatives? You have to look at what your completely irrational statement means from other perspectives...
From a national perspective, what makes boston such a great city? Its the universities, stupid! People come here from all over because there is one of the best concentrations of great institutions of higher learning. While this generates revenue for the school, it also attracts smart people, businesses, and tons of other revenue-generators. It has fostered a diverse business environment in which we are blessed with leaders in technology, finance, medicine, etc. Expansion is one of the ways the schools can remain at the top of the lists...stay competitive in landing the best students.
If you want to start handcuffing the schools, then great. Just create another reason for the best and brightest to look elsewhere. If you want to live in a city where you dont have to share with universities and enjoy all of the economic activity they generate, then move to Detroit. I hear there are no institutional expansion problems there...
Whoh. Scary.
Even if I think Boston is an okay to good city right now, I'm with anon-a-mouse on all the rest of it!
ok, so embellished a little
But its all the same nonetheless.
Anono-mouse,
I tend to agree with the idea that, while the colleges and universities contribute a great deal to this city, and that students make the city safer, the colleges and universities are not in such big trouble as one might believe, but yet I also think that the nearby neighborhoods really should not disintegrate into great big college campuses, because the very fabric and character of the neighborhoods is destroyed in the process. Also, it has gotten so that many of the lifetime/longtime residents of these neighborhoods can no longer afford to live in those areas, because deep expansion into these neighborhoods by the colleges and universities have driven the rents (and property taxes) sky-high.
Also, with the mention on other posts, there's the constant antagonism by many students living off campus of the lifetime/longtime residents by loud all-night parties during all nights of the week, which is also problematic to many of the permanent neighborhood residents. Here's another way (albeit a rather crude way) of putting it: Trample on other people's rights long enough and sooner or later it comes back and bites you in the ass. it's something that many of these kids will invariably end up learning...the hard way.
I
I can see your point
but it is a bit exaggerated. The forcing out of families is not just the schools, but rather the influx of money, high paying jobs and the resultant gentrification. While I dont love gentrification and the things it does to some nighborhoods, the opposite is not the most palatable, either.
There are loud/all night parties in other neighborhoods that are more affordable as well...its just not rich college kids throwing them.
I live right near BC. Trust me, I hate it when my flowers are ripped out and thrown on my car, but I am not about to fault the university, for I believe if it werent there, we would have similar, yet different problems. Maybe it wouldnt be flowers on my car but spraypaint. Cities have crime, nuisances, problems. Its in their nature. Cities are not utopias, there are compromises to be had in exchange for living so close to the urban center.
When one thinks about it, however,
Boston, in a way, has become a victim of its own success. The cost of living here in the Boston area has become so expensive that a substantial percentage of the best and brightest have begun to look elsewhere to work and live.
That will correct itself.
Rents and home prices are comeing back down to reality.
Things seem to go up and down.
If home/property values go down too far, though, it's not a good sign either. There are some parts of the midwest, for example, where, due to loss of jobs, many people have lleft, and a house can be picked up for $50, 000.00. Not a good sign, either.
Back to the subject of the Boston area, however, it's a buyer's market right now, but things can and do change. The economy is still continuing to tank, and lots of people are still being left behind and can't afford their own home(s).
adamg, do you REALLY think I'm that stupid and unaware?
I've got news for you: I'm more aware of things than you and pretty much everyone else here on this blog gives me credit for, especially since I've known many people who were/are either products of the Boston Public School System, or whose kids were/are, who've received a really stinking education. People, including yourselves, who were able to get their kids into any of the better Boston Public Schools got lucky.
then and now
The BPS is very different than what it was twenty years ago. NCLB, the state laws on local aid, and other requirements to improve the infrastructure and curriculum and programs have made a huge difference.
After what my niece and nephew went through, I wouldn't have put my own kids in the Boston schools. If I had babies now, I'd think differently. Ten to fifteen years makes a big difference.
There are some better Boston Public Schools.
However, many, if not most of the "centralized " Boston public schools are still poor to mediocre at best, and all too often, have become dumping grounds for kids who're not academically proficient enough for the better Boston Public Schools, and/or don't go on to get any form of higher education, or who come from families on public assistence. As a result of that, there's often not enough of a tax base coming into those "centralized" Boston Public Schools to pay for improvement of such schools. Many of the more proficient kids attend better schools such as Boston Latin, Latin Academy, and other better schools, or, if families can afford it, they send their kids to private schools or pack up and leave the city altogether. This is not new; it's been going on for ages. All of the above being said, I'd like to see more of the Boston Public Schools be improved, so that more Boston kids can get a decent education.
Will count to ten here
I'm sure you do know people who have graduated from Boston public schools. And I agree that there are some pretty bad schools. And yes, we got really lucky in the lottery.
That having been said, how BC, BU and Harvard expand does not affect my part of the city one whit (well, save for the stupid office building Harvard is putting in across from the Arboretum). Ditto for numerous other parts of the city. As a parent of a kid who is actually in the Boston school system, I'm telling you that BC buying 2000 Comm. Ave. has absolutely zero impact on the quality of the public schools around here. In fact, one could argue that having all these universities around here benefits Boston public schools, both through things such as scholarships (I don't know about BC and Harvard, but BU has scholarships just for Boston residents) and through programs in which they participate in Boston schools.
I don't want to argue for the original claim, but one question
Do these expansions have any implications for property tax revenue?
I have only a vague understanding of how this currently works in Boston, so I'm asking.
If they buy up tax-paying property, sure
But I wonder if the impact of that over the past decade has been mitigated by increases in residential and commercial property values.
There's the whole Payments in Lieu of Taxes issue, which will be an issue in the fall election, and something I'll probably be posting something about later today.
In the case of the "stupid office building,"
The only impact could be positive. That parcel wasn't bringing the city any tax revenue before. It was a sort of abandoned "park" before, a bunch of weeds and piles of dirt. A good place for teenagers to go to smoke dope and people to not pick up their dog poop, that kind of thing.
$35 million dollars later, it'll hold greenhouses, labs, and administrative facilities, with room for 48 researchers and assistants. These are people who would otherwise not be working and perhaps living in our neighborhood.
So that ought to be a plus. Especially if Harvard can flex their muscles and put a freakin' crosswalk across Walter Street.
And as I mentioned above.
I bet that if BC said that Brighton High School could use the field for their home baseball games, residents would oppose that too.
Yeah!
If these schools keep buying up the neighborhoods, the local kids won't have anything good to do with their time and they'll turn to singing songs in the alley in roving gangs while Officer Krupke harasses them! Hey, independentminded, Krup you.
Awwwwwwww.....
Krup you too, Kaz.