Those are all tourist attractions begging tourists to look at them and bring their tourist money. Thanks for reinforcing my case.
South Station Tower | South Station Air Rights | Downtown
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citydweller
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I doubt that any tourist visiting the city would offer a critique of, nice city, but the lack of sexy lighting of the skyline was a big disappointment.
type001
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Exactly. Also, no one is clutching pearls like the original poster wrote.
Exactly. Also, visitors to Boston generally expect revolutionary war sites like Paul Revere's house and the Old North Church, which is fine with white lights, but it would look ridiculous in neon and LED lighting. As the saying goes, know your audience.
Tourism is bad???????
You may want to argue that with Massport, The Boston Tourism Bureau, the MCEC, and every single urban revenue expert alive.
Thank God, we've left the "Banned in Boston" Puritanical mid 20th century. Last week my family did a thorough tour of the BPL AND had a great time on Codzilla. Boston can be more than a dowager's one-note town.
......and, btw, revenue is kinda necessary in the real world.
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Charlie_mta
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Yeah, I don't get the derision of tourism, a major economic element of the city.
And some snazzy lighting of skyscrapers and major landmarks? Why not. This is the 21st century, not the 19th.
type001
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Are you claiming that there is some significant lost revenue in the city because South Station Tower is not lit up?
type001
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What?
Yikes. Not in particular. But a lit up city encourages more dynamic nightlife and energy, A dark city deadens it. It closes doors to revenue opportunities.
To do business, you have to be open for business. No one wants to go down a totally dark street.
If Boston didn’t tend to close down at 9pm (11pm on weekends) there would be more revenue generation. Those hours dark are a lost revenue/business oppportunity. That’s Economics 101. This is why Downtown is hurting and the Seaport is booming, by the way. Last summer I stayed at the Marriott Custom House for a week. This summer it was the Omni Seaport. The difference simply from street lighting and building lighting was stark. Lighting is ONE PART of the solution (along with residential, hotels, theatres, stores, etc).
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I was literally talking about tourists in Boston coming here and expecting to see things Boston is famous for. Please don't twist my words to make an incorrect claim that I said "tourism is bad." Very uncool to do stuff like that. I'm willing to have a conversation with you, but I absolutely do not accept your twisting my words.
That said, tourism is good. And as I said, tourism in Boston is different than tourism in Dubai or Vegas. Jeeze.
Mea culpa. Those first two sentences were wrong on my part. I hate it when people do that, and I fell into it myself.
You and I simply have different opinions on what helps a city appeal more to a wider audience and attract more revenue (with the intent never to lose it's character). And that's ok.
I DO know, however, that the importance of "tourism" to Boston is far more than just the Freedom Trail and the Swan Boats- - I would venture to bet that the City makes loads of revenue from the conventioneers and others coming for non-Revolutionary War sights and sounds and, yes, can indeed compete for some of the Dubai/ Las Vegas market share. The 18th century historical sights are an important PART of the whole. Boston can do better all around (and LED lights are very inexpensive - there's nothing to lose).
Again, my apologies.
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I appreciate that. Thank you.
Yes, we do have a difference of opinion on LED lights on buildings in Boston. The thing we have to lose is far from nothing; it's the visual identity of the city. I think it's cool for newfangled cities like Dubai and such... cities that are building their identities and attempting to create an image of what they are in people's minds, but once you put those lights on the skyline of an older, established city such as Boston that already has a well-established and perennially successful identity in people's minds, it changes the skyline forever. Much as companies do large studies before releasing a new product or ad campaign to determine if their customers will approve or disapprove of them, I'd think about the change to Boston you're recommending in a similar way.
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I don't mind the amount of light atop the skyline as I do the tone. A warm white, slightly yellowish, around 3000 Kelvin is more environmentally friendly and is, in my opinion, more suitable for a New England city. Also, the lighting that promotes late night street activity is on the street level not the skyline, no? The light that causes excessive city glow is at higher levels emanating from windows. Proper windows and proper external lighting help to restore a more natural sky.
To be more precise - I'm not proposing the Disney-esque style of a Vegas/Dubai, but more along the lines of what you are indicating. Better lit streets and ground floor retail/signage etc. with better lit but muted (enough for orienting oneself to location at night - i.e. 'Oh yes, there's the Pru/Back Bay, and there's South Station, and there's MIT Dome/Cambridge....." Sense of place, safety/comfort and ease of orientation is important to the psyche (although we all have GPS today, feeling you KNOW a city is important to the experience).
Another point - - I disagree with SMCYB's view above in post #5,053 of Boston as ONE skyline: "....but once you put those lights on the skyline of an older, established city such as Boston that already has a well-established and perennially successful identity in people's minds, it changes the skyline forever......"
Today, Boston is MANY skylines/neighborhoods. I wouldn't propose the same nighttime lighting for Back Bay Marlborough Street as the Seaport. But I do lean to far more lighting around South Station and the Greenway. I don't see it as a monolithic policy to be had.
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I'm talking about the Disney-esque gaudiness on skyscrapers. I agree with having nice, not-over-the-top lighting on city streets, proper signage on storefronts, safety in public spaces and all that. I just don't want to see spires with neon and LED, Times Square TV screens, and other things of that nature. I like seeing the shapes of the buildings define the skyline in a city like Boston, and part of that is the lit windows at night. I really like that... it gives you a sense of scale, whereas all-glass building all lit up have the opposite effect. I think we're settling on a happy middle ground here.
And "other" skylines such as Assembly Row can do whatever they want. They're far enough away from Boston's main skyline(s) that it won't affect it, IMO.
And "other" skylines such as Assembly Row can do whatever they want. They're far enough away from Boston's main skyline(s) that it won't affect it, IMO.
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I think we can generally agree that while what somewhere like Shenzhen does is too much, Some accent lighting is warranted. In this case, I'm going to say that I oppose the full gamerspec RGB treatment all the time - to the point where I dislike the Cambridge Ziggurat Hyatt's LED strip. What I do like is warm white and yellow, which is how NYC generally does it - most of the time, the Empire State, 1 Vanderbilt, etc feature plain white/yellow accent lighting, which is generally elegant and nice without being brash. Yes, 270 Park has that huge LED display up top, but I don't imagine it'll be on every night, and white lighting will be its default.
Warm white and yellow on the daily should be how we accent light Bostons towers - elegant without being brash, and shows off the new without shouting. Save the full RGB color treatment for the occasional holiday or championship - Red White and Blue on the 4th, Green if the Celtics win the playoffs? Totally fine.
The problem is... once you have the ability to turn it multiple colors, its a little tempting to do it everyday, and that can be a slippery slope. An acquaintance of mine had an insider at 1 vanderbilt - unless it had a planned scheme, they were happy to light it up with colors on request via app. Admittedly an impressive party trick when on a rooftop watching it, but yea.
This is too much:
(While thats a single nightly show, the entire city is like that full time, see here:)
This looks good:
(Since it has 175 park, this must be a render, but still)
Warm white and yellow on the daily should be how we accent light Bostons towers - elegant without being brash, and shows off the new without shouting. Save the full RGB color treatment for the occasional holiday or championship - Red White and Blue on the 4th, Green if the Celtics win the playoffs? Totally fine.
The problem is... once you have the ability to turn it multiple colors, its a little tempting to do it everyday, and that can be a slippery slope. An acquaintance of mine had an insider at 1 vanderbilt - unless it had a planned scheme, they were happy to light it up with colors on request via app. Admittedly an impressive party trick when on a rooftop watching it, but yea.
This is too much:
This looks good:
(Since it has 175 park, this must be a render, but still)
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In that last photo, it's crazy how the Chrysler Building has been eclipsed by NYC's supertalls. It looks tiny. Yet the Chrysler Bldg is more than 250' taller than anything in Boston! I definitely agree though that this warm, white-ish light looks very classy.
I agree. I think New York City generally does it right.
Chrysler counts its stick though, so not exactly apples to apples. Notice that the Hancock's roof goes above the last "normal" floors of Chrysler and into the crown. Chrysler's significant spire ends up being 194' above the Hancock's antenna and 139' above the Pru's. Honestly, a building like this would fit in quite well if the city ever gets a new tallest (not holding my breath).
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It would be hard to go wrong with what is quite possibly the most beautiful skyscraper ever made.