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More lab space proposed for Fort Point
By adamg on Wed, 03/01/2023 - 10:09am
A New York developer that paid $80 million for a slice of Gillette's land in South Boston in 2021 says it will soon file detailed plans for a new building there that will have both lab and retail space, or as it calls it, "a vibrant, inclusive mixed use project that integrates into and complements the Fort Point neighborhood."
In a "letter of intent" filed with the BPDA, Tishman Speyer says it is looking to put a 455,000-square-foot building on its 2.4 acres of land at 232 A St..
The proposal will also include "expansive public realm and open space improvements along Fort Point Channel" on what is now a parking lot, part of which sits atop ramps leading to and from the Ted Williams Tunnel.
The Project’s public realm improvements and ground floor retail space will promote equity and inclusivity along the waterfront with the goal of attracting residents and visitors alike to the Fort Point Channel waterfront.
The company adds it's also "committed to implementing forward-thinking resiliency and sustainability measures throughout the Project," which sits near a waterway that already overspills its banks during storms and on windier King Tide days and where a consultant for the Boston Water and Sewer Commission recently recommended construction of a storm-surge barrier with gates that would rise to protect areas further inland that was once a bay.
The company says there is enough non-tunnel space under the site for a new garage to replace the 125 parking spaces now there.
The planned building is the latest life-sciences proposal for Fort Point. Drugmaker Eli Lilly plans to move into a building at what was once planned as part of GE's headquarters. A developer has proposed a seven-story research building on Channel Center Street. Another developer has BPDA approval to convert a Melcher Street office building into lab space.
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Comments
thank God - more "lab space",
thank God - more "lab space", such vision, really invigorates the city
"ground floor retail space will promote equity and inclusivity along the waterfront"
and ... in PR Land I guess "equity and inclusivity" formally means absolutely nothing now.
The BPDA...
....is awaiting your development plan for the site. You know, the site that has been set for industrial and related uses since the land was filled in in the 1860's.
Put up or clam up.
I'd upvote this twice
If I could.
What the alternative? Well, it's been a parking lot for a while. Lab space are places people work, people working is good for the economy, especially a stone's throw from South Station so they have at least a chance to get there without driving (especially if, you know, Maura can un-Baker-ify the T, although that's a heavy lift!).
In the long run we need to build a lot more housing, and probably in that neighborhood, but so far this site hasn't been proposed for it. If OP wants to put forward a housing proposal, go for it, but then OP would probably vote it down because it was "ugly" or "too dense" or something.
you assume a lot, I work in
you assume a lot, I work in "labs" they are desolate places with, actually, very few people in them
"put up or shut up" what are you, 8?
You Are Obviously Not A Developer
They obviously have a better plan for the site than you do.
You sound miserable.
Perhaps leave your lab job and build all the housing / parks / Trader Joe's and Cat Cafes the market will bear.
If not, put up or clam up.
Others are, you apparently, can't.
I'm happy for the lab space.
I'm happy for the lab space. The fact is, most commercial space downtown is in old, disgusting buildings and not suitable for the kind of work that is fueling this economy. The area near gillette is also beautiful and a prime location, but all it is is an abandoned wind-tunnel in between Southie and the Seaport.
The Equity and Inclusion blurb, I 100 percent agree, is empty chat-bot talk, like telling us this is all going to be carbon neutral and cruelty-free as well as totally organic.
Don't forget the ABCs
Artisanal, bespoke, and curated.
Why are they replacing the
Why are they replacing the parking spaces? This is the city's chance to undo the mistake of having a big surface parking lot.
In other parking annoyances, why is Binford Street resident parking 24/7? Is it for all the South Boston residents living in their cars in the adjacent Gillette lots? Or maybe it's so people living near Castle Island can drive to work.
it makes a lot of sense
highly educated bio-technocrats are almost literally without the substance we would call "consciousness"; it is in them somewhere, but dormant. Very, very dormant and there are a lot of internal and 'cultural' obstacles self-perpetuating its deep sleep.
With the likelihood that the Atlantic Ocean will successfully and determinedly reclaim most of downtown Boston in the coming years, the only thing that it really makes sense for Boston to do (in so far as this depraved, near-sighted capitalist paradigm is not something anyone can constructively shift away from), the ONLY thing it makes sense to do, is let rich stupid people build their stupid shit in the floodplain and charge them a premium to do it. Now are you happy? You ARE happy!
Its real hard to take "lab space"
these days considering that the cost median cost of a 1 bedroom apartment in the city of Boston now is about 2500 dollars.
Keep building that "lab space" and Boston will be a commuter city that no one who makes less than 150k can live in anymore.
That's the logical outcome
When the zoning and permitting processes are designed to allow a bunch of "stakeholders" to demand concessions in exchange for approval (or, at least, agreement to not oppose). When you require projects to set aside units to be sold or rented below-cost, that means the other units have to make up for that subsidy. So less gets built (and Boston is already a high-cost place to build) and the lack of supply keeps the market high.
Developers aren't going to build enough housing because despite all the puffery about a housing crisis, public policy in Boston and Massachusetts in general is not actually intended to facilitate the construction of new housing.
yup
This is where policy needs to step in. We need to make it attractive for developers to build residential over lab.
And boy, you offer some delicious tax breaks, and we'll have our own residential housing boom tomorrow. Corporations love those tax breaks. piggies lining up to be fed.. oink.
I mean I guess this is all good. by 2050, Boston should resemble Venice so all the rich people will be living in their island high rises. While the rest of the peons all have moved to Worcester and Manchester NH because boston got too expensive. The rich get flooded out, and we're saved.
So I guess maybe it works out in the end...