The Residences at Alewife Station | 195-211 Concord Turnpike | Alewife | Cambridge

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tysmith95

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Two six-story residential apartment buildings proposed steps to the Alewife MBTA station. 320 apartments would be constructed across both buildings including studios and 1, 2 and 3-bedrooms. Both buildings' ground floors would contain a total of 200 garaged parking spaces; 42 additional parking spaces would be constructed on site. Resident amenities would include a fitness center, a pool, a yoga studio, resident lounges, a theater room and bicycle storage and maintenance space. Zipcars would be located on site. Two existing buildings on site, the Lanes and Games bowling alley and Cambridge Gateway Inn motel, would be demolished.
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I will always equate this development with the loss of Lanes and Games, making it just sad overall.
 
Are we just pretending Rt 2 is a local street now? This + vox on two are trying to create the world's least likely (and most dangerous) residential avenue.
 
Gameguy326 said:
I will always equate this development with the loss of Lanes and Games, making it just sad overall.
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After years of bowling and boozing and celebrating there--I even partook in the legendary Tuesday Night Trio league there one momentous summer--I threw my first 200 game for the first time there a few weeks back.

Walked from Alewife T station through the delightful wetland conservation path to get there; cut under the new hotel. The handwriting has been on the wall for Lanes and Games for some time as a result of that hotel and much else [that is undeniably positive] aside; it still won't make its pending loss any less mournful.

But hey, it's probably got 1 good year left before it faces the wrecking ball, right?
 
FitchburgLine said:
Are we just pretending Rt 2 is a local street now? This + vox on two are trying to create the world's least likely (and most dangerous) residential avenue.
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Both of these buildings back up onto the Discovery Park and its trail/road system. It's not as dire as it looks.

I'm just going to call this style "Alewife Vernacular". Cheap, lazy, overpriced.
 
I am such a NIMBY on this one. I have no other rational reason to dislike this project other than memories.
 
Equilibria said:
Both of these buildings back up onto the Discovery Park and its trail/road system. It's not as dire as it looks.

I'm just going to call this style "Alewife Vernacular". Cheap, lazy, overpriced.
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Will this be overpriced? I would think building in this location would be for the sake of affordability.
 
Jouhou said:
Will this be overpriced? I would think building in this location would be for the sake of affordability.
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The question is more "How MUCH overpriced will it be in spite of the location?" I somewhat doubt the units facing Route 2 noise are going to be any less expensive than the ones on the other side. And it's still a total no-man's land accessibility-wise because Acorn Park Dr. isn't even close to configured correctly for accepting traffic on either 2-facing end in any sane, safe, or rational way.

I'll also believe it when I see it that this thing isn't massed up right up on top of the "sidewalk" just like the one next door with its death-defying kiss-and-ride driveway that's the only direct vehicle access to a building entrance.



City-level planning in Cambridge can be so frustrating. For everything they get right, there's something WTF? like Acorn Park that they get wrongest and keep digging in wronger on. After a decade living across Danehy Park from Alewife I still don't 'get' what their endgame is for this whole area. Clearly there is one since Alewife's fast on its way to being built out, but damned if I could tell you what pastiche it is they're working towards.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
City-level planning in Cambridge can be so frustrating. For everything they get right, there's something WTF? like Acorn Park that they get wrongest and keep digging in wronger on. After a decade living across Danehy Park from Alewife I still don't 'get' what their endgame is for this whole area. Clearly there is one since Alewife's fast on its way to being built out, but damned if I could tell you what pastiche it is they're working towards.
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That's what you get when you do an area plan and then say "eh... forget it" as soon as developers start shoving tax revenue in your face.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
I'll also believe it when I see it that this thing isn't massed up right up on top of the "sidewalk" just like the one next door with its death-defying kiss-and-ride driveway that's the only direct vehicle access to a building entrance.
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Is that for real? The only vehicular access there is on the one-way stub-end of a highway? What about those who have the misfortune of coming in the 2W direction?
 
Couldn't this building be designed to front Acorn Park Drive and not Route 2? That's how the new AC Hotel right next door is laid out, I believe.
 
JumboBuc said:
Couldn't this building be designed to front Acorn Park Drive and not Route 2? That's how the new AC Hotel right next door is laid out, I believe.
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Probably not. That driveway isn't a public way - the AC Hotel is a part of the development.
 
I don't think Cambridge could have designed the Alewife area any worse. Residents of this and Vox on 2 should not have to go through the congested alewife brook intersection in order to get onto Route 2 west. The Alewife garage area is probably the biggest clusterf$#! Interchange in the state (which is more because of it being a highway dumping onto city streets than the actual design of the intersection). Also there should be some sort of barrier between route 2 and that sidewalk. Route 2 is a limited access highway for god sakes.
 
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tysmith95 said:
I don't think Cambridge could have designed the Alewife area any worse. Residents of this and Vox on 2 should not have to go through the congested alewife brook intersection in order to get onto Route 2 west. Also there should be some sort of barrier between route 2 and that sidewalk. Route 2 is a limited access highway for god sakes.
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I would agree. This is tantamount to living right on route 1. I have always wondered why they felt the need to build this right next to route 2? Couldn't they have set it back say 25-30 feet more?

You're almost on an island of sorts living here - it's a pain in the ass to get onto route 2 west.
 
Shepard said:
Is that for real? The only vehicular access there is on the one-way stub-end of a highway? What about those who have the misfortune of coming in the 2W direction?
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Yes...that is literally it for vehicular access. The building is encircled by a walking path with a gigantic-ass courtyard in back...a courtyard that would've worked splendidly as a grand entrance. But no...there is zero vehicular access whatsoever back there except for a groundskeeping garage that requires jumping the curb to get a truck in there there. Kiss-and-Ride o' Terror is the only way in and out...to the concierge, to the parking garage, for any service vehicles, for handicapped spaces.


It's a truly stunning piece of work. It doesn't take mere incompetence to make a building that inaccessible...it takes work, dedication, and high achievement.
 
Aside from my comments earlier about losing Lanes, I think this is a great area to develop. It is on the edge of the city with no NIMBY opposition, it is a fairly large plot of land - imagine what it would take to find this plot in Kendall or Central Square. It is near the Red Line and a short drive to that shopping center with the Whole Foods, etc., and being right on Route 2, you can easily be out of the city in no time.
 
^yeah I think a lot of us agree. The challenge though is that it's now too dense to be easily drive able, but not well enough planned to be easily walkable easier. It's a bit of a black hole.
 
F-Line to Dudley said:
City-level planning in Cambridge can be so frustrating. For everything they get right, there's something WTF? like Acorn Park that they get wrongest and keep digging in wronger on. After a decade living across Danehy Park from Alewife I still don't 'get' what their endgame is for this whole area. Clearly there is one since Alewife's fast on its way to being built out, but damned if I could tell you what pastiche it is they're working towards.
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Draw a straight line from the extreme northwest edge of the Alewife Brook Reservation there, due east, just 1.2 miles, basically to Matignon High School.

It traverses four municipalities: Belmont, Arlington, Cambridge, Somerville. How much of the perennial challenge of this whole area, as you describe, is attributable to lack of cross-municipal planning cohesion--if not downright bickering/acrimony?
 
^Most likely all of it. If there was a true regional planning council like exists in London, many things in Boston would be very different.
 
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