Roving UHub photographer John McMahon managed to survive a trip down Appleton Street in Cambridge.

Dan Secatore provides an overview of the holiday, which, of course, starts with the Tolling of the Bellhorn.

Update: Food-serving license approved.

The Boston Licensing Board could decide tomorrow whether to grant a food-serving license to a Papa John's franchisee for an outlet at 1501 Dorchester Ave. in Dorchester's Field's Corner.

Under the latest proposal by franchisees Joe and Ralonda Johnson, the outlet would be open between 10 a.m. and midnight Sunday through Thursday and between 10 a.m. and 1 a.m. on Friday and Saturday.

At an unusually spicy hearing today, the proposal by a New Jersey-based franchisee - but with a local manager who went to Burke High School - was met by opposition from a local business group and residents, who say they don't want some national chain with unhealthy food competing with home-grown small businesses in a neighborhood that already has more than enough pizza options. One of the opponents owns a pizza place across the street - and formerly rented the space where the Papa John's would go for a burger joint.

The Johnsons, though, countered that their food is a lot better for you than some of the stuff you can get elsewhere in the neighborhood. "Our opponents sell fried food," Joe Johnson said. "We don't sell anything fried." In fact, he continued, their pizzas are made with "from the vine into the can" sauce with no additives and are baked, not fried.

And he said the "public need" for a Papa John's - down the street from where another franchisee failed with the concept a few years ago - is not just the food but the fact that he, his wife and Tabb are all Black, in a state where Black and Brown restaurant ownership is far below the minority percentage of the population.

"Just as important as what's being sold is who's selling it," he said.

They said their proposed manager, Charles Tabb, is as local as you can get - he grew up in Dorchester, went to school there and still lives there, and will be a part owner. "I'm from the city and I worked so hard to get to where I'm at," Tabb said, adding all the opposition "is kind of heartbreaking to me."

Joe Johnson, who said his company has already poured $500,000 into the Fields Corner location, said that as he and his wife have grown their business to 23 franchises, they have developed a program to educate employees in franchising and to bring some on - such as Tabb, as partners in individual outlets.

However, as their lawyer, Dennis Quilty said, unlike with liquor licenses, food serving licenses do not require any showing of "public need," only that the restaurant will meet certain requirements for food preparation and running a decent operation.

Still Quilty said all the opposition to the proposal was being ginned up by Antonio's Hi-Fi owner Brian Chavez, whom he accused of being out to scuttle a competing pizza option, in part over bitterness of getting kicked out of his BosBurger space for failing to pay his rent.

Chavez, though, said he objects to "mischaracterization and outright lies," although he added, "this is not the forum for what would be a private business dispute."

He said his objection was simply that Fields Corner already has "a saturation of pizza" and Papa John's would have "no emphasis on healthy options." Sure, he admitted, he used to sell burgers out of the space, but his place also had "healthy options" on its menu and even offered fruit.

Ellen Schmarsow, president of Fields Corner Main Street, which advocates for local businesses, opposed the proposed Papa John's. She said the area needs locally owned businesses - and more fresh food - and that the Johnsons "have not been transparent" about their own personal location. "New Jersey does not count" as local, she said.

Board Chairwoman Kathleen Joyce started her questions by asking the Johnsons: "What is your response to the fact there are four other existing pizza places in the same general area?" She continued, however, that her main concern was with parking and congestion outside a place whose owners estimated 70% of their business would be takeout and delivery.

Joe Johnson said that while the outlet would allow third-party deliverers, he said it would concentrate on using its own employees to deliver orders, and that they would have a space in a parking lot out back.

Joyce said "times have changed," because the pandemic made third-party delivery far more common - and said a national chain such as Papa John's might spur even more delivery runs than a locally based outlet. She asked the Johnsons and Quilty to supply a written plan on how they will minimize potential traffic and parking issues - something the board now routinely asks eateries that plan to allow third-party delivery.

He and Quilty said they doubted traffic would be any worse outside the Papa John's than the previous BosBurger.

The City Council voted 12-1 today to ask the state legislature and the governor to let Boston increase the tax rate on commercial properties to higher levels than normally allowed over three years as a way to protect homeowners from potentially large property tax rates.

Only Councilor Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, Downtown) voted against, arguing both that the council was trying to pull a fast one over residents and businesses and that the council knew the problem was coming months ago and should have taken action then.

Under the proposal, which Mayor Wu - who sponsored the latest iteration - has to sign before sending it to Beacon Hill, the city would be allowed to set a commercial tax rate at 181.5% of the residential tax rate next year starting with bills going out in December, compared to the normal 175%. The rate would then decrease back to 175% over the following two years - with $15 million set aside in each three years to help small businesses, with less than 50 employees and $5 million in revenue, along with an increase in their exemptions for "personal property" - such as tables and barber seats.

The problem the measure seeks to address, at least temporarily, is that while residential property continues to show strong increases in values, commercial property, in particular large office buildings downtown, continues to shrink in value, in part because more workers now work at home instead of going downtown to work.

Under the state's taxing regulations - enacted after the passage of Proposition 2 1/2 in 1980, this means that residential owners would have to pick up a larger share of the city's overall spending burden, unless the legislature lets the city increase the commercial rate. At today's meeting, councilors said that even with the increase, owners of many commercial properties may still see an overall tax decrease, just not as much as they would get if the legislature rejects the proposal. Earlier this year, the state House approved a similar request from the city, with a longer time for the rate to shrink, but the state Senate rejected it.

Councilors acknowledged the measure is only a temporary fix, one that could ultimately still see residential property owners see ever growing tax burdens, but said the measure could buy time for home owners to adjust - and for the city to begin looking at ways to decrease its general reliance on property taxes, which currently make up about 71% of the city's revenue, compared to 55% the last time the city got permission to adjust its commercial rates, under the Menino administration.

"It's so important to stress that the 28% increase is still coming, it's just spread out of three years," Councilor John FitzGerald (Dorchester) said. "After this vote, let's not act like we've cleared a major hurdle."

But Councilor Sharon Durkan (Beacon Hill, Back Bay, Fenway and Mission Hill) praised Mayor Wu for finding a way to "cut the Gordian Knot" with a proposal that reduces the potential bite on homeowners while not overburdening office-building owners.

FitzGerald and other councilors vowed to continue to look at ways to diversify the city's revenue stream and, like councilors have routinely done for a couple decades now, warned non-profits they'll be looking at them to pick up their current voluntary payments in lieu of taxes.

"Harvard, BU, Northeastern, all these institutions get a pass," Councilor Julia Mejia (at large) said. "At some point the city's going to have to say you're going to have to pay if you want to do business in the city of Boston."

That was the one point that Mejia - who accused some councilors she did not name of whipping up fear among the elderly and other, poorer residents who have the most to fear from large property-tax increases - and Flynn agreed on.

Flynn said half the property in the city now belongs to non-profits, who don't pay taxes and that something needs to give.

But first, he charged that the council was rushing the vote and that accountability and transparency were more important. "No matter how tight deadlines are, we cannot simply adhere to the value of transparency only when convenient," he said.

Yet at the same time he admonished everybody else on the council of rushing things, he said the council knew things were coming to a head months ago and yet did nothing then to look at tightening city belts. Flynn said councilors in the spring and summer should have been looking at hiring freezes and even cutting spending outright. In July, though, Flynn called for increasing police hiring.

He repeated his call for a blue-ribbon commission to study ways to increase city revenues.

The family that owns Down Home Delivery & Catering at 2 Bowdoin St. in Dorchester's Four Corners has filed plans to replace their building with a seven-story apartment building - with 2,400 square feet of ground-floor space for their restaurant to move back into.

The Webster family's proposed 22-unit building would be one story taller than typical modern Boston apartment buildings because rather than the typical construction of a steel-and-concrete "podium" topped by five floors made of wood beams, the entire structure will be built out of cross-laminated timber, a strong wood product that means fewer carbon emissions than from creating steel and concrete, according to the family's filing with the Boston Planning Department.

The building would have five one-bedroom apartments, ten one-bedroom apartments with dens and seven two-bedroom units. Four of the apartments would be rented as affordable.

The building would also have a roof deck for residents.

The building, which is near the 23 bus route on Washington Street and less than a half mile from other routes and the Four Corners/Geneva Fairmount Line stop, would have no parking.

The filing includes letters of support from the United Neighborhood Association, the Mt. Bowdoin Betterment Association, Four Corners Main Streets, state representatives Chris Worrell and Russell Holmes and state Sen. Nick Collins.

2-8 Bowdoin St. filings and meeting schedule.

And is escorted out.

UNITE HERE Local 26 reports that it has reached a tentative deal with the owner of the Hilton Boston Logan Airport and Hilton Boston Park Plaza and has suspended its picketing outside the two hotels.

If workers vote to ratify the deal, they will return to work at 4 a.m. on Friday, the union says, adding the deal also applies to workers at the DoubleTree Hilton Boston-Cambridge and the Hampton Inn & Homewood Suites Boston Seaport, who walked off the job for three days last month.

The Boston Fire Department reports firefighters responded to 128 Capen St., near Fuller Street in Dorchester, for what turned into a two-alarm fire around 7:15 p.m.

The department reports the fire displaced 15 residents, but that none were injured.

Nick Schmidt moseyed onto the mock-up of a proposed next-gen Green Line trolley, the one that will have multi-segments, on City Hall Plaza today. He reports:

Cautiously optimistic about the new GL cars. Critical new features: 100% low floor, contoured seats, dynamic digital line maps at doors and windows, and no more exterior ads or interior printed ads. Data feeds and digital ads on interior screens.

If you miss it today (it's open until 7), the half-a-trolley will be back on the plaza tomorrow, between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.

In 2022, the MBTA approved an $811-million deal with Spanish train maker CAF, which built the trolleys the T added for the Green Line Extension, for 100 of the new trolleys, which will be 40-feet longer than current Green Line cars.

Interior view, by Schmidt:

A fed-up resident filed a 311 complaint yesterday about a guy who is always playing his bagpipes in Adams-King Playground in Dorchester:

Unknown person playing bag pipes in park in Dorchester. Adams King Playground. Can someone stop him. Plays every night at 5pm.

The city has marked the case closed:

Permits are not required for street performers and musicians as long as no laws are being broken. Noise ordinance is not affected at this time of day.

Yesterday, a thermal inversion meant smoke from fires in Salem and nearby communities stayed close to the ground and came down into the Boston area. The thermal inversion is still there this morning as Nicholas Agri shows in photos from the Cottage Park Yacht Club in Winthrop. He reports the wind was blowing east today, but some folks are still reporting the odor of smoke.

The Boston Fire Department reports firefighters responded to 1049 Hyde Park Ave. in Hyde Park for a fire around 4:10 a.m.

Firefighters had to get one resident out of the house for transport to a local hospital.

The department reports eight residents in total were displaced.

No firefighters were injured.

11 a.m.

Banker & Tradesman reports state environmental officials have given the OK for a $500-million, 700-MW battery-storage facility for energy from offshore wind farms on what is now a series of abandoned oil tanks along the Everett waterfront - the first part of a redevelopment plan by the Davis Cos. that would also include new housing and office space.

The proposed Everett Docklands storage plant, which still requires changes in state energy laws, would be the largest in the Boston area. Another company is seeking to build smaller lithium-ion storage plants in Chelsea and Brighton.

Davis is planning to use roughly 20 of the 86 acres in the former tank farm for construction of the new battery building.

Before construction, Davis will first have to cover those 20 acres with roughly 700,000 cubic yards of fill, in part to raise the level of the site above possible future flooding from rising seas and more intense storms.

The batteries that would then be installed on the site would be able to output up to 700 MW of electricity.

[T]he facility will store excess high-voltage electricity produced when spikes occur at renewable energy generating facilities and at times when demand is lower than the available electricity. Energy stored at the facility will then be released to the grid at times of high demand via an underground transmission cable connected to Eversource Substation. ...

The facility will include two sections, one located north of Beacham Street and the other south of Beacham Street. It will include two open-air substations, both of which will cover an area of approximately 90,000 sf (2.1 acres); a 5,000-sf warehouse building for storage of equipment; an 800-sf office building for personnel operating the facility; battery cells grouped together in containers; power control system units; and inverters. Each section will be surrounded by a 2-ft thick wall ranging in height from 10 feet to 40 feet. The BESS will be linked to the Eversource Substation 250 on Alford Street in Boston via two electrical circuits in a 2,900-ft long underground conduit. The conduit will be constructed under existing streets along a route following Beacham Street, Dexter Street, Robin Street, and Alford Street.

Complete approval letter (6.6M PDF).

As promised in the morning by the National Weather Service, the smelly haze that settled in over the Boston area from brush fires along the North Shore lifted early this afternoon. But when Josh Bittker looked out of his Seaport window this afternoon, he could still see smoke rising from north of the city.

A Boston resident last week sued Pho Pasteur, 682 Washington St.. in Chinatown, for the way a meal there ended last month.

In a negligence suit filed in Suffolk Superior Court, Nathalie Murcia alleges she was finishing up a bowl of pho on Sept. 20 when she asked her server for some "fresh broth to go:"

Defendant's employee(s) failed to properly secure the lid of the soup container.

Defendant's employee served Plaintiff the soup in a container inside a paper bag, without the lid properly or adequately secured to the container holding the soup.

As a result, upon service to Plaintiff, the improperly or inadequately secured lid leaked soup into the paper bag, and caused the bottom of the bag to fall out and spill on Plaintiff's lap causing serious burn injuries.

The complaint alleges Murcia suffered permanent injuries because of the spill. On a cover sheet filed with the complaint, Murcia's attorney says she suffered "2nd & 3rd degree burns on groin and thigh area requiring in-patient stay at burn unit, skin grafting surgery" and that while her final medical costs are to be determined, they will total more than $50,000 - and that that does not begin to account for the pain and suffering, disfigurement, mental anguish and "loss of capacity for the enjoyment of life," she has suffered.

In the complaint, Murcia's attorney, who works for the law firm with billboards advertising that its number is 444-4444, apparently started thinking about the infamous coffee lawsuit, because after discussing pho, the complaint suddenly switches to several allegations about the restaurant's and employees' failure to adequately prepare "coffee" and even the "coffee cup" for handing off to their customer.

The restaurant has until Feb. 24 to respond to her suit.

An annoyed resident filed a 311 complaint at 7:52 a.m. about the striking Park Plaza workers, who now strike up the band, um, buckets and loudspeakers, starting at 7 a.m.:

Strikers outside park plaza are louder than previous week. They used to only stay from approx 7am-7:30am outside the Statler Park side annoying local residents …. today it’s been since 7am and it’s now almost 8am with no end in sight - they are certainly targeting residents in an attempt to get US to do something. This is so unfair, I’m having heart palpitations and anxiety every morning from the noise.

Another adds:

Adding to the multiple 311 reports for the noise disturbances by the union strike. Hope the strikers and Mayor Wu don’t require any services from sleep deprived pilots, doctors, and nurses affected by the constant noise at the Park Plaza/Bay Village. Any feedback on how to address the quality of life issue we have been experiencing all month would be greatly appreciated.

The Boston Public Health Commission responded to one complaint there's nothing they can do, protest protesters should call police. But according to one resident, police are doing nothing, certainly not taking any action like when bucket bangers kept springing up outside the mayor's house:

Protestors are using football stadium band drums and horns so loud you would think they are air raid sirens. The protesters have every right to protest, but the manner by which they are allowed to protest is completely beyond any reasonable allowance. Who has the power to control this? Is it a city judge? PLEASE contact us back so we know how to address this issue with someone who can make a change.

More Park Plaza 311 complaints.